Welcome to Urban Doula!

I am a birth and postpartum doula, serving Vancouver, BC (and surrounding areas).

I have been a birth enthusiast since childhood and have always known that my calling is to nurture and support women and families through childbirth and during the postpartum period. Read my full bio here.

The Value of a Doula

{photography credit: Monika Bessler}

Pregnant women and their partners have a seemingly never-ending array of options for birth: doctor or midwife? hospital or home-birth? which books should we read?  What prenatal class should we attend?  What ARE our beliefs and assumptions surrounding birth?  It really can be very overwhelming.  Figuring out how to navigate these endless choices is one way that a doula can help you.  We are trained to be generalists and are excellent resources for finding out what things are available to you in your community, within your price-range and congruent with your beliefs (see here for my resource list).  We strive to be open-minded, unbiased and supportive of whatever it is that parents opt for.  Birth is an important and transformational journey and having a birth doula present can help you receive the continuous physical and emotional support that you will need in order to have a positive experience.

As soon as a baby is born, adults become ‘newborn parents’.  Plunging into parenthood brings an extremely steep learning curve and is an emotional roller-coaster.  Living in a culture of the ‘nuclear family’, parents more than ever feel strained as they often receive very little support. In many cultures around the world, women and their newborns are given a period of rest (the amount of time ranges, but often at least one month) where they are totally taken care of.  Family and friends assume the new mother’s regular duties like cooking, cleaning and caring for older children which allows the mother to rest, bond with and breastfeed her infant.  Here in North America on the other hand, new parents are expected to figure it out on their own and often report feeling very unprepared, uncertain, sleep deprived, and emotionally unstable due to the lack of support, guidance and in-home care following birth.

If you are seeking support, finding a doula that is the right fit for you is of the utmost importance.  There are many different approaches and philosophies to birth and infant care and the personalities of parents and their doula must be a good match for optimal outcomes.  This is why I offer a free consultation to prospective clients; please contact me today to arrange an interview.

For a full description and price listing of my services, click here.

photo by J. Hardwig

Thank you,

Chloe Dierkes, BSc.

Email: urbandoula@gmail.com

Phone: 604.314.9683

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.