A Day in the Life of a Doula: part 3

Charlotte’s day continues…

During the labour, a birth doula is there to provide continuous emotional and physical support for you. There are no shift changes for a doula - they will be there for as long as you need them! Charlotte (and Sarah, our birth doulas), can spend 5, 10 or 48hours at each birth, depending on when baby arrives.

And the support doesn’t just stop then. It is part of our packages to include anytime after the birth until which the new family feel ready to be on their own. Again, this may be until they leave the place of birth, for a few hours after arriving home, or for continued support, we also have postnatal doula packages for support after birth, with baby.

What difference can a doula make?

Research has shown that having a birth doula can:

• shorten the labour of a first time mother by an average of 2 hours

• reduce the need for a Caesarean by 50%

• reduce the use of forceps by 40%

• decrease the need for pain relief

• help new fathers to participate with confidence

• increase rates of breastfeeding success

Ref: Mothering the Mother by Klaus, Kennell and Klaus 1993

Wonderful local knitters have made lots of newborn hats

We believe that the role of a postnatal doula is to enable and empower women to fulfill their role as a mother by giving support and encouragement in the early weeks of parenting.

Between us, we bring a wealth of personal and professional experience to the support we offer to new mums. We passionately believe that women have an innate understanding of and connection with their baby, though they may not always recognise it themselves. Our aim is to help women to trust their mothering instincts and feel confident in their ability to parent as they want to.

In Chalrotte’s case, this family requested Placenta products as part of mama’s post-birth recovery. Sarah and Charlotte coordinate with this so that Sarah gets the placenta in tip-top condition to be encapsulated.

Placenta encapsulation- another Birth Baby Balance service

While we have our packages to provide support to families, we are more than prepared to be flexible as life with baby can take you by surprise. It is not unusual for families to call for more support beyond their initial requests as they realise the benefit to have a rested and well-looked after mama and baby.

Sometimes it can be a call for added support once partners return to work and mama needs some reassurance and help for the first little while.

Whatever your need, as with all our doula clients, we aim to help as much as we can, to ensure new families have the best start to life together.