Supporting Birth Diversity means… // The SBD® Doula

We here at stillbirthday support birth & bereavement diversity.

Diversity

Embracing our similarities while celebrating our differences.

Birth Diversity

Every mother has a right to her own interpretation of her own experiences.
We are prepared to validate and support to the depths of our well, and for us, this begins with the acknowledgement that birth occurs in any trimester, and it follows through by slowing down, asking questions, and validating the mother and family as we mirror back to them their interpretation so that we can best support them.
We support birth – all birth. This includes:
- uncomplicated, uneventful live birth, and all related birth plans and decisions.
- NICU, adoption, surrogacy, ART, birth trauma, pregnancy and infant loss.
Our experiences of birth and of bereavement are profoundly intimate and personal, and yet they have an irrefutable influence on our family, our community and even our global culture. Supporting Birth Diversity means to hold these truths with reverence.
We provide support prior to, during and after birth in any trimester and in any outcome.
Every bereaved individual has the right and the potential to give birth to healing.

Bereavement Diversity

Supporting bereavement diversity is intricately and intrinsically connected to supporting birth diversity, because of the inclusion of giving birth to healing and mothering our mourning.
Pregnancy and infant loss knows no boundaries. It touches every continent, culture and community. We aim to do the same.
We have an extensive network of support resources for bereaved families as they become pregnant with grief, as they labor toward healing, and as they learn how to parent their mourning by providing it with both the permission and discipline it needs to stay healthy.

“When a woman conceives her true self, a miracle occurs and life around her begins again.”

~Marianne Williamson

Get Involved

Send your photo to: Heidi.Faith@stillbirthday.info, to be added here! Show in your photo what SBD means to you:

Supporting Birth Diversity
Supporting Bereavement Diversity
Stillbirthday Birth & Bereavement Doula
A pregnancy loss is still a birthday
StillBirthDay

Supporting Birth Diversity means…

“…my family is diverse, and, I know the diverse ways that God used to knit our family together.”

~~~~~

“…supporting my birth choices.

These photos were taken while I was 8cm dilated during the homebirth of our youngest son.”

My oldest son (my rainbow baby) is loved and raised by my husband as if he is his own. Our daughters were grafted into our family tree by adoption. Our two younger sons are the fruit of my womb after a successful vasectomy reversal. My two photographs shared here (with photographer credit) represent birth diversity.

~~~~~

“…respecting that alternative families are families.”

The first SBD doula I contacted was open, inquisitive, and supportive. She gave me a wealth of information, resources, knowledge, time and love. She was very upfront that our family wasn’t one she was morally comfortable or familiar with supporting, but she was willing to learn where she could stretch her own boundaries through seeing my needs. She referred us to another doula when the time was right for all of us, but she supported us very well up until then, and she met with us several times afterward, and so did the other doula, who was also great. They both gave my partner and I so much, but it was the support of the first doula that stood out to me the most. She really impacted me, and that impacted my labor and birth. I am very pleased.

{photo source}

~~~

“…honoring that NICU grief is real.”

I had 3 Trisomy babies pass away. Micah passed away in the womb – Sophia lived 23 days – & Angel passed away in the womb. I do not have any images of Angel, unfortunately.

~~~~~

“…the birth of my beloved, deceased son, Arik, at 27 weeks gestation, is still a birth.”

~~~~~

“…including the whole family and never forgetting any child no matter how small.” This is set up in our home so we can all go to it whenever we need to. Elizabeth was stillborn at 7 months gestation and Zeth was stillborn at 23 weeks gestation.

~~~~~

“…my husband can still adopt my baby who was born through miscarriage before we met and married.”