Prenatal Visits

*** PLEASE NOTE: As of January 2025, birth doula support is being offered in-person to families in Calgary, Alberta. The following prenatal visit structure will apply to families in the Calgary area. Thank you! ***

Prenatal visits are an important element of the work that birth doulas do with expecting families, helping them to prepare for the big event of labour and birth as a team. For most doulas in the Halifax area, a standard birth package includes two prenatal visits, usually 1-2 hours in duration, where the doula gets the opportunity to chat with their client about birth plans and wishes, how the pregnancy is going, and planning for postpartum. Prenatal visits also offer a rich opportunity for doulas and their clients to get to know each other better, developing a relationship that can help the pregnant client feel safe and seen throughout their labour and birth experience. There’s a lot of love about the two prenatal structure – it’s often enough time to build a good relationship before the birth and it feels manageable for scheduling.

At Beltane Birth Doula Services, we are planning to trial something a bit differently with our prenatal visit structure. As of September 2024, we will be trialling a three-visit prenatal structure that provides three separate opportunities for me to connect with pregnant clients and their support persons in advance of the labour and birth itself. The biggest reason why I’ve decided to trial a slightly different structure, adding on a third prenatal visit, is because I’ve noticed something important missing from the work we do to help people prepare for birth. While talking about birth interventions, preferences, and plans is important and meaningful, we often don’t get enough time to talk about and practice coping tools that support birthing folks. Let’s talk about why that’s important.

In labour, the body experiences intense sensations as the baby and body work together to facilitate the birth of the baby. These intense sensations gradually build as the cervix dilates and the baby’s head makes its way through the bony and soft tissue structures of the pelvis. It’s common not only to feel the intensity of each contraction, but also pressure, shakes, nausea, and other strong bodily sensations. While many birthing people can imagine what early contractions might feel like by thinking about when they’ve experienced menstrual cramps, the sensations of birth are unique and often take people a bit by surprise. In most of our everyday life, when we experience sensations of that intensity in our bodies, it’s instinctual to think, “something is wrong” and to feel worry or fear. Labour and birth are highly unusual experiences because those intense feelings are actually a sign that things are going exactly as they should! But even though we know that intellectually, we don’t always feel safe and like things are going right in our bodies when we experience those feelings for the first time. And if you’ve experienced previous birth trauma, those feelings of not quite being safe might come up again with the sensations of labour. In my experience as a birth doula, it’s not unusual to feel a disconnect between our brains (which know that contractions and other sensations are normal signs of labour) and our bodies (which might be feeling fear and overwhelm because of these sensations). When we only prepare our minds for what is to come in labour, we set ourselves up to experience a bit a problem because our brains don’t work the same way when we’re experiencing the physical stress of labour as they do the rest of the time. That means that the mental tools we use to prepare ourselves might not be as effective as we’d like them to when labour actually begins.

So how can we help to prepare ourselves better to cope with the intense sensations that labour brings? Simply put, we need to develop coping tools that help us to be present with uncomfortable sensations in our bodies. Ideally, we start practicing how to do this early and often, so that when labour actually begins, it’s easier to tap into those skills we have developed so they do a better job of helping us. That’s where the third prenatal visit comes in – or rather, the first! At Beltane Birth Doula Services, we are going to try adding an additional prenatal visit at the beginning of our work together. After the free consultation and after a client contract has been signed, we can schedule the first prenatal visit as soon as it is convenient for you. Whether you hire me at four-weeks pregnant, 12-weeks pregnant, or 30-weeks pregnant, we will begin by scheduling an early prenatal visit that focuses on helping you to develop embodied coping tools – such as body scans, mindfulness meditations, and offering compassion to the body – so that you have as much time as possible to practice them throughout your pregnancy before it’s time to use them in labour. Practicing these on your own throughout your pregnancy can help you to feel calmer and more grounded throughout pregnancy and feel more prepared to navigate changes and sensations of birth. The beautiful thing about adding in this early prenatal is that you’ll still get two additional prenatal visits – the same you would with most other doulas – to do the other preparatory work of discussing birth interventions, values, preferences, and plans. And at those prenatal visits, we can also check in on how those coping tools have been working out for you so far and make any needed adjustments with lots of time to let those changes land in the body.

So, what does the three prenatal visit structure look like in practice? Here’s an example:

Client A meets with me for an initial consult in the first trimester and we really connect. They decide to hire me as their birth doula, and we complete the necessary paperwork together. We schedule our first prenatal visit for the next time we are both free. When I meet them and their partner or support person, we take a moment to tune into our bodies and the sensations they are experiencing, we hold space for that moment, and then we explore and practice some tools together. By the time I leave, they have a tool they want to practice using on a regular basis. As my client, they have access to call, text, or email me when they want to chat about their pregnancy or troubleshoot their coping skills. Once the third trimester arrives, we schedule the remaining two prenatal visits. At the second prenatal visit, we talk about how their pregnancy is going and their birth wishes. We discuss the stages of labour, interventions they want more information about, and what kinds of comfort tools they might want to use to manage the sensations of labour (bodily positions, breathing techniques, massage, pain medication options, etc.). We talk about the energy they want to birth in and what we can do to try to make that happen. At the third and final prenatal visit, we get a chance to review any changes that might have been made to the birth plans/preferences, practice any body positions or coping tools that they might want to practice again before using in labour, and talk about plans for the postpartum period. Then, at 38 weeks of pregnancy, I go on-call for my client so that I’m ready to join them when their baby decides it’s birthday time.

I understand that trying to schedule in three prenatal visits might feel like a lot for folks who are just starting to look for a birth doula later in their third trimester. I am committed to trialing this structure for at least six months or so to see whether it makes the kind of difference in people’s birth experiences that I’m hopeful it will. Beltane Birth Doula Services is always looking to evolve and grow to meet the needs of birthing families, which means that this structure may stick around, or it may change if, in trying it, we discover that there’s another structure that works better for birthing and support people. I’m hopeful that prospective clients will appreciate the extra face-time with their doula and be curious and excited to see what these new skills will offer them throughout their journey to parenthood.

To learn more about our birth doula package, click here: https://www.beltanebirth.ca/birth-doula-support

To schedule a free consultation, click here: https://calendly.com/beltanebirth