Meet Kerry!

I believe that there is more than one way to have a baby and all births can be positive, powerful rites of passage into parenthood with informed consent and the right support. I draw on my knowledge, training, and experience to provide emotional support, physical comfort and, as needed, advocacy to make sure you have the information you need to make informed decisions as they arise in birth. As your doula I provide reassurance and a wide perspective to you and your partner, and make suggestions for labor and birth. I will also help with relaxation through massage and positioning and can provide other techniques for comfort as needed including aromatherapy and acupressure points.

In my personal life I really love and enjoy all that life has to offer –the beach is my happy place and if there is a water activity available you can bet I’ve tried it at least once. SUP and Kayak are my personal favorites. When I can’t be at the beach you might find me visiting a local brewery or winery with friends, or getting messy in the garden. I also love organizing, and my kids tease me that I’d like for my house to look like a model home and there *might* be some truth to that, but I also don’t like to take myself too seriously and have been known to laugh out loud at my own quirks.

I am one of the few DMV natives who grew up here in the DC Metro area. I spent my early years playing outside and riding my bike to the pool in Reston, VA and then enjoyed my high school years in Columbia, MD.I excelled at the arts (and socializing!) in school, danced in a Modern Dance Company and loved singing in an a cappella singing group. My favorite college courses included Psychology and Photography but I also took every dance class imaginable. I always knew I wanted to be a young mom and while finishing my degree at Northern Virginia Community College I found out I was expecting my first daughter! My Jazz and Tap classmembers had a lot of fun watching me complete my final exams, which included choreographed solo dance performances, with my growing belly.

I enjoyed everything about pregnancy and felt empowered and invigorated by my natural birth experience. While I had a lot of energy for being at home full–time with my daughter, I did not have a lot of outside support, none of my friends were having babies yet and the postpartum experience felt isolating. As itdoes for many of us, life brought me many unexpected ups and downs and when my daughter was two I became a single mom. I needed to get back into the workforce and found that my organizational and interpersonal skills made me a great fit for working in property management during that time. It came naturally as my dad has been a residential community manager for as long as I can remember and still is! I quickly moved upto an Executive Assistant in Commercial Management and because of my nurturing demeanor, I was known as the “office mom”. I was proud to have been able to rise to the challenge of raising my daughter on my own for those 8 years, yet was yearning for a career I felt passionate about.

In my heart, I know that “doula–ing” found me at the exact time in my life that I was ready to embrace it. While on a vacation in Bermuda, I met a woman who was three months pregnant and we immediately hit it off. I ended up spending most of my vacation with her and as luck would have it, she and her husband were on the same early morning New Year’sDay flight home to Dulles Airport! Sitting at the gate she looked at me and said “you should be a doula” and I actually had to google it. Fast forward 6 months, I had the honor of attending her birth, which was actually quite complicated and full of interventions. The next day, as I drove home from that experience, I knew I had found my calling. I became a doula that day and immediately started working on my DONA International Birth Doula certification. Shortly thereafter I found out I was going to welcome my second daughter in the spring of 2008! Training as a doula while going through pregnancy was such a gift, I was learning how to support others though their pregnancy and birth while preparing to give birth again myself. I had an amazing doula for that birth and she taught me so much about the kind of doula I wanted to become. The birth of my younger daughter was long and hard, and I am glad I had my doula along side my partner working together to support me through that experience. I had an intense 20 hour back labor which taught me a lot about my strength and about my personal goals…and about letting go of expectations! For that birth I eventually decided on an epidural and I am still proud of that decision as it truly helped me to reach my ultimate goal of a vaginal delivery. I knew that I would need more support in the postpartum experience the second time around, and made sure to take advantage of all of the support I could get from friends as well as a postpartum doula.

I completed my birth doula certification in January 2009 and I have now been attending births full–time for over 10 years. Having attended more than 550 births, I have extensive experience in supporting all types of birthing choices including home birth, medicated and non–medicated hospital, cesarean birth, twin deliveries, LGBTQ families and VBAC deliveries. I am thrilled to support ALL families as they embark on the amazing journeyinto parenthood.