Midwife and Doula in HypnoBirthing Birth

What's a Doula?

The word doula comes from the Greek word meaning "woman caregiver." 

The word is now used to describe a trained labor companion who provides the woman and her partner continuous emotional support, physical comfort and assistance in obtaining information before, during and just after childbirth. 

Labor support consists of helping a woman develop her own rhythms and rituals, providing distractions with breathing patterns, comforting touch, varying positions, use of a birth ball, warm or cold compresses, vocalization, visualization, relaxation, or whatever is needed to provide comfort. 

Every birth is a unique experience and she will work with you to modify and vary comfort measures as desired and needed.

Know the difference between a midwife and a doula. 
A midwife provides prenatal care, delivery of the baby, care of the mother post-partum and newborn care. The midwife is responsible for the safety of mother and baby. Some kinds of midwives also provide family planning, annual exams, and other kinds of well-woman gynecology.

Certified doulas do not provide any kind of medical care. For instance, they would not listen to the baby's heart beat or do a vaginal exam or deliver the baby. However, a doula is instrumental in providing emotional and physical support for the laboring woman and her family (husband) and/or post-partum care of the mother and baby. Doula care has been shown to improve outcomes for both moms and babies shown through many studies.

A doula can specialize in assiting you at just your baby birth, or post-partum (after the baby arrival) care of mother and baby, or both. A birth doula stays with you throughout your labor, no matter how many hours it lasts, and leaves after the baby arrives.

Many doulas know massage techniques, or belly casting (making a cast of your full belly for decoration at home), or know to prepare your placenta after delivery to take as pills to eliminate post-partum symptoms, or prenatal yoga they can show you, HypnoBirthing relaxations, lactation consulting, photography or videography of birthing or after birth, etc. Call up a couple of them to find the one who is available and again, who 'clicks' with you: she will be your hand-maiden in your birth room, and will keep you and your husband comfortable.

The post-partum doulas can stay  with you (a new mom) longer, or come after the baby arrives, for a few hours a day, to clean up, take care of you, teach you to breastfeed the baby, and how to take care of the baby, some will shop and cook for you.

If you choose to want to find a post-partum doula who takes care of you after the birth, please connect with her in advance as well. Doulas' experience is reflected in amount of births she attended and the price she charges.
How to Hire a HypnoBirthing Doula?

A doula can greatly enhance your experience of childbirth and the postpartum. Your HypnoBirthing birth doula will be at your side along with your care provider and partner, as part of your team for continuous support during labor and birth. Or maybe you’d like a postpartum doula to help you through the transition into parenthood and family. Either way, finding a good fit for you and your family is critical.

A doula’s education, training, experience and credentials are important. When doulas have DONA International certification, you know that they have had the best education and training available. You can also be assured that they have a strong sense of professionalism and integrity.

Also important is doula's experience. Many doulas attended hundreds of births and have enormous wealth of knowledge and practical experience. Some have just started. Their pricing will depend greatly on the experience and confidence in assisting you in the birth that you want.

You will also want to consider whether you and your partner feel comfortable with an individual doula. You will need to feel that this doula is supportive of your hopes and expectations about labor, childbirth and parenting, in addition to having a strong professional background and credentials. That is why we recommend the following four-step hiring process when hiring a birth or postpartum HypnoBirthing doula.

Morrin Bass specializes in training hypnoBirthing doulas for moms specific needs. Certification classes are offered at New York Awareness Center. 

Enjoy Your Post Partum Expression

In recent research I have done about moms reporting HypnoBirthing births, there is no mention of post partum sadness.

In fact, HypnoBirthing allows the mother to experience elevated levels of oxytocin, endorphins and relaxins - hormones and neurotransmitters creating loops of continuos good mood that has prevalently positive effect on their newborn babies development.

Stories of mothers who experience sadness after having a baby are so inconsistent, that made me think that depression is a modern lifestyle choice. And I wasn't alone in that thought.

The National Institute for Child Health and Human Development conducted a study by Dr. Duane Alexander, which pointed the results over 36 months with 1215 first time mothers in 14 universities around the country.

Randomly 55% of mothers were reported to have "never had depression", some others had various degrees or periods of "sad modes" which quickly dissipated by doing work, or exercises, or breathing, or meditations, and only 8% reported prolonged periods of sadness, which in all 8% of the cases was pre-existing before the baby arrived. Their choice was made!

