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10 Reasons to become a doula! #1 reason to be a doula: Helping families. Helping mothers with baby is always important. A birth doula helps prepare the parents and mother for motherhood! The postpartum doula helps with after care.
#2 reason to be a doula: I get to work with babies! If you really love babies you probably should consider the postpartum doula work over the birth. You will get to care for babies more and help mamas as well with postpartum care. Birth doulas do get to see babies as kind of the "reward" for helping mamas prepare for birth. #3 Spiritual and Emotional support: Mamas need more spiritual and emotional support in this world then ever before. The "c-ovid" scare is one reason and just more mothers suffering from depression. We need to stop this from happening. Birth doulas and postpartum doulas can offer mothers the support they need for anxiety and depression! #4 Dad support too! Dads are sometimes forgotten, but doulas know how to support the father and help them prepare for the "trip of a lifetime" - fatherhood! Dads are kept in the birth room with doulas. Dads are considered a great asset. #5 Help reduce mamas pain! Doulas are great at relieving pain and this is a great way to help by becoming a doula. There are various pain prevention techniques esp. for birth doulas to help their clients! #6 Reason to doula is to build lasting friendships! Every mother I work with becomes a friend! A lifetime friend is great and then you can also watch your "doula baby" grow up! It is so much fun! #7 Meet other professionals in your field of work! As a doula you can meet other doulas, midwives, chiropractors, nurses, etc. You really get to know more people in the health field industry. And if you are thinking about becoming a midwife, many women start out as a doula first! #8 Gain more medical knowledge! Yes, you will be quoting to your spouse (if married) or friends all kinds of medical terms once you start working as a doula! There's a lot of things you get to learn about and you can transfer those skills to other projects in the future (like midwifery or nursing if you choose to go further). #9 Self-knowledge - I love to study and learning about doulas, midwifery and such is always interesting and there's always more books out about doulas and pregnancy and childbirth. It is fun to keep up with continuing education and some doula classes require this too! #10 For the JOY of being a doula! I believe doula work is fun - there's not really a part I don't particularly like (well maybe paperwork!) Doula work you get to know mothers and babies and enjoy your work! So, if you are "ready to committ" to a class check out the Memorial Week Sale link. Teen Doula Explore link -if you are a young adult or teen who wants to take a smaller class first. Birth Doula Page, Postpartum Page - Fast-track postpartum is starting June 6th - our zoom classes! Thanks for reading this blog! Our Marian post will post on the 31st about Queenship of Mary!  Prayer to Infant Prague:
INFANT OF PRAGUE NOVENA PRAYER O Jesus, Who has said, "Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it shall be opened," through the intercession of Mary, Your Most Holy Mother, I knock, I seek, I ask that my prayer be granted. (Make your request) O Jesus, Who has said, "All that you ask of the Father in My Name, He will grant you," through the intercession of Mary Your Most Holy Mother, I humbly and urgently ask your Father in your name that my prayer will be granted. (Make your request) O Jesus, Who has said, "Heaven and earth shall pass away but My word shall not pass away," through the intercession of Mary Your Most Holy Mother, I feel confident that my prayer will be granted. (Make your request) PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING Divine Infant Jesus, I know You love me and would never leave me. I thank You for Your close Presence in my life. Miraculous Infant, I believe in Your promise of peace, blessings, and freedom from want. I place every need and care in Your hands. Lord Jesus, may I always trust in Your generous mercy and love. I want to honor and praise You, now and forever. Amen  Welcome to our Memorial Week Sale. Go here to see that page!
