1. Because it all starts in your mum’s belly. If you can get a great start there, mum has a positive birth experience and you can be born gently, both of you can start out on your adventure tgether in tip top form.
2. Because an optimal start, physically, emotionally and spiritually will pay life-long dividends.
3. Because a mother supported to nurture and feed her child as she feels she needs to will have a deep fulfilment from parenting and her child will be ‘securely attached’.
4. Because ‘securely attached’ babies and children tend to be well-balanced, independent, successful adults.
5. Because sane, well-balanced adults tend to make great parents.
6 And great parents change the world!
To all those great parents reading this: Great Parents don’t operate in isolation. We need each other. Mums need mums. We need a village of friends and neighbours around us. Doulas are those friends and neighbours who aren’t too busy or too far away to come round and share a cup of tea and proffer a hankie and a shoulder.
As the ‘global village’ seems to get smaller and smaller, for many of us, our friends and family seems to be getting further and further away, causing undue suffering and isolation for new mothers.
So No. 7? It takes a village to birth and raise a child.
And here’s a recent addition to the evidence around attachment parenting:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100921163709.htm
Maddie… gosh but it’s hard to define why I do what I do.
I’ve been termed a career Doula in my time, but what a career! I can’t imagine doing anything else. Seeing new life come into the world… does it get better? Supporting a new family as they take those first tenative steps in a new life… Leaving well fed clients in my wake, happy feeding babies, smiling, rested mums. What can I say?
I love people. I truly just love people and if what I do makes things a little easier and happier… then that’s what I’ll do.
I want to be part of the Village!
Mars xxx