My experience with Tami Mor as my doula made my second pregnancy and delivery the best experience of my life. Her dedication, love, and support ensured that I received exactly the type of delivery experience for my daughter that I had been praying for.
After the birth of my son four years ago, I felt like there had to be a way to give more support to woman during pregnancy, labor, and delivery than the hospital allowed me to experience with him.
Three years went by before my husband and I decided we wanted to expand our family. In that three years, I had furthered my education and began working as a breastfeeding counselor in the Maternal Child Health department at the Public Health Office so I knew exactly what I wanted and did not want from a hospital delivery experience. I also knew a doula would help ensure I would have a blissful experience the second time around.
I met Tami when I was twenty weeks pregnant. I had been researching local doulas and Tami has a wonderful reputation in the community for helping women have supported births so I e-mailed her to set up a meeting. At the time, she was teaching a prenatal yoga and birthing education class. I made arrangements to attend the class so I could meet her and see how she “worked”. It was amazing! The class was so informative, as well as enjoyable and Tami has one of the most smoothing and relaxing voices I have ever heard. I was immediately intrigued by her spirit and impressed with her knowledge. After class, we spoke and set up our first doula meeting.
I continued to attend her prenatal yoga class and met with her every other week to begin with. It was wonderful. Tami connected with my thoughts and desires for the most natural labor and birth experience I so badly desired to have. She believed in me and my ability to make my labor and delivery desires happen. She visited the hospital with me and always made our meeting relative to the stage of pregnancy I was in. When I was about twenty-eight weeks along, we began meeting weekly. Our meetings consisted of talking about many different pregnancy and birthing topics including but not limited too, fears, wants, spirituality, how to express my needs and wants to hospital staff, how to connect to my growing baby, and always preparing my body with stretching and yoga techniques. She went above and beyond to get to know my whole family to make sure all of our needs were met. It was wonderful! Tami helped me enjoy my pregnancy and look forward to my daughter’s birth. Tami always ended our sessions with a relaxation session and towards the end of my pregnancy, focused on keeping me stress free with relaxing massage. I always left her studio in the best mood, feeling amazing physically and mentally.
Finally, my baby girl decided to make her appearance. My water broke at home at five o’clock in the afternoon. I was so excited! Getting to experience my water breaking was thrilling. I proceeded from there pretty slowly, only having a contraction about every 15-20 minutes and no pain. I went ahead and called Tami so she could begin to prepare to join me. We made our plans and I proceeded to continue to labor at home- my goal was to labor at home as long as possible. Around eight o’clock, Tami called to see how I was doing and wanted to come join me. I was still having no pain and my contractions were still only every 10-15 minutes. Tami prepared to come and give me a massage to help me calm down, relax and get things moving.
It worked! By 9:15pm my contraction were only a couple minutes apart and were getting painful. Tami eased my pain using massage, oils, and lavender like we had practiced many times in our sessions and I felt comforted immediately by all of them. I felt so much control and excitement. I was so well prepared from our doula session for what was happening that I was able to stay focused very easily.
By 10pm, I felt like we should go to the hospital. In the car, the contractions began coming very quickly but Tami was with me the whole way keeping me focused and my husband relaxed. We arrived there at 10:15/30pm and Tami guided me through my breathing. I could feel my body doing exactly what it was meant to do and despite the pain of the contractions, I was in heaven. Tami kept me focused on my breathing which helped dull the pain and my daughter was born completely naturally at 11:05pm. It was the most powerful experience of my life!
Tami was the pivotal person during my pregnancy, labor, and delivery. She trusted my body to do exactly what it needed to do to bring my daughter safely into the world which made it easier for me to trust myself. She had dedicated herself to getting to know me throughout my pregnancy and so she knew exactly what I needed to be able to accomplish the birthing experience that I wanted. I truly believe God has given her an amazing gift.
Tami,
Thank you for all that you did for me and my family to make my beautiful Lily’s birth the amazing experience that it was. I think of her birth often and a smile always crosses my face as I remember how perfect it truly was. You made yourself available to us at all times, you cooked for us, you made it a priority to get to know my family and what our needs were. I feel so blessed to have met you and I will forever will be grateful to you.
All our love,
Linda, Jeff, Matthew 04/08/07, and baby Lily 04/02/11
