Caesarean Birth Doula

Hands up- I confess! One of my pet hates is the notion that doulas only support "the types of people who want to breathe their baby out". 

I'm here to support you- whoever you are, whatever baggage you come with, in whatever choices you make. There should be no hierarchy in birth. Some of the most powerful, beautiful and healing birth experiences I've come across have been belly births. You know what's right for you better than anyone else, after all. 

I encourage all my clients to have a plan for and an understanding of emergency caesarean regardless of the other preparations for birth that they make, as I have seen how this significantly mitigates against emotional trauma from such a procedure if it is necessary. 

However, if you know off the bat that you are going to have a caesarean birth, this might be the package for you. If, along the course of your antenatal care it happens that you choose to opt for a planned caesarean, we would divert our preparation, postnatal sessions and care to make sure you are supported fully in the path to birthing your baby abdominally and optimising your recovery thereafter. 

We would cover elements of caesarean birth in more detail such as understanding the surgery, emotional support to help you have a beautiful birthing experience, affirmations for caesarean birth, creating a personalised birth plan, preparing in the antenatal period, supporting your babies microbiome, common challenges specific to newborns born abdominally,  a unique approach to postpartum recovery and planning for parents after c-birth etc.

We will discuss whether you want my support to advocate for my attendance at your birth. If your choice is that I do not attend your birth, I offer additional overnight support at the hospital for your first night. If you do not require a period of on-call support before your baby is born, I offer one additional postnatal visit afterwards in lieu.  

The pricing and other elements of this package are identical to those for people planning other modes of birth (3 antenatal sessions, a few exercises to do outside of our in person sessions, virtual support antenatally and until 6 weeks postpartum etc). As with all my care I offer sliding scale pricing at 3 price points in order to make my care as accessible as possible.