About Us In 2007, the initial aim of The Doula Project, formerly the Abortion Doula Project, was to provide people choosing to terminate their pregnancies with all of the benefits of what is typically known to be the territory of birth doulas: pain management and relaxation techniques, information and education about pregnancy, and above all, emotional support and empathy. The founders of the project, all reproductive justice activists and birth doulas, came to this work to fill a very distinct gap that pushed into both sides of the reproductive justice framework in the context of abortion and in the context of birth. While recently there have been forums in which birth activists and abortion activists have comingled, a divide still exits. The Doula Project works to connect the choices, needs, and experiences of people across the spectrum of pregnancy and to provide support for these people no matter what their choice may be.
The Doula Project is coordinated by two of the founding members and is home to several volunteer trained abortion and birth doulas. Trainings were designed by the coordinators to provide the abortion doulas with a steady understanding of the abortion procedure, the clientele we serve, and workshops in counseling, meditation and self-care, among many others. Doulas who received birth doula training did so independently through an established certifying organization.
While the Project did originally intend to center on abortion, the presence of those who came to abortion clinics because of miscarriage and lethal fetal anomaly began a shift in the way we approached the project. Likewise, as our trained birth doulas worked with birth mothers through our partnership with the pro-choice adoption agency Spence-Chapin, it became less and less appropriate to consider ourselves solely as “abortion doulas.” In early 2009, we changed our name to The Doula Project and adjusted our mission, vision, values, and constituent base.
The partnerships we have with clinics and organizations is crucial to the work we do as it provides a means for doula support to all clients who are served by these institutions. Traditionally, the interaction between clients and doulas is structured around a private, often monetary interaction, wherein the client seeks out the doula service. Because the goals of The Doula Project emphasize accessibility, we had to appeal to clinics and organizations rather than individual clients to incorporate the doula model of care into their services. In doing so, doulas become a part of the clinic structure not only for clients, but also for clinic staff. Likewise, for birth mothers choosing adoption the idea of a doula often seems out of reach. However, many birth mothers do not have a support network that they can turn to, nor do they necessarily know what to expect during their labor. By creating a partnership with Spence-Chapin the doula service can be offered directly to the pregnant person, free of charge.
As The Doula Project extends itself to new communities, we have received positive responses from around the country from activists and clinics who are interested in beginning a similar project. In an effort to meet their needs, we are developing a training curriculum and organizing the Training and Networking Circle to offer more intensive support to start-up doula services throughout the U.S.
After 18 months, we have served over 1,000 women in the NYC area. In 2010, we will expand our service to at least 2 more NYC clinics to serve women having abortions or experiencing fetal loss, at least 1 hospital/organization to serve women giving birth, and launch our Training and Networking Circle for doulas working across the spectrum of pregnancy around the country.