Lately, the work that has been inspiring me most is postpartum bodywork. And it makes me want to shout from the rooftops just how essential nurturing touch is for the new mother or birthing person after birth. Birth, however long or short, whether vaginal or by belly, takes you OUT there! It is a massive expansion, and on the other side, the demand for attention outside of your own body and center, on your newborn, is nearly constant. Postpartum bodywork calls you back home.

Tell me your deepest wounds and I’ll tell you your deepest gifts. In recent years, I came to know this notion to some extent through the realization that my life path of supporting mothers could be traced back to my own birth and the absence of support my mother received. Without even knowing it, I was fulfilling a mission that was born with my own arrival earthside. More recently, I experienced a deep healing that revealed even more to me. In a combined IFS therapy and breat

One of the core principles underlying Comforting Touch for Birth is learning how to take good care of our client’s (or partner’s) nervous system. When I was first developing the curriculum for these classes, I was reflecting on my understanding of what makes touch feel good for my clients. What is the je ne sais quoi of Comforting Touch? One of the things I noted was the significance of communicating when a given stroke has come to completion. Meaning, rather than abruptly re

I’ve been feeling a bit haunted by a recent post I shared of the “Your Body Is Powerful” card on Instagram. Not because it isn’t true, or because the reminder isn’t something deeply welcome during pregnancy and labor, but because, like all the cards, it isn’t the full picture. Sometimes these words can feel painfully untrue. A client, like others before her, recently emerged from the birth of her child feeling traumatized. A birth that had the potential to leave her with a pr

If you read my most recent posts, you know that my own grasp of the potency of the Wisdom of Birth deck has expanded and transformed since using her more and more in practice. The original and still lasting intention is for this deck to be used during pregnancy to offer guidance and insight to support people in feeling well prepared for all that birth is and can be. I envision an expectant mother flipping through the deck and guidebook being drawn to imagery and prompts t

I remember the moment I realized our Wisdom of Birth Oracle & Tarot deck was an invitation into something even deeper and beyond what I'd originally even imagined. I was working with a client who's baby was breech. She was about 33 weeks pregnant, though this pregnancy was by far the longest lasting pregnancy after multiple miscarriages. She had one living, first child, born via cesarean, and she was planning this birth at home. When she sat down to pull a card from one of

As many of you already know the inspiration for our Wisdom of Birth Oracle & Tarot deck came through a desire to make the guidance and support of a doula available to all expectant mothers and parents-to-be. To offer pregnant individuals a window into the the kinds of support they might wish for while literally giving birth. Over time it morphed into something inclusive of that original intention but also far beyond it. Case in point, my experience over the past 2 weeks lea

This is where it all began. When I was invited to attend the birth of my friend Yael’s first child (pictured here), back in 2001. She was the kind of person who loved to be touched all labor long. My hand was still cupping her sacrum when this photo was taken. Fast forward to the second birth I attended, where my friend literally could not tolerate a hand on her body. These were perfect early doula experiences, demonstrating the range that touch can play in the realm of bir

Last week I collaborated with a fellow practitioner to create content geared toward supporting postpartum recovery for new mothers and parents. I’ll be excited to share the final offering with you when it’s ready. In the meanwhile I thought I’d share some of the highlights from our work, so those of you either entering or supporting those entering the postpartum time now can already start considering these ideas for your immediate benefit. My contribution to the project lar

One of the cards in our forthcoming Wisdom of Birth deck offers the prompt "Birth is Messy". If you're familiar with Tarot, this is our "Tower" card. We loved it so much that we turned the art into a candle so this reminder, that birth is messy, would be even more readily available. A sample of this candle has been sitting on the shelf of my desk, and boy has having that prompt in eyeshot on a regular basis been helpful in recent weeks. Both in the process of dealing with