Laurel Ripple Carpenter is a radical doula, reproductive rights activist, abortion advocate, maker of feminist art, anarchist, partner, and mama to the fiestiest red-headed toddler ever. She publishes the CUNTastic Zine, is founder of The Doula Partnership, and lives at the Black Diaper Collective in Grand Junction, Colorado. Contact her at laurel@cuntastic.org.

Websites are: blog & zine, doula non-profit, feminist art, and doula website.

RD: What inspired you to become a doula?

LRC: My own experience with an unplanned pregnancy sent me on a journey of discovering reproductive health. I began studying reproductive rights and pro-choice politics, and became passionately committed. When I independently designed my Bachelor’s degree as the Anthropology of Reproduction, I began to understand reproductive rights as a continuum, from pregnancy and birthing to abortion and birth control, rather than one end of a spectrum. Being a doula is one way for me to support women in their choices about their bodies, and is a great addition to my other reproductive rights work.

RD: What is your doula philosophy and how does it fit into your broader political beliefs?

LRC: As a doula, I advocate for the birth that the mother desires, whether that’s medicated or unmedicated, at home or in the hospital. I am particularly committed to serving marginalized populations, including teen moms, survivors of abuse & assault, recent immigrants, incarcerated women, non-English speakers, and non-traditional families. Doing this work, and doing the work of raising my own child in our non-traditional family, are the most radical acts I could ever enagage in.

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This is a series highlighting folks who identify as Radical Doulas. Are you interested in being part of the series? Email me.

Nicole Webb, this week’s Radical Doula, can be reached at NicolaLaDoula@activist.com.

RD: What inspired you to become a Doula?

NW: Like so many Doulas, my own birth experiences led me to this path. I experienced a normal hospital birth when my first son was born. I was not unsatisfied with the birth, because I was so extremely grateful not to have had a surgical birth. I had an epidural, too many IV pokes, failed forceps, sucessful vacuumed birth. The hospital staff allowed me to push for over 3 hours, numb, before using the tools. I didn’t feel anything until the day and weeks following the birth. That’s when all that missed pain and missed signals to move came back to haunt me. After this birth, I learned the vast importance of the transition to motherhood because of my own needs and my own mother helping me. It is a huge rite of passage and we rarely treat is as such.

It was when my second was born that I realized what had been missed with my first. I had an unmedicated birth, on hands and knees in a sports bra, with a hospital midwife. I learned that the pain of birth is only the movement of the baby and it completely ends when the job is over. It doesn’t last for weeks like an epidural and too much inneffective pushing might cause. I never even needed a pain reliever after this birth. After the birth, I had that bonding experience I had read about. I had the “runners high” and feelings of incredible power, energy and pride in my abilities. I felt and still feel that I can do anything. And it feels like an unintended consequence of hospital birth is robbing women of this empowering experience. It feels like hospitals birth robs women and children of the intense bodning that should occur immediately after birth, an imprinting of sort.

RD: What is your Doula philosophy and how does it fit into your broader political beliefs?

NW: As a doula, I want to allow women to learn enough to make informed choices. I want to assist women to build the kind of birth that empowers them and thier choices. Not a birth that leaves them feeling drained, emotionally and physically, that seems to prevail our society. Politically I feel the same; we should not uphold (pay for via taxes) a government that treats us like incompetent morons, limits our choices and eliminates responsibility altogether. I believe it’s time for a huge change, politically, and I think that those changes would be the first step to eliminating corporate control of government that leads to corporate government control of health care and limitations in choice.

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This is a series highlighting folks who identify as Radical Doulas. Are you interested in being part of the series? Email me.

Introducing Jill Wodnick, this week’s radical doula:

RD: What inspired you to become a doula?

JW: Being a doula seemed a natural outlet for my myriad of passions: women’s studies, healing arts/body work and public policy. As soon as I found out what a doula was, the calling was clear. I truly love that my doula care enables me to share chants, mantras, recipes, and work in the wise woman tradition AND be part of improving maternity care by knowing evidence based practices and policies that are essential for maternal infant health.

RD: What is your Doula philosophy and how does it fit into your broader political beliefs?

JW: Working one on one, my philosophy is very compassionate and seeks to awaken one’s deep intuition and instincts for labor and life as a mother. My broader political belief encompasses that social justice begins with birth (access to prenatal care, reducing racial perinatal disparities, legislative policies to support breastfeeding intiation and retention). Seeing birth as a reproductive rights issue really is meaningful. I am inspired by the cogent and clear policy messages of ‘MomsRising.org’ to create legislative reform.

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