Due to popular demand, Liz Haliday of Private Midwives Ireland and myself are running a bijou birth couples preparation day on the 22nd February. This is an Antenatal preparation course with a difference. We will bring our expertise of attending many hundreds, if not thousands, of births in hospital and home in Ireland to enable you and your partner to be fully prepared for childbirth. in addition, unlike many other childbirth preparation course this course will only have a limited number of participants enabling you (and your partner if they are coming), to ask all the questions that you nee ..read more

Using homeopathy for childbirth will help you prepare for the many emotional and physical symptoms of early and established labour. Homeopathic remedies and knowing how to use them are an extremely helpful addition to any birth bag, whether you are going to have your baby in hospital or at home and whether you are planning a normal birth without interventions, a birth with pharmacological pain relief or a caesarean birth. To book click here. How can homeopathy help in childbirth? Homeopathy helps with the many emotional symptoms of labour, such as anxiety, fear and the feeling of being ov ..read more

Perinatal and Infant  Mental Health in Ireland Guest blog by Barbara Western Perinatal and Infant  Mental Health in Ireland attracts a growing body of research. It is wonderful to see the attention moving towards infants and young children, a cohort who until the last 20 years, or so, have been seen as having little to no agency or as ‘tabula rasa’ – blank slates upon whom adults can impart knowledge and the proper way to conduct oneself. Sometimes, however, the focus can get skewed and researchers can often neglect that the individuals who are conceiving, carrying and birthing these ..read more

This weekend I got to attend a great Spinning Babies Workshop given by Spinning Baby trainer Jennifer Walker. It was a wonderful inspiring session and I would recommend it or similar to any doula. In conservative antenatal education we are all taught to focus on the cervix as a measure of progress and change in labour. As doulas we know that the cervix is simply a symptom of the work of the fundus and all the surrounding ligaments, soft tissues and muscles and we rarely consider dilation in supporting a woman ‘s prgression in labour. Instead we look at the depth the intensity and the woman’s s ..read more

Mothering our mothers I was with a few women the other day and one of the topics that came up was the difficulty in coping with the gradual realisation that our own mothers may be unwell with a poor or uncertain  prognosis. What does that mean for us as mothers in our own right, trying to care for our very young families and trying to be there for our mothers physically emotionally and spiritually? It means feeling over stretched, and can be especially intense when we are pregnant, And the very fact that it is our mother and not another relative makes it somehow more intense. The small d ..read more

Poem: A Mother’s Love, Author Unknown A mothers Love; Unknown Poem   The post A mother’s love appeared first on DUBLIN DOULA SERVICES ..read more

Top  10 things I learnt at the Essence of Midwifery Conference It was great to be invited to several events over this week in support of all the wonderful midwives who work so hard to support women during their journey to pregnancy birth and beyond in Ireland. The big day was the Essence of Midwifery conference at The Coombe. As usual they put on a great show and there were some great speakers and posters with the focus being on caesarean section and choice within it. Maternity Strategy 2016 1. That the maternity strategy has been launched a 100 days and nothing has yet been implemen ..read more

Minister of Health Leo Varadkar Today, January 27th 2016, the Minister for Health Mr Leo Varadkar launched Ireland’s first Maternity Strategy. This is a big first for the country, as until now maternity service have developed in an ad hoc basis without any overall direction or unified goals. This has resulted in a “geographic lottery” in terms of women’s choices and developments with some parts of the country offering midwifery led care, birth pools, home birth services, open doula policies, anomaly scans, early transfer home, DOMINO care and other parts of the country offering nothing beyond ..read more

Tonight, the 31st January is Bridget’s eve. It is rumoured that the goddess Bridget will gift the land of Erin with her blessing. As she wanders over the land, offering her fertility and the energy to birth a new Spring, her cloak will touch the fields, the trees, the water, the forests, the rushes and the grass. Everything it touches will be blessed and in the early morning we see evidence of that blessing in the form Bridget s Day dew. This is the three faces of Bridget in a sculpture in the ground in Bridget s Garden in Roscahill Co Galway The goddess Bridget has three faces; the face of th ..read more

Due to popular demand, Liz Haliday of Private Midwives Ireland and myself are running a bijou birth couples preparation day on the 22nd February. This is an Antenatal preparation course with a difference. We will bring our expertise of attending many hundreds, if not thousands, of births in hospital and home in Ireland to enable you and your partner to be fully prepared for childbirth. in addition, unlike many other childbirth preparation course this course will only have a limited number of participants enabling you (and your partner if they are coming), to ask all the questions that you nee ..read more