About

My first experience with birth that was not my own child’s was a friend’s in Arizona, in 1997. A mother of three, I have been active in the Santa Cruz birth community since shortly after the homebirth of my third child, Henry, at home in 2002.

My particular passion is ensuring that women understand that they have options in birth—and the benefits and risks of various choices—so that they can make the best choice for themselves and their babies.

After many years as a doula and four years of midwifery school and apprenticeship, I was licensed by the Medical Board of California in March 2010. By the close of 2020, I had attended more than 500 births.

I served on the board of directors for Birth Network of Santa Cruz County for several years. I love educating young people and have taught the childbirth portion of a local junior high’s sex education program since 2010. Additionally, I have participated in career fairs and panels at local junior highs and high schools in the area.

I joined forces with another amazing midwife, Tari Neill, LM CPM (that’s her, above!), to create Pacific Community Midwives. We each have independent practices but collaborate and back one another up. See our website for more information. Please note that neither of us is taking clients in 2021.

I was co-founder of a midwifery advocacy group, also with Tari, called Birth Santa Cruz that ran for 10 years as both a website and Facebook presence. Based in community, Birth Santa Cruz organized yearly picnics for midwives and families. With snow cones! And face painting! It was also a great way to stay up to date about what’s going on with birth locally and nationally; it is now defunct. You can see some of our flyers and postcards here. 

From 2011-2014, I was Regional Co-Rep for the California Association of Midwives (CAM). I continued to work on projects with their sister organization, the California Association of Licensed Midwives (CALM), including keeping midwives updated on continuing education opportunities, meeting with state legislators on midwifery issues, and creating a welcome packet for newly licensed midwives in the state. If you have an interest in seeing it, please email me and, if appropriate, I can provide you the password.

In all my midwifery work, I drew heavily on my background in writing, editing, and proofreading materials including brochures, client handouts, postcards, posters and displays, and more. Click here.