My Life

Denise ~ That is such a wonderful opportunity!! Someday I would love to work with teen Moms. I've looked into working with Crisis Pregnancy Outreach (a doula friend of mine works with them) but they aren't in need of doulas.

So the low-down about being a doula.....

You need to take some kind of training. A doula doesn't need to be certified (unless Margaret Hudson requires that their doulas be certified) but training is necessary, IMO. That can be attending a training, doing a distance course, or a doula apprenticship. If you learn best by sitting through a workshop, you don't want a distance course. If you have someone you can learn under and get hands-on training at the same time, then a distance course is a good option (not to mention you don't have to travel to get to a training).

Here are the major training/certifying organizations:
CAPPA - Childbirth and Postpartum Professionals Association. This is who I am trained and have my childbirth educator certification through. I am also the state representative. They offer a distance training.

DONA - Doulas of North America. This is the most well-known. MANY ladies get trained and/or certified with DONA. They have a lot of name recognition. Good program but I do have a few beefs with their certification process.

CBI - Childbirth International. This one is strictly distance training. I've heard great things about it!

ALACE - Association of Labor Assistance and Childbirth Educators. I haven't been able to get their site working lately. Tiffany got her doula training and childbirth education stuff through this program.

OPS - Ontario Perinatal Services. I just learned about this one yesterday. I have no idea about prices (someone thought the doula course was $300 and some of the other ones were $50) or what credentials you receive after you are certified.

There aren't any programs for doing an apprentice-type thing. That would just be a matter of finding someone to go to births with and learning from them.

Basically your training will involve reading (a lot of ladies start this before beginning a training/certification program to get it out of the way), attending births, writing a paper or two, observing a childbirth class, a breastfeeding class, and maybe a newborn care class. And if you choose to certify, pass a test. Each organization has different requirements, numbers of births, etc.

If you choose not to certify you still need to stay within the standards of practice for doulas. This includes not doing anything clinical (taking blood pressure, monitoring fetal heart tones, palpating baby's position, vaginal exams, etc). Labor support that provides those services is called Montrice care.

The actual work of a doula is quite hard but so rewarding!!

You need to be able to leave your family for an unknown amount of time when you get the phone call that your client is in labor.

You must provide unbiased, evidence-based information to your clients.

You MUST provide continual support...which means you may not pee for several hours, you may not eat for several hours, you are on your feet a lot, you use muscles you didn't know you had (LOL), you don't get to take a nap, when Mama is in labor (even if she gets an epidural) you do not leave the hospital (the only exception would be if she is in veeeeeeeery early labor...just tell her that you're going to go home to rest and to call you when things start picking up), etc.

Any other questions??? :)