I am Kim Hawley, a Holistic Sleep Consultant and Lactation Counselor. I have also trained as a Bringing Baby Home Educator and childbirth educator. I love helping parents find their confidence through evidence-based information and encouraging them to listen to their parenting instincts. I believe that parents are most confident when they are informed by science and research, but also when they can trust their intuition. You are the expert on yourself and your baby. 

I live in Capitol Hill, Washington DC with my husband, 2 living children, and a few pets, including my guide dog. We have a daughter who was stillborn in August of 2016 and will always be an unseen, but loved, part of our family.
I love to run, read a good book, spend time with friends, eat delicious food, and enjoy a glass of wine or cup of coffee. Actually, I don’t know how I survive without coffee!

My Journey to Birth Work
I grew up in the world of moms and babies. My mom, at various points in her career, was a midwife, childbirth educator, birth photographer, La Leche League leader, and pediatric nurse. Casual conversations in our house included discussions of pregnancy complications, physiological birth, lactation, and how normal it was for babies to wake at night. My mom tells me that I played with her model pelvis so much as a kid that I broke off the tail bone (ouch poor pelvis!).
I took all of this knowledge and perspective for granted until I was in graduate school studying medical anthropology. Suddenly the anthropological perspective on culture I had immersed myself in for years was turned to birth in the U.S. This new way of looking at birth fascinated me. I decided to get my Masters of Public Health in Maternal and Child Health and to focus my career on pregnancy and babies.

After graduate school, I spent several years working for the government as a Public Health Analyst, but I felt disconnected from the babies and families that my programs served. I wanted to work with people on a personal level. I wanted the chance to connect with parents as they navigated the transition to parenthood.
When my son was 9 months old the stars aligned, and I decided to stay home with him while working towards a more connected way to work in maternal and child health. I studied as a Lactation Educator Counselor and got involved with La Leche League. Lactation support was only a start, and I continued educating myself on more factors that affect parents in the early years of parenting. Eventually, I realized that I loved helping parents navigate family sleep in a gentle, responsive way, and that this approach to sleep, based in normal development and responsive parenting, was very much a need. 

Holistic Sleep Coaching training

Certified Bringing Baby Home Educator, The Gottman Institute

Certified Infant Sleep Educator, Bebo Mia 

Certificated Lactation Educator Counselor, UC San Diego Extension
Master’s of Public Health, Maternal and Child Health, the George Washington University
Master’s of Arts Cultural Anthropology, the George Washington University
Bachelors of Arts Anthropology, Wake Forest University