Womb Revolution Blog | Doula in Olympia WA - WOMB REVOLUTION

BIRTH CONTROL DOULAS: CHANGING THE WORLD ONE CYCLE AT THE TIME

10/16/2018

When I introduce myself to people, the question I hear most often is “What’s a birth control doula?” The word doula was used in ancient Greece to mean “servant woman.” The current definition has a closer meaning to “a person who serves women.” Birth control doula is a term coined by Emily Varnam (co-founder of The Fifth Vital Sign). A birth control doula provides emotional and educational support for people as they choose or transition between birth control options.

It’s crucial to have support in our communities, especially surrounding traditionally taboo topics like menstruation, birth control, and sex. In my personal experience and in the stories of the people I have served, we are up against coercion, dismissing of pain, and misinformation. It’s critical that we know our rights, that we know how our bodies work, and that we have the information to make us experts on our own bodies. Everyone is entitled to this.

“It’s critical that we know our rights, that we know how our bodies work, and that we have the information to make us experts on our own bodies. Everyone is entitled to this.”

This is what happens when a fertility app betrays you

9/2/2018

THERE IS A NEED FOR ALTERNATIVE CONTRACEPTIVE METHODS
This is an exciting time to be a menstruator. Many people are choosing to leave behind hormonal birth control and follow a fertility awareness based method instead. There are dozens of new companies popping up to fill a need for natural contraceptives and as a result, new opportunities have arisen for people to take control over their own fertility without medical intervention. But as Spider Man’s Uncle Ben so aptly reminds us “with great power comes great responsibility.” After all, the stakes are pretty high when we are talking about someone’s ability and desire regarding reproduction.

“With great power comes great responsibility.” After all, the stakes are pretty high when we are talking about someone’s ability and desire regarding reproduction.

THESE ARE MY HOURS: A NEW MOVIE ABOUT BIRTH

8/4/2018

These Are My Hours is a new movie about birth, and it's completely different from any other movie about birth that has ever been done.

Although it is technically a documentary, it feels a lot more like a fiction film because it tells a single story of a single mother birthing her child. This movie is not about statistics, evidence-based information or public policies.

Instead, watching These Are My Hours is a lot more like actually being at a birth. And not any birth, but one in which a woman takes matters into her own hands and fearlessly rocks her experience, even though at times it seems impossible to do.

I had the honor to chat with Emily Graham, the subject of this film, who shares with us how she got involved in this project, why it is important for her, and what she hopes for the film to do in our crazy world.

THESE ARE MY HOURS from Peripheral Productions on Vimeo.

M: Tell us, how did you get involved in the birth world?
E: I had my first baby at home almost 10 years ago and I found that after I gave birth I still wanted to read all the books and talk about it and I realized that I was interested in learning about it and working in birth more than just as a mother. So I asked my midwife if I could work with her. Despite me having never trained in anything related to health or birth, she said yes.

“My birth work is all about women finding their truth and expressing their autonomy through their birth experience.”

When my baby was nine months old, I started attending prenatal appointments and births with her. I worked with her for a few years. I had another baby with her and then I moved to South Carolina, where I live now. I studied with Whapio for two years, doing her holistic midwifery program. My plan at the beginning was to become a licensed midwife. But as I got more experience and of course as I trained with Whapio and heard of her philosophy, I decided that I didn't want to be licensed by the state and I didn't want to practice midwifery the way it is in our culture.

4 awesome things I love about charting my menstrual cycles

4/20/2018

-By Michele Drake

I have spent the last few years passionately listening to women talk about their health, and a few trends have become apparent. One of the most startling, but also most common, stories I hear is about people being invalidated by their doctors or healthcare providers (see my blog post about informed consent). This is infuriating for many reasons, but mostly because no one knows your body better than you. You should be your #1 resource in your own healthcare. For me, this means being observant and curious about my own body.

“You should be your #1 resource in your own healthcare. For me, this means being observant and curious about my own body.”

The symptothermal method is a Fertility Awareness Method which requires tracking cycle days, basal body temperature (BBT), and cervical fluid observations. When you learn to observe and record these fertility signs, you will be able to clearly see how long your cycles are, if and when you ovulate, and determine whether or not you are fertile. To clarify, fertility is a measure of health- whether or not you are trying to conceive. Healthy bodies are fertile bodies, so even if you choose not to reproduce, you should still be working toward a healthy, ovulating body.

Below are my top 4 reasons for charting menstrual cycles (and none of them are for conception or contraception).

