“The point is, you’re you. And that’s for keeps.”
— Mary Oliver
I'm an approachable birth doula and coach called to this work to inspire, understanding that my profession is based on purpose. I am practical, curious, and ready to facilitate a positive birth and postpartum experience for you and your family. If you’re a birth professional, I’m here to help make this passion also be of service to you in your life.
I started my professional career as a journalist, educated at University of Minnesota at Duluth, witnessing and researching social issues important to the community. My published series on homelessness, Without A Roof, in the Pottstown Mercury in Pennsylvania, led to the creation of the first ever homeless shelter in the county. I have also served as a journalist for Minnesota Public Radio and KARE11. In all of these positions, I was driven to learn. Learn the hearts of the people whose stories I told. Learn the conditions and systems in which they raised their families. Learn how their lives were either enhanced or diminished by these systems.
As my professional life unfolded, so did my personal life, my family life. Marriage and children. Through my own births, I learned to ask “How can birth be safer, simpler, more enjoyable for families?”
I studied, became certified and started teaching prenatal yoga and childbirth education. Along the way, I built many relationships as an educator and outreach coordinator for Blooma, running their keystone event, Bellyrama for three years. I also founded Birth Doula Centering and Modern Parent Village, both community-care models of douling for families and birth professionals seeking more connection and depth during the birthing time.
Over the last ten years, I have served as a doula for over 500 births and worked at every hospital and independent birth center in the Twin Cities.
Becoming a doula, becoming, more me, has unlocked many beautiful and authentic opportunities in my life. I have been able to draw on the vulnerability and courage of the families I have served, to live a life that feels true and intuitive. It has allowed me to be an independent business woman, to travel and facilitate yoga and self-renewal retreats locally and internationally.
Through all of my professional and personal life experiences, I have been a writer. Hundreds of pocket-sized paper journals are archived in my closets, storage units, bedside tables and bookshelves. I’m always writing, and always have. In the winter of 2022 I self-published my first poetic memoir, “Both and All.”
I live on occupied and unceded Dakota and Anishinaabe land (also knows as Minneapolis, the city with one of the largest birth disparities based on race in the country). I believe and proudly proclaim that Black Lives Matter, Love is Love and that ALL families deserve safety, simplicity and ease. I am a queer woman who uses she/her pronouns and actively and vocally works to be anti-racist and relationship with the BIPOC birth workers who have solutions to reducing birth rate disparities for the black, brown and indigenous birth givers in our community and the United States.
In my work, my intention is to truly work alongside each client, and help them realize they are safe inside their own bodies.