
Birth Work is Family Work
There is a trend for families to want to seek out the help of a Doula or midwife once they learn the news that their family will grow with the arrival of a baby. This is often seen as a fad or a luxury that well to do or upper middle class families have access to. The truth is, it is a return to our roots as human beings and can be one of the most important things that a family can do for their children as they begin their lives.
The work of a Certified Perinatal Educator (Doula and Lactation Educator), is the work of an advocate for families and children. The work of a CPE is not women's work as many stereotypes would like you to believe, it's family work. It is the job of anyone tasked with the responsibility of making sure a child is brought into this world and raised in the safest, most healthy way possible. A CPE is responsible for the advocacy, education and delivering the most mentally, emotionally, and physically comfortable service they can for mothers.
But it doesn't stop there. Often fathers are excluded from the birth procces by not only doctors and medical providers, but friends and family as well because traditional stereotypes have often deemed them only complicit or needed during conception and post partum as a disciplinarian or financial provider. If we acknowledge that it takes a village to raise a child, then we must stop only providing services and support to half that village (women and children) and do better about providing support and acknowledging more of an active role for everyone.