Sorry that last post was too confusing - so, for summertime enrollments through August - you can pay $425 for a class for fast-track as part of our MEMORIAL week sale! You can pay down payment AHEAD OF TIME and then take the class later. Your down payment holds your spot in the class as we are filling classes fast! So, for example you can pay $115 down for birth doula fast-track - even though the next one doesn't start till July - we will hold your spot for you! After summer, our prices will go up for some of our classes. Take advantage of our special sale! 20% off self-paced and more off fast-track classes! Postpartum fast-track starts June 6th - we meet on Tuesdays! If you are interested in the Magnificat courses, please contact us and we will send you the price list for the 20% off on those classes and special link to enroll. (Magnificat classes include Childbirth Educator, Holistic Woman's Health -which is not ready, and Fertility doula) Anyway, just wanted to correct that one thing. The classes will be higher soon. Next post will be about Crowning of Mary and May - thank you. God Bless.  Welcome to Memorial Week! And our sale! We have decided to put our classes on sale for 20% off this week only. Here's our special deal - this is a great savings on any of our classes, but especially fast-track - so we are going to raise pricing on that class soon - but you can get in for lower amount by putting a down payment on the course - even if you want to enroll for July/August or September (Fall) sessions! You pay a money down to hold your spot (no refunds) and then your payment plan will start in either July/August or September (for rest of class payments). Or you can start your payment plan now and be finished with payments by class start date! We will be charging $500-$600 for our next doula sessions. This deal gets you into the class for $425 (correction) with one book included for either birth or postpartum class (and a book required to read for the class). This also includes one mentoring session with instructor! (Take me to memorial week sale...) (So, pre-order your fast-track course for late summer or fall!) If you prefer a self-paced course, we are discounting those to $360 for this special sale as well (for birth or postpartum doula). Other classes on sale: Fertility doula (see below), Childbirth Educator is $400, Mommy Latch is $400. So, let us know which course you want for our sale pricing! Go to our Memorial Week Sale page to register for any of our classes - only place on our site for the special deal. Fast-track postpartum doula is starting in June - now this session is lower priced at $425 - for new students - this is the last time we will be hosting the class at a lower rate! If you want to join our June Session and get in at the lower rate please go here to get that information. Enrollment postpartum page. Now, what does cars and doulas have to do with each other? You have to get around! Right?! Well, maintaining your car is important - found that out this week! Make sure you get those oil changes every 3,000 miles! Maintaining your doula business is like oil changing a car... are you "oiling" or "doing self-care"? Are you taking time for yourself if you are busy and have clients? Practice one self-care technique today - self-massage or reflexology or smelling the roses! If you are a new doula and don't have clients, perhaps it is time for you to join our doula circle! We are meeting 2nd Saturday of June. Catholic doula students are free - we ask others for $25 donation (if you can) towards our scholarship funds. Thank you so much! Or you can buy our 10 Tips for Doula Bag Mini-Class and we will count that as your donation for coming to the doula circle - plus you get a mini-class too for only $25 - click here to purchase the mini doula bag class! What a win-win for you! Next newsletter I would like to do something in honor of Mary for month of May - so stay tuned! Thank you.
 Perhaps you are just curious about doula work and want to know more about what doulas have to offer or perhaps you are a doula already... either way this class is going to rock your world! We will offer 10 tips for your doula bag (and by the way includes some postpartum stuff too) and it is a type of introductory mini-class for anyone who's curious about birth doula or postpartum doula work and this might just help you decide about our bigger courses! So, grab a chair, some coffee, and you will be able to listen to this pre-recorded class! We will also send you some samples of our courses with the pre-recorded class too! This class is coming soon - I hope to have it up in about a week! Get on wait list by using our contact form! Thank you!
Guest writer: Margaret Wolfe... Have you spent hours middling and re-wording your Google search to put together your doula business plan? Maybe you have a grand vision and just need a little jump-start to get you going.
