What is a Doula?

One of the best things you can do to allow yourself a more positive experience is to become informed about your options during pregnancy and birth, the more informed a women is, the more empowered she feels, therefore able to indulge in her pregnancy and feel those special connections. Understanding what is happening to your body and having people with knowledge and experience to support you, is essential to help you relax and enjoy your experience with confidence.

Throughout history, most women have developed ways in which to feel secure when giving birth. They may have made sure that their own mother was at hand, or a substitute for their mother like a friend or a doula. A professional doula, is someone who is dedicated to providing emotional care, information and skilled practical support during pregnancy and birth and to assist with post natal care.

A doula will be there for you whichever birth method you chose and evidence has shown that due to a greater sense of security, comfort and understanding, medically managed births are less common where a doula is involved.

Feeling in control of your body and having the extra care and support can make a huge difference in how your labour and birth progresses. Encouragement from your Doula should enable you to feel less stressed and more focused, which has been proven to decrease the need to pain relief and shorten labour time by an average of 2 hours. Douling can also:

- Decrease the chance of caesarean section by 50%
- Help fathers participate confidently
- Increase success in breastfeeding

"Mothering the Mother" Klaus, Kennell & Klaus, 1993

The services of a doula vary enormously depending on the needs of the mother and father, not all fathers want to attend the birth of their child and not all mothers want them there either. Some women are lucky enough to have fantastic support during the birth, but can often feel very alone and anxious about caring for their new baby. Postnatal support is also available to help you through the early weeks after the birth of your baby, although not a baby-sitting service a postnatal doula will be happy to look after your baby if you want to sleep, have a bath or simply have some ‘you time’; and they will, of course, help if you are simply not sure about something. Many women keep their birth doula on for a few weeks after the birth of their baby to help them through those first crucial weeks.

For further information please contact me.