Where do you support births?

Anywhere within 1 hour of my home in Silver Spring, MD. I support hospital births, birth center births, and homebirths at which there is a midwife present.

What types of births do you support?

I am passionate about providing nonjudgmental and heartfelt support for your birth choices. I support both medicated and unmedicated labors, vaginal and Cesarean births, and all variations. I also support stillbirth and termination.

What do you think you offer that is unique as a doula and photographer?

I really get to know my clients before birth - with 7 hours of childbirth education, a prenatal meeting, and more phone calls and meetings as desired, I have usually spent more than 10 hours together with you and your partner before your birth. This is unusual for doulas and pretty unique for birth photographers. The birth portraits I take feel different because I know and appreciate you as a whole person - I’m not just shooting specific moments in the action, I’m honoring and capturing you. Not all doulas can be birth photographers, and not all photographers can be doulas. I really love filling both these roles. Finally, I do comprehensive childbirth education with all my clients, so that by the time birth comes, you feel confident that you already have everything you need inside you to birth your baby. I love what I call a “whole brain” approach to this preparation, where I can get left-brain analytical with all the skills I learned in my PhD to talk you through the evidence base for different interventions, and in the next moment, we’re going deep into right brain, intuitive processing by creating birth art to explore your hopes and fears in a safe and supportive space. Please reach out if you think we are a good fit, I can’t wait to meet you!

Do you offer different doula packages?

I do this work because I want to accompany you on your entire childbirth journey. As such, I have put together a package that includes childbirth education, tailored to your needs, and a postpartum doula visit. This allows us to build a meaningful relationship that best supports your birth journey from start to finish. I have also found that birth photography helps clients process their birth and see their own power in a special way, so I now include it for all doula clients. Newborn photography is optional - feel free to ask me more!

How many clients do you take?

I take about 6-8 clients per year so that I can focus on one client at a time, and only work with clients for whom I truly believe I am the right doula to support their family and journey through birth. I am usually on call for only you and no other families simultaneously. This minimizes the risk of needing to call a backup and makes sure I can bring my all to our work together.

Do I get to say how or if my birth or newborn images are shared with others?

1000% yes! All the images shared on this site were shared with the enthusiastic consent of the client. First and foremost, my goal with birth photography is to help you see your own power as you brought your baby into the world, whether you felt powerful or not at the time. Part of honoring your power is respecting that these images are yours, and you get to decide who gets to see them! Some clients feel moved to share a few, some, or all of their images more publicly as part of a shared mission to put more positive, empowering images of birth out into the world, but this is by no means expected. You always get to decide.

What’s the difference between the Fresh 48 and in-home newborn photography options?

Fresh 48 sessions occur within 48 hours of birth, and tend to be slightly more documentary in nature, as you are still freshly recovering from birth. These take place at your place of birth. In-home sessions occur 7-14 days out and are more like lifestyle sessions, with slightly more posing direction while still keeping things relaxed.

Why “wild thistle”?

Have you ever tried to kill a thistle? You fucking can’t! That’s the kind of resilience I know you to be capable of as you navigate birth. A thistle’s seemingly endless resilience comes from an interconnected root system, which reflects how I believe we all deserve to give birth with support and within community. Thistles are ungovernable, beautiful, and full of life - like birth.