Here are some tips for jump-starting your business with a stellar doula business plan. 1.Do the hard work! Make sure you put in the time to develop a mission for your business. This should be an overview of how you want to make an impact on your clients before and during their births. 2.Develop your brand and logo- This is crucial if you intend to set up a business with some kind of store virtually/brick-n-mortar. Make sure your brand and logo represent exactly who you are and what you believe in. Make sure to have a consistent brand. Make sure to add points of interest in your description that make your business unique to your brand. 3. Come up with a description of how your business will be run. Will you run it yourself (sole proprietorship, LLC, partnership or corporation). With this, unfortunately, comes taxes, so you’ll want to make sure you have this ironed out. 4.Come up with long-term goals for your business this might include extra services you offer with your doula business (cooking for the new couple, knitting a baby hat, cleaning service, nannying, breastfeeding class etc. Make sure when you’re coming up with this to really zero in your market You could charge extra for this. 5. Finally, to the fun part, start your business whether it have a physical location or a site online. It’s important to create a clear description of your business and find ways to attract your specific niche. Developing your business might include finding a location or investing in a site. Fun fact: you can write off several things that pertain to your business as deductions on your taxes! These are proven five steps for jumpstarting your successful doula business. I hope you find them helpful! - Margaret Wolfe... Julie speaking here - If you need a template for this - you can find free stuff inside my book Doing business the Doula Way which has recently been updated. Go to this amazon link (not affiliate marketing): https://www.amazon.com/Doing-Business-Doula-Way-3rd/dp/B0B1HXV8JC/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1683310701&sr=8-1 Many titles of Mary... Welcome to May! May is Mary's Month - so I plan to hopefully post once a week here or in the newsletter about Mary and some of her feast days. See below for our first "Marian story" for this month...also keep reading for giveaway information. We also have a May Specials page! We are hosting a mini-May mester for Teen Doula Explore starting next week around May 8/9th and going for 2 weeks. We will also have a June and July class - learn more about our explore course. Enrollment link is at bottom of page or use this link. We are hosting our 7-week fast-track birth doula course starting in mid-May to become a birth doula, so we start around May 18th for that class. We are extending the early bird to May 8th to save $200 after that we might do a savings of $100 off up to the start date. Enrollment link is at bottom of page or use this link. We are also considering a weekend combo doula course - or you may pick one or the other as well (birth or postpartum) - this Memorial Day weekend course is tentative for Memorial Day weekend - but if it doesn't make - we will consider doing a different weekend in June or July for this idea. Click here to get more information! Mother's Day Giveaway - so technically this giveaway you can enter till end of the month- we will give away a book or two from my author collection (Choose A Catholic Postpartum, Little Way of Motherhood, or Rebozo Revealed) - if we receive more than 50 entries there will be 2 books. For now we will give away one book and the M.O.M. Advocate Breastfeeding course as our prizes. I may find other things to include - so surprises maybe included if you win! Go to our contact page to enter. Marian Titles - Mary has a lot of titles - probably over 100! So, I thought I would feature at least one or two of her beautiful titles each week in this blog and our online newsletter as well. We will also feature a picture or two of Mary under the titles we talk about. Our Lady of Banneux January 15 Little Mariette Beco, waiting for her brother to come home, pressed her face against the window while darkness fell; it was seven o’clock in Banneux. Mrs. Beco was working in a back room; the rest of the family had retired – none of them had attended Mass that Sunday morning – the father was a lapsed Catholic. Suddenly Mariette called out, “Mother, there is a lady in the garden. It is the Holy Virgin.” Mrs. Beco scoffed at this. Taking a rosary Marietta had found on the road, she began to pray it. When Julien came home and heard what had happened, he said there was nothing in the garden; perhaps the icicles reflected weirdly and confused Marietta. The pastor was informed, but he did not put much stock in the story, thinking the vision of Beauraing and Lourdes was resulting in an epidemic of visions. He sent word to Mariette to forget about it and not spread stories. The next morning, Wednesday, the priest was surprised to see Mariette at Holy Mass – she had quit school because she failed in her First Holy Communion examination three times, and after that had not gone to church anymore. That day Marietta went to school and for the first time in her life knew her lessons well. The next evening she went into the garden, knelt and said the rosary; her father followed her with a coat which he threw around her shoulders. He tried to get the pastor who was out, then called a neighbor, a practicing Catholic, and together they followed. The child was being beckoned