Reflecting on 2020

The heaviness of March and April was overwhelming and downright debilitating. What some people call work, I call my passion and heart. There is no doubt that supporting and documenting transformative moments for families is my life’s calling. With the sudden lock down, the restrictions in place and both of my children exclusively home with me, and no end in sight - my ‘work’ was gone in a flash - or at least it felt that way. Additionally, as a major empath, I could feel the collective sadness from families all around the country that were being forced to birth alone. Or that were experiencing loss and their partner had to wait in the parking lot. I could feel the stress and intensity on all of the front line workers. With what felt like no end in sight, my heart was broken and I felt lost.

But with time, the support of my family, some amazing friends, an incredible therapist and phenomenal clients, I found my footing again and ended up supporting a total of 25 different families this year - 11 hospital, 9 birth center and 5 home births. This includes 2 surrogate births, 3 cesarean births, 5 rainbow babies and 2 VBAC/HBACs. Fifteen of those families became parents for the first time and 10 of those families were becoming parents again.

This is a collection of one photo from every birth I was granted permission to share. It was no easy task to chose just one image from each birth as they were all filled with so many incredible moments. But as I look at this collection I am, yet again, reminded of just how incredibly special this work is and how blessed I am to have listened to my calling. I am so grateful to each and every family that has invited and trusted me to walk this journey with them.