Here are pictures of my daughter Rachel and I; the first taken in 1988, the second in 2007. Rachel was born at home. A planned home birth. Sandra Fields, C.N.M. was there for us. She sat at my feet, watching over Rachel and I. She ensured that all was well, and I was able to give birth to Rachel in the quiet calm and safety of our home.

Sandy was my lighthouse in the storm of labor, guiding me to a safe harbor. I once read a saying that likened labor as a time when "a woman holds hands with God." As a midwife I often recall that image as I support a laboring woman as she works to give birth to her baby. I understand that I am there to watch over the labor, ensuring all is well, and to provide the laboring woman with a sense of safety and security as she knows that I will be alert to any problems or concerns and will act to protect her and her baby.

I became a Certified Nurse Midwife in August 1982 but I knew I was meant to be a midwife from the time I was 15 years old. I read an article in Life magazine about the Midwives of the Frontier Nursing Service of Kentucky and found my calling.

As a midwife I came of age in the 1970's and 1980's when childbirth practices were being revolutionized in the United States by the conjoining of the Women's and the Natural Childbirth movements. As a Certified Nurse Midwife I first worked in inner city hospitals serving poor women, as did most other CNMs at that time. There we midwives declined to order "preps" (shaving) and enemas, "permitted" women to get out of bed and walk in labor, even shower. Sips of water were quietly offered so that today food and fluids are now the norm in labor in most settings. The routine IV fell away. We stopped cutting routine episiotomies (if we had ever done so) and even began to teach the resident physicians how to deliver a baby without cutting an episiotomy. We championed vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC) and a woman's right to choose who would be present for her birth, including children.

In the 1990's women from all socioeconomic backgrounds began to seek midwifery care in greater and greater numbers. Certified Nurse Midwives, including myself, then had an opportunity to work in a wider variety of settings. Some worked in out of hospital birth centers, others formed home birth practices. Still others were recruited to middle class communities to become the first midwife to provide care in that setting. I had such an opportunity in a suburb of New York. It was in this setting that I first had the opportunity to care for women throughout their pregnancies and attend their births. Previously I often did not know the women whose births I attended due to the anonymity of the impoverished urban setting.

The midwifery philosophy of care is grounded in the understanding that a woman's ability to form a trusting relationship with a midwife during her pregnancy carries over to her labor and birth, profoundly affecting the woman's birth experience. In addition, midwifery recognizes that pregnancy and birth are normal physiological experiences where we seek to achieve and/or maintain health. Knowledge and the means to act on this knowledge empowers women in their pursuit of a healthy birth. While I had always intuitively understood this, and it had been a part of my midwifery education, it wasn't until I had the opportunity to care for women who were not subsumed by poverty, that I saw it fully put to action. Later I moved to Minnesota to work in a rural setting where I attended births in a small community hospital and attended home births as well. My experiences attending births in the homes of women affirmed for me that this is a choice that should be available to women, always based upon safe principles of care and always occurring within a setting that provides for medical consultation and referral as needed.

From 2005 through 2007 I cared for women as they birthed their babies at home in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis and St. Paul) and surrounding Minnesota communities. I was so fortunate to have known and worked amongst a community of people dedicated to protecting and promoting natural birth - the many doulas, midwives, childbirth educators and activists, chiropractors, physicians and nurses and most especially my birth assistant (doula and sage femme) - as well as the many families for whom I cared. It took a great love to take me away but having such positive memories of Colorado, the birthplace of my midwifery dreams, I look forward to becoming a part of what I know is an equally dynamic community.