This is what you deserve to know when choosing birth control

12/9/2017

Guest blog post by Michele Drake.
Are you interested on blogging for Womb Revolution? Contact us!

Disclaimer: This blog post is not intended to dissuade anyone from using hormonal birth control (as each person’s needs are unique), but rather to empower all people to make the best possible decisions they can for themselves.

My name is Michele Drake, and I am a reproductive health educator and advocate. I am particularly focused on female fertility and the menstrual cycle. I also work as a facilitator for an organization called The Fifth Vital Sign whose mission is to empower women with unbiased information about their bodies so that individuals can make the best possible choices about their health.

Photo by Kristen Renee Photography

One of my greatest concerns is a trend that I have observed in the stories that many women have shared with me: a lack of information and explanation that patients receive from their healthcare providers about their bodies, symptoms, medications, and procedures. I’ve heard countless stories of a woman’s pain being normalized, of concerns being mocked, and of women discovering, after the fact, that they truly didn’t understand the potential consequences of the medical intervention they consented to.

I was surprised to learn--at twenty-five-years-old--that my birth control implant works, in part, by suppressing ovulation. This may not seem significant, so let me elaborate. I had been using hormonal birth control for ten years, five of which were with the use of an implant. I am college educated and went to public school in New York State since kindergarten. Why did it take a decade of hormonal contraceptive use before I learned how and why it works? How had I missed this?

The Pride and Shame of Feeding a Baby

8/8/2017

World Breastfeeding Week recently ended and I realized that although breastfeeding has been such an important thing for me as a mother and as a woman, I have never written anything about it in this blog. I don’t know at what point I started to think about it as a controversial topic and preferred to avoid it. The obsession with what "the best" is, can be a dangerous territory and it's hurting us.

FEEDING A BABY CAN BE A STRUGGLE
Some people who are very dear to my heart struggled with breastfeeding, one of them being my own mom. She nursed me for an incredibly painful month and a half and decided to stop when she found me spitting blood from her injured nipples.

She had absolutely no support. There were no lactation consultants she could talk to and her own family was very far away, on the other side of the country. She is, of course, not the only one who has been failed by a system that tells parents breastfeeding is best but gives them no tools to overcome the many challenges they might face.

Does Birth Really Have To Be Painful?

1/24/2017

WHAT HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT BIRTH?

I still remember the first time I heard someone talking about birth in a positive light.
I was living in Mexico City at the time and I went to visit a friend’s country house over the weekend. My friend's sister was there with her kids. She had a very friendly and smart three-year-old son and a sweet little baby girl around 2 months old.

I had just graduated college a few months earlier. Having babies was the last thing in my mind at that point, so I’m not sure how we even got started on the conversation about labor. I think I mentioned something about how painful I imagined birth to be, based on all the stories I have heard. She shook her head gently and told me about her experience. “It was a unique sensation,” she said, “but I wouldn’t call it pain.” She went ahead and told me about giving birth in a big tub of water and how lovely it was. She said she had been so relaxed that she had often fallen asleep in between contractions.

Well, she definitely blew my mind a little bit. First, I didn’t have idea that babies could be born underwater and second, painless birth? You gotta be kidding me!

The Challenge Of Loving Your Changing Pregnant Body

12/7/2016

You know what sucks? Worrying about your appearance all the time.
If you’re a woman, chances are you know exactly what I’m talking about, since statics show that at least 80% (although some say it's as high as 98%) of women feel dissatisfied with the way they look.
Isn’t that insane?
The documentary Embrace (trailer below), goes deep into this struggle for self-love.

This Is How I Overcame Fear And Found Strength In Sisterhood

11/30/2016

I NEVER THOUGHT I WOULD BE THE KIND OF PERSON WHO WOULD JOIN A WOMEN’S CIRCLE

The first time I ever heard about a women’s circle I immediately felt repelled by the idea. I was never a girly-girl. Ever since elementary school I got along better with boys. I spent a good chunk of my life making a huge effort to “not be like other girls.”

Now I realize how much of my life I have spent being confused and tormented by internalized misogyny. I have considered myself a feminist since I first read the definition in the dictionary, but for a long while I associated empowerment with stereotypical male characteristics. I thought if I wanted to be a strong woman I needed to be unsentimental, practical and extremely rational.
I was afraid of being vulnerable.

On top of that, I hated everything and anything that separated men and women. I wanted us to be completely equal. The idea of a women’s circle sounded kind of sexist and I couldn’t imagine myself enjoying it.