Growing up in a small rural community my environment was heavily influenced by the Amish and I was raised believing that women were created to give life and birth was a natural and normal event. All the women I knew growing up gave birth naturally, with no epidurals, mostly at home, and without fear. I was surrounded by pregnant women, breastfeeding moms, and women sharing their birth stories so I believed that birth was beautiful and amazing. When I left that small town in Missouri and started to interact with women giving birth in the standard medical system I was shocked at the stories I heard and the self doubt that most women are filled with surrounding birth. I don’t even know when the deep knowing that one day I would be a midwife crept into my brain began but I KNEW and I still know. Women are made to give life and to be supported by other women cheering them on in the process helping them to believe in themselves when their own thoughts tell them otherwise, helping them stand when they are too weak and getting them through one surge at a time. This is the passion that drives me in birth work. I BELIEVE that birth is beautiful, transformative, and most of all, that it is something every woman should be able to do in her power - this is HER story and I am just there to champion her through the process. I studied under Lindsey Meehlis CPM for my Doula training and under Valentina Caputo IBCLC for my Infant and Maternal Care Specialist training but the years of growing up around natural birth and infants are also a huge part of what I bring to you and your family during this time. I am continuing to go on and study Midwifery as this is my life long passion but would love to support you as a doula until that transition.