My interest in pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum issues

All my life I have been interested in and fascinated by the events surrounding child birth (pregnancy, postpartum, infancy, ...), even as far back as early childhood (age 4 or 5). My interest lead me to first start studying nursing (with plans of being a labour & delivery nurse), then switch my focus to work in a non-medical aspect supporting families (I recently earned my bachelor's degree in Human Ecology, Family Social Sciences).  For the past couple of years, I have spend my career heading in a different direction (working with older adults). And although I love my job, when I found out I was pregnant, I realized how much I am missing out by not following my true passion.

When I took my child birth education classes (from a local non-profit called Manitoba Childbirth and Family Education), I realized how much I'd love to be a doula and a childbirth educator. I had previously thought about becoming a doula but I wondered if the timing wouldn't be right since I had never been pregnant, never mind gave birth. I thought that I'd have more to offer as a doula once I had 'been there'. This is not to say that doulas who haven't given birth wouldn't be great as well!  Now that I have 'been there', I feel this is the perfect time to pursue my dream of working with soon-to-be and new families in this capacity.

My interest has led me to start a new blog that focuses on issues surrounding pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period (including parenting), with a more natural focus.  The blog will be education and current issues (news) based.  I am currently working on the design and hoping to get the website up and running within the next few weeks.  In the meantime, I have decided to start posting articles on Everything Up Close.  The articles will eventually appear on the new website as well.

Upcoming articles will include one on water birth and two follow-up articles on the birth pool in a box, an objective informational article and a review article (my experience using the birth pool in a box for my daughter's birth).  I will also be posting a couple of book reviews on birth issues (first, Ina May Gaskin's newest book, Birth Matters).

I hope you enjoy these articles and will join me over at my new blog website once it is launched.  In the meantime, you can follow my new twitter account for everything Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Postpartum related - @beaubeginnings.  If these topics are of interest to you, you may want to check out my current follow list (some great people and organizations)!

If these topics don't interest you, I hope you will continue to stop by Everything Up Close and enjoy my articles that help you to Spend, Save, and Savour Life Smartly, with lots of reviews and giveaways as usual.