The effects of mothers' sad and sometimes withdrawn behavior resulted in their children by 36 months being withdrawn and less responsive and prepared for social behaviors in school, which in turn lead to lower results in learning.

On the opposite, mothers, using positive language with their babies, optimistic approach to their babies development, methods of hypnobirthing, has shown the positive effects of babies and mothers post partum.The close replicating of the environment in the womb for the baby after the birth eliminates possibilities of birth trauma, and for the mother, who is relaxed and flooded with oxytocin because of her exciting bond with her newborn, creates an ideal environment for the baby to enter into the new world.

Since birth such babies exhibited abilities to hold prolonged meaningful gaze, calm demeanor and were using the cry very effectively. Babies develop quickly and physically well-formed, stronger and more able. By month 36 babies birthed consciously by mothers who deliberately created the thoughtful environment, exhibit leadership qualities and are able to assume responsibilities which lead to learning advancement.

Whaa-whoo, mommies! We are creating the next generation of leaders!


Once again, I am glad to discover that research shows numbers in favor of HypnoBirthing births, as expected. Now the choice is yours.

Choose peace in mind and practice it every day.

Morrin is available for fine-tuning your future ideal birth experience, hypnotic induction of labor, communication with the baby in utero, and removing limitations of the past, so you can have the birth of your desire. 


HypnoBirthing classes are only the beginning of your journey to a healthy and comfortable birth.

More information at NewYorkAwarenessCenter.com

TO EAT OR NOT TO EAT ... PLACENTA ???

Most people never heard of ingesting placenta. Most people would look at you as if you are crazy if you mention ingesting placenta. But wait! let me introduce the latest research on ingesting placenta.

Do you want your breast milk to come out abundantly and easily for your baby?

Do you want your baby weight ease off your body quickly?

Do you want to have tons of energy to nurse your baby and take care of your family right after birthing?

And finally,

Do you want to have positive outlook and feel incredible bonding experience with your baby, instead of postpartum depression?

Find out how you too can be happy and healthy quickly and easily right after your baby's birth.

Placenta contains high levels of prostaglandin which stimulates uterus to get back to normal size quickly. Placenta also contains oxytocin which stimulates the muscles around the mammary cells to contract and eject milk. These levels of natural oxytocin add to your hormonal balance and help you feel happier and have a light positive outlook on life.

Mammals eat their youngs' placenta in full. All of it. Ewww! Remember that we are mammals. So it is only natural to ingest placenta, even though not in full, but a little bitty piece of it, about 0.5 cubic inch, raw.

How's that? Wow!

At least you don't have to eat all of it!

Still sounds bizzarre?

Now, let's explore.

I met this homebirth midwife of 20 years Jenny West, at last year's HypnoBirthing Conclave, where I got my liscense to teach HypnoBirthing to doulas and other birthing professionals.

She gave me her book about eating placenta, as I shared an experience I heard about from one of my HypnoBirthing student-moms, who ate a tiny piece of placenta right after its birth, raw, once. She told me she just tore a piece right off the big blob of the whole thing and swallowed it. She experienced her body temperature lowering soon, her breast milk coming after colostrum within a day, she felt consistantly happy and satisfied with her birth and baby being peacefully calm and healthy.

Jenny shared that it is a very healthy thing, to eat a piece of placenta. There is lots of lore about the placenta, Alaskan, Native American. It was considered a healthy way to start your postpartum and enjoy your baby long before the drugs have been invented that are currently used during and after birthing for various issues.

Her method is to ingest placenta dried and capsuled. She prepares the placenta in your home and leaves for you a capsuled daily dozage for your to take in a few times a day. Or you can choose to eat it once, right after birth, raw, or in a smoothie, and be done with it.

I know I mentioned it to one of my couples in class and they laughed at me thinking I am joking. Then they both backed up visibly and made a face.  I went on describing how the postpartum begins to be the best time of your life if you ingest  a piece of placenta, and then finally one mom said, "I will do it!", and then the other looked at her and said, "it does sound crazy, but yes, I want to do it too."

One mom tells her story as she initially froze her placenta for keeps. By the time her son was 6 weeks old, she was seriously lacking energy and sluggishly dragging herself around the house, doing her daily routine, depressed, and exhausted, she finally decided to defrost her placenta, dried it and encapsulated it and began to take them. On the third day she felt results and kept feeling more energized every day since.

It is your choice. It's your placenta.

Find out more, click here.
With questions contact Morrin Bass, at New York Awareness Center.