The end of March marked World Doula Week 2024, and it reminded me of how important doula care can be in making the fourth trimester a positive experience for new parents. A doula is someone who mothers the mother, whether it’s during the labor and delivery process or during the fourth trimester, when she offers…
This is an excerpt from my book – Life After Birth: A Parent’s Holistic Guide for Thriving in the Fourth Trimester now in press. It’s a bit long for a blog and I hope you enjoy it. If you do, please share your comments below. Postpartum W.E.L.L.N.E.S.S. Plan © Diane S Speier, PhD At the start of…
I recently received an email about dealing with disappointment, which often happens as the result of unmet expectations we have about how things should be or turn out. We can feel a range of emotions when we feel let down, by ourselves or by others. It’s a tough feeling to experience but it’s a natural…
Lately I’ve been thinking about my work as a doula and how important it is to support a woman making the transition to parenthood; it’s a time of unique vulnerability for a new mother who is moving through uncharted territory while also responsible for the needs of an even more vulnerable newborn person, 24/7. A new mother…
Reflections on breastfeeding. These days more and more women are choosing to breastfeed, sometimes under pressure to do the right thing, but often for the pleasure and benefits that it provides. The vast majority of women born during the baby boom generation were not breastfed. This generation of women, including me, didn’t have the personal…
What is the distinction? I believe that one of the difficulties that women experience during breastfeeding is the pull between cultural femininity and biological femininity. This distinction was first brought to my attention in Karen Pryor’s book, Nursing Your Baby (which I believe is out of print now). Cultural femininity is comprised of many stereotypes…
Childbirth Education. Over the years as a certified childbirth educator I have had the privilege of teaching about childbirth and how to give birth in an informed, empowered and confident way. I taught classes for twenty years, first as a Bradley Method® teacher, and then I created a methodology that synthesized and incorporated the best of what I…
In the days when I was working as a childbirth educator, I always discussed with my clients the value of asking questions of clarification from healthcare providers. Though these questions were related to being pregnant and giving birth, they are questions that will serve you in life no matter what health or medical situation you…
Happy Mother’s Day! Every so often the date of my fourth child’s birth falls on Mother’s Day, and this year is one of them! He was born on May 10th, 1988. This is the last installment of my children’s birth stories that I’ve blogged about. We thought we were finished having children after the birth…
As the mother of two sons, when the time came that we were planning to expand our family, I wanted a daughter to add to the group. Back then (35 years ago) I was reading about sex selection, and spent a good deal of time in the UCLA Biomedical library reading up on the latest…
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