A Doula For Everything: An Interview with the National Black Doula Association
Content Warning: This article mentions sexual violence.
100% of Knix and Carriage House Birth’s proceeds from Life After Birth will be donated to The Black Women’s Health Imperative to support the NOURISH program — a Postpartum Doula training program created in partnership with Knix that supports the needs of Black birthing families.
The NOURISH curriculum was designed by the National Black Doula Association, and we were so grateful to sit down with its CEO & Founder, Tracie Collins. Meet Tracie.
Hi Tracie! Tell us a bit about yourself and how you got into the doula field.
I’ve been in this field for almost 22 years. I started in the year 2000 after I had my son. I started off as a doula then transitioned into midwifery about 2 years into my doula career. I studied, apprenticed and practiced in Oakland— but I decided not to stay on the midwifery side after pretty much completing all my necessary requirements. Instead, I took everything that I learned and brought it back to being a doula.
I was able to successfully marry the foundations of midwifery and traditional midwifery (to be really specific), and blend it with people who are birthing in the hospital system that needed a doula. With my experience, I was able to support people birthing in homes, hospitals and in birthing centres. So much so, that I became known for and cemented as someone who did “quick births” — quick natural deliveries that take 6 hours or less.
What I did was create a system in which I'd combine nutrition and other elements that put the body in the most efficient place for labour and delivery. This would result in having a healthier birthing person and a healthier baby in the end. And that’s what we want!
What led you to starting the National Black Doula Associations?
Really simply— something had to be done about the Black maternal health rate. So I founded the NBDA in October 2017 with 17 years already in the field. My initial thought was that it would just be a database that would pair Black and BIPOC birthing people with Black birthing professionals. Once I first started going live on Instagram, people started to get a taste of my personality, background, and my knowledge. And people would say to me— we want you to train us.
So, in 2019 I started creating a curriculum for the NBDA. We’ve quickly grown into the leading organization when it comes to training BIPOC birthing professionals. But also, we’ve created a system for BIPOC birthing families to be able to find support that looks like them— people who understand the system they’re up against.
On the NBDA side, we’re really lucky to now have 11 trainers and nearly 300 members across the country who are listed in our directory. We have elevated the Black birthing professional and then at the same time, married that with helping families in our communities.
People like that I say it like it is. I don’t have time to bite my tongue. We’re dying. And until we stop dying and things change, then I’m just going to call it like it is. Because we have work to do.
Through Life After Birth, we focus quite a bit on the postpartum time period. What do postpartum doulas do? And why is that care especially important for Black birthing parents?
When I started out in the field, there was no such thing as a postpartum doula. There were just birthing doulas. Over the course of time, postpartum doulas were implemented. But they were implemented incorrectly— and I want to go on record saying this!
The initial understanding of what a postpartum doula was is someone who comes in, helps mom and baby by cleaning the house, making meals, and running errands. And they all had different levels of certifications and training— for example, some were night nurses, some were Certified Lactation Consultants who could support with breastfeeding.
With that being said, there were no significant perimeters or definition of what a postpartum doula was. So when I created the Postpartum Doula Training, I knew I wanted to get in there and redefine it.
From 0-3 months we’re helping parents successfully care for their baby and themselves. And we’re really specific about what that means. It means they’re a professional who is trained, certified (or in the certification process), and they come in with a plan of support. They understand why it’s so important that when working with Black and Brown birthing parents, they’re looking for postpartum danger signs.
What are some of the signs postpartum doulas look out for?
For example, we suffer from C-sections that can happen if they’re not giving us enough time to birth our baby— if our voices are not being heard. This happens at a higher rate for us, and it increases the chance of having a pulmonary embolism. They’re also looking for postpartum preeclampsia. We teach our doulas how to look out for these warning signs, and how to help their clients and their partners exercise their voice to say: this hurts, this doesn’t feel right, this doesn’t look right.
We don’t want them to just flower it. Black women don’t hire doulas for the luxury of it. They hire doulas so their lives can be saved, because they understand the bureaucracy of what they’re up against. We focus on how to pay attention, and how to go up against the Western system in order to save a life.
Did you take this same approach in creating your other doula programs as well? There really is a doula for everything— how did these trainings come about?
The Birth Doula Training is a really beautiful combination of history. It’s the understanding of how obstetrics and gynaecology came to be, it’s the understanding of how Black bodies were used as experiments, it’s the understanding of science and evidence, and it’s learning the execution of business— all wrapped into one.
The Sex Doula Training came about because there’s such a disconnect with the body, especially if you've recently gaven birth. In birthing situations you’ll probably hear the phrase: I don’t want to look down there. Now, “down there” is a term I’m not too fond of. So, how do we bridge that gap? How do we help people see that sex is the thread through it all?
What we’re finding with the Sex Doula Intimacy Coach Training is that there are so many layers that people need to unpack just to realign themselves with their bodies. Especially with Black bodies— we’ve been raped ever since we’ve been here. So there’s an automatic dissociation from a physical, and even a cellular DNA stand point with us.
Even in the Holistic Fertility Doula Program, it’s like— how do we focus this practice on a holistic point of view that helps to decongest the system? We understand that medicine can definitely play a part, we don’t negate that. It’s just not the only thing.
You’ve helped there to be other options and more systems of support in place, it’s filling a very necessary need. That being said, what are some of the biggest issues Black women are facing when it comes to maternal health right now?
Not being heard. Not being respected. And we don’t feel pain. The number one thing is we “don’t feel pain”. But if we can control the pain, we can control what’s causing the pain. But first, to control the pain— that needs to be heard.
Absolutely. Is that your hope for the future of Black maternal health?
Well, we need to completely eradicate Western medicine. Point, period, blank. It’s based on the patriarchy, it’s based on a system of racism. So we need to completely annihilate it so we can build it up again from the ground up. And it needs to be built by people who are affected by the decisions made— not by people without uteruses. We need to do that. When we talk about defunding the police and reforming housing laws, we also need to include conversations about Western medicine— especially when it pertains to obstetrics and gynaecology.
Interview has been edited for length and clarity.