who has a doula and how often do you see or hear from her?

[Momma Aimee]

We hired a doula, and she is new, we will likely be her first birth.

I am ok with that, i like her attidue and we really need a 3rd adult there -- to free Scot tup for Theodore and so on. I contacted a numbver of doula, there are not that many around here, and had differnt issues with a number of them. sooooooooooooooooooo

but i don't hear from her often. we have had one prenatal and we have one more on teh book. however it is often well over a week before she answers an e-mail.

i know she is new -- it showes -- she seems little unsure of what she needs to be doing.

Not sure what more i want from her, just uhhhhhhh not feeling it, you know?

How often are you hearing from your doula? What have you and she discuissed....

AImee

[Grace24]

Yeah, I know how you feel... I'm not sure what the accepted amount of time is to spend with a doula. It seems like you'd want to know them kind of well before they attend something so intimate as your birth. I've been kind of wondering this myself.

Mine is just getting certified but has attended a lot of births... so I'm her first paying client. Basically I know she's available for whatever I request, I just don't know how much to ask of her. DH and I met her for a long lunch once, and she came to my last appt. with my midwife, and I told her I'd love her and her DH to come over for dinner... then what?

I think I'd like to have at least one session with her where I sit down with her and talk about what she'll do for me during the birth... how involved will she be, what kind of comfort measures does she use, etc. Then I might feel more prepared.

I'm curious to hear from others on this, thanks for posting this question!

[gcgirl]

Mine makes three scheduled appointments (for planning and technique discussion), which we've already had, but she is open 24/7 for me to call her with questions. Then I'm supposed to call her at the first sign of labor or even if I only *think* I'm in labor.

There's not really a whole lot else they need to do unless they're also teaching you a birth method.

[wwisdomskr]

We're hiring a postpartum doula and meeting with her a few times before the birth. She has offered to also attend our birth as "a baby gift," and we are considering.

I was touched, though, by what she said about this. She said that if we decided to have her attend our birth then we should meet several more times to get to know one another...since it's such an intimate experience.

She is right. It's a privilege for her to be invited to be there...

This is in alignment with the experiences we had with our previous birth doulas, for dd1 and dd2. We met with each of them a lot (less for dd1 because she was 2 months premature...).

Hope this helps.

[BabyBugsMom]

My doula is also my mom!

My mom has been at all of my births except the last, and she is a wonderful support. She's also just completed her doula training/certification as of about a year ago, so now she's official.

Now we're just hoping and praying that the baby cooperates and arrives while Mom is in town....

[lisalulu]

We haven't actually met with our doula yet but we used for ds so we know her already. We've had to rescehdule 3 meetings so far because of births and ds getting sick! But we will meet with her twice before the birth and she is pretty quick on email but she is also a busy doula/educator who uses it as a means of communication off her website. I think when we used her last time, we just interviewed her and then met with her twice after that to go over notes, etc. We could call if we had any questions but I don't think we ever did.

[Curlita]

I met with my doula once to do a meet and greet, then she came over to meet my husband. Since then, we have had some e-mail conversations (mainly logistics, like what number should I call her at, etc.) She was FANTASTIC when I was panicking about the previa. She wrote me prompt, comforting e-mails with lots of great information. She also remembered the date that I was going in for another US and sent me an e-mail the night before to let me know she would be thinking about me.

I asked her about meeting before the birth, and she suggested that we meet 2-3 weeks before the due date, because at that time we'll be focusing on the birth and less on decorating the nursery and accumulating diapers, etc.

With our first doula, we also signed up for lactation education. So I think we spent 3 evenings with her doing lactation and birth education. I think that two nights of that was lactation ed, but I can't remember. I don't really feel like I got to know her really well until the night of the birth.

It WOULD concern me not to get prompt responses to e-mail, though. I'd let her know that you really need more timely responses to inquiries, unless she is out of town or something really prevents her from answering. Also, her response time would be more and more important to me as I got closer to my due time.

[pixiesmommy]

Mine is an online friend, and is certified. If I email her a question about birth or pregnancy, she usually emails me within a few days. If I email her a "hey howya doin" email, it's sometimes more than a week.

I've met her in person once over dinner with my family, and plan to meet with her at least once more before the birth (SOON!) to discuss my birth plan and get a pre-natal massage. She is a licensed massage therapist and said that she likes doing one pre-birth massage so we are more comfortable with touching, etc. during the birth, which makes lots of sense to me.

I've never called her, but I don't doubt for a second that she would be more readily available by phone than by email, as she has told me this and I believe her!

I say, if you have a question or an issue to discuss, call her instead of emailing!

Manda

[AimeeandBrian]

I don't meet mine until 36 weeks. We only hired her since my midwife requires a birth assistant. I'll be at home and have a few other support people, so I am not too anxious about her.

[monocyte]

Yeah doula...gosh, that is on my list of to do's...the one I was hoping and praying for isnt going to be able to do it. She's afraid with thanksgiving and family coming in from out of town. At least she was honest.

I know a local LLL who does it on the side, I'm going to call her sooner or later. Someone remind me :

Seriously, no brain cells left. Short term memory - gone. Never had long term...