Jennifer Creel, BS, LM, CBE

I moved to Fayetteville in 1993 to attend college at the University of Arkansas where I received aBachelors of Science degree in Zoology. I fell in love with the Fayetteville community and decided to stay and make this town my home.

After the birth of my first daughter Greenley in April of 1995, I began my journey toward midwifery. Greenley’s birth was a typical hospital birth filled with interventions and minimal loving support from the hospital staff. Although I loved my baby, I was left with feelings of confusion and frustration that were accompanied with breastfeeding problems. I assumed that breastfeeding was a natural process and would be easy. That was not entirely the case. My mother had been an avid La Leche League attendee and she recognized that I needed help. I began attending La Leche League meetings and not only learned about breastfeeding, but also met other mothers. Many of these mothers had given birth at home. When the homebirth moms described their experiences, there was one common denominator to their stories – empowerment. I immediately found out more about homebirth. I was astounded to learn of the safety, loving compassion and the continuity of care associated with the Midwifery Model of Care. As I discovered more about midwifery, I felt positive that I wanted to help women and families experience the control and empowerment a drug free homebirth provides.

Then in 1997 I nervously contacted Kate Conway, a local midwife starting a midwifery school. I spoke with Kate and soon began apprenticing and attending births with her, Teresa Elder and Bonnie Bowen. I also attended the Arkansas Midwives School and Services to acquire the academic portion of my training. While in school, I experienced my first homebirth with my daughter Elleya. It was fantastic. I felt so strong and loved having my baby with me from the moment she was born. My husband Curt loved being the first person to hold and touch our baby.

In 2000 I received my degree in Midwifery and received my midwifery license allowing me to found Birthroot Midwifery. In 2001 I gave birth to my first son Huxley, at home of course.

Over the past twelve years of participating in midwifery, I have loved serving families and the community in such an intimate and passionate way. In the past three years, I have been so grateful to the community for loving and supporting me and my family after the sudden and unexpected death of our daughter Elleya in July of 2005. The Fayetteville community and birth community supported and loved my family in every possible way. One way in which help and comfort arrived was in the construction efforts on the Birthroot Midwifery office. My husband, along with many talented homebirth dads, created the beautiful space where we now care for families and babies. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! It has helped me tremendously to come back to work. It is fantastic to be a part of each family’s joy. At this point in time, I have had the privilege of helping with over 200 births and look forward to many more years as a community midwife.

Shawn Elyce House, CPM, LM

I moved to Fayetteville in the Spring of 2004 to study midwifery at the Arkansas Midwifery School and Services. Although the school disbanded the following Fall and I was never able to take classes there, I did meet some amazing midwives and was able to start my apprenticeship. I continued my apprenticeship for the next three
years, while taking some structured classes and lots of self-study. I became licensed in the state of Arkansas in August of 2007 and received my Certified Professional Midwife license in the Spring of 2010.

During this time, I met my future husband, we married and had our first child together in December of 2009. Her homebirth was an awesome, powerful and life-changing experience for me. It was a long and hard labor, and changed the woman and midwife that I am. I am so grateful for the opportunity to give birth at home and to have
supportive midwives around me.

After Emma Jean was born, I decided to take some time off from midwifery starting at the beginning of this year. I have very much enjoyed the time to focus on my family, but I have missed birth, pregnant ladies and babies!

My midwifery practice has never been large, since we live in Boxley. However, I have consistently backed-up and attended births with other midwives, in addition to helping my own clients.

I am grateful to have the opportunity to join the Birthroot Midwifery team and help more families. Birth changes who we are, no matter where it happens. I appreciate that I can help women and their families experience birth on their own terms.

Rebekah Wood, Postpartum Doula

Rebekah Wood is bringing a new dimension to the services that Birthroot Midwifery offers. Rebekah is certified as a postpartum doula. Rebekah began her training as a postpartum doula in April of this year. She received her training through the Doula Organization of North America (DONA) which offers training workshops for both birth and postpartum doulas.

Rebekah’s parents moved to Northwest Arkansas when she was 21, and she followed them here. She’s been living in Northwest Arkansas for about 13 years now and loves the family community here. She feels like it’s a very supportive, safe and fun place to raise a family.

Rebekah had a planned homebirth for her daughter and felt lucky to have the support of people around her for several weeks following her birth while she recovered and focused on her new relationship with her daughter. Even with all of that help, she faced many physical and emotional challenges around becoming a new mom. For Rebekah, as for many new moms, there were lots of tears, lots of trial and error, and lots of wishing she could just take a shower…

This made her think a lot about women who do not have a lot of help available to them during postpartum recovery. She couldn’t imagine trying to go through it alone. Because Rebekah knew that the help she had received was such a gift, she decided that she wanted to do what she could to give other women that same gift.

It became even more real to her, and became an even more important goal when one of Rebekah’s close friends had a difficult birth and recovery. At the time, this friend was living several hours away from any friends or family and was obviously struggling. Over the few weeks following her birth, it became obvious that her friend was suffering from postpartum depression. Rebekah worked with her friend’s husband to provide her with much needed help.

Over a few days, they teamed together to provide her with simple things like healthy meals, the chance to shower, someone to do a load of laundry and it allowed her to make some amazing progress. That show of support and time to breathe gave her friend a chance to assess her situation, see that she needed help and seek counseling. In retrospect, a postpartum doula could have provided the help she needed, and could have saved her a lot of heartache. In helping her, Rebekah knew that she could do this for other women and find a lot of joy in it as well.

The main role of a postpartum doula is to help ease the transition of having a new member of the family. Doulas offer support and encouragement as well as very basic help. They help with everything from tips on changing diapers, and tricks to help calm a fussing baby, to doing a load of laundry and helping with older children as needed. Doulas are also trained to watch for signs of postpartum depression and to equip new moms and dads to cope with all of the exciting changes in their new family. Each new family has different needs, and the doula is there to meet those needs in whatever way she can. A doula’s role is as varied as the families that need her.

Even with all the lack of sleep and the many challenges that come with a newborn, the early weeks of parenthood can be beautiful and full of magical moments. My personal goal as a postpartum doula is to help manage the challenging stuff so that you can focus on the magical parts. If there’s one piece of advice I can offer to new/expectant moms, it’s to accept every offer of help that is given to you. -- Rebekah

To learn more about DONA and becoming certified as a birth or postpartum doula, you can go their website at: www.dona.org