on to the highway by the lady, now known as Our Lady of Banneux, till they reached a spring, into which Marietta plunged her hands at the command of the lady, who said, “This spring is set aside for me. Good night!” Then she vanished. When they reached home, the Abbe was waiting for them. Marietta described the lady: “Her robe was long and white; she wore a blue belt and rays of light shone from her head. She was a little more than five feet tall; her right foot was bare and under it a golden rose. Her hands were raised to her breast on which was a golden heart. A rosary hung from her right arm: - all similar to the Lourdes apparition. There were six or seven more apparitions of Our Lady of Banneux; at one of these Marietta, at the advice of the pastor asked the lady her name, to which Our Lady of Banneux replied, “I am the Virgin of the poor,” and leading the girl to a spring, said, “This spring is for all nations…for the sick…I would like a chapel built. I come to relieve suffering. Have faith in me and pray much. My dear child, pray hard…” At the end of each visit Mary would say “Au revoir,” which means, “until we meet,” but at the last visit she said, “Adieu,” which means, “good-bye.” She blessed Marietta then, at which the girl fainted. Marietta did not see the lady depart. The Beco family and many others became model Catholics. The chapel was built, and the spring became the site of numberless cures. During the German occupation of Belgium in 1942, the bishop encouraged the cult of Our Lady of Banneux, Our Lady of the Poor. In 1947, the bishop approved the devotion. In 1948 the cornerstone of a new basilica was laid; this was to supplant the small chapel. During the war, Marietta married a Dutch salesman. During the Battle of the Bulge in 1944, an American chaplain found them and their fifteen month old baby living in a cellar of a small home occupied by American troops. Belgium is one more reminder in these days when communism seems to be sweeping everything before it, that our great hope – our only hope – lies in our carrying out the requests Our Lady made at Fatima and other places. Mary prays for us without ceasing, but we, too, must pray, must sacrifice. We must do our part, if we expect Mary to help us. *from The Woman in Orbit @@@@@@@@@@@ Our Lady of Bethlehem January 22 "Bethlehem, the city of David, is located about 5 miles south of the city of Jerusalem. According to tradition, Bethlehem is the place where David was born, and also where he was anointed king by the prophet Samuel." "The place which the supreme King of kings and the Lord of lords had chosen for entertaining his eternal and incarnate Son in this world was a most poor and insignificant hut or cave, to which most holy Mary and Joseph betook themselves after they had been denied all hospitality and the most ordinary kindness by their fellow-men. This place was held in such contempt that though the town of Bethlehem was full of strangers in want of night-shelter, none would demean or degrade himself so far as to make use of it for a lodging; for there was none who deemed it suitable or desirable for such a purpose, except the Teachers of humility and poverty, Christ our Savior and his purest Mother. On this account the wisdom of the eternal Father had reserved it for Them, consecrating it in all its bareness, loneliness and poverty as the first temple of light and as the house of the true Sun of justice, which was to arise for the upright of heart from the resplendent Aurora Mary, turning the night of sin into the daylight of grace. Most Holy Mary and saint Joseph entered the lodging thus provided for them and by the effulgence of the ten thousand angels of their guard they could easily ascertain its poverty ad loneliness, which they esteemed as favors and welcomed with tears of consolation and joy. Our Lady of Bethlehem When later the Magi approached, the heavenly mother awaited the pious and devout kings, standing with the Child in her arms. Amid the humble and poor surroundings of the cave, in incomparable modesty and beauty, she exhibited at the same time a majesty more than human, the light of heaven shining in her countenance. Still more visible was this light in the Child, shedding through the cavern effulgent splendor, which made it like a heaven. The three kings of the East entered and at the first sight of the Son and Mother they were for a considerable space of time overwhelmed with wonder. They prostrated themselves upon the earth, and in this position they worshiped and adored the Infant, acknowledging Him as the true God and man, and as the Savior of the human race. By the divine power, which the sight of Him and his presence exerted in their souls, they were filled with new enlightenment. They perceived the multitude of angelic spirits, who as servants and ministers of the King of kings and Lord of lords attended upon Him in reverential fear. Most Holy Mary, with saint Joseph and the sacred Child, took leave of the cave although with tenderest regret. When the Child and his mother took leave of the cave, God appointed an angel as its keeper and watcher, as He had done with the garden of Paradise. This guard had remained to this day, sword in hand at the opening of the cave; and never since then has an animal entered there. from City of God by the Venerable Mary of Agreda
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AuthorJuliana Larsen is the author of the Catholic Doula Blog. Archives
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