Serena's support was truly a vital blessing in an unbelievably challenging chapter. I had a…read morepremature baby who was struggling with feeding and weight gain. Nothing was working. I was triple feeding and burning the candle at both ends on top of the emotional strain of feeling like my body failed. Serena made me feel grounded and whole when everything felt chaotic and out of my control. She normalized some of the challenges that we were experiencing. She gave me really grounded advice that helped me set expectations. Including really thinking about risks and benefits when dealing with a baby who had oral aversion. Rather than focusing on every feed or every ounce on the scale, she helped me focus on the big picture of helping the baby feel safe and in control in his own body and developing a mother and infant bond that would support our long-term journey. Not only did she offer a calming presence, good advice, but she continued to be available and responsive weeks months, and even years down the road. She supported me with my second baby years later, and has continued to be a supportive, trusted person in my life. I call her my Milk Fairy GOdmother. She truly was a blessing.

It is no wonder Serena has 5 star ratings. Our 8 wk old baby started showing slow weight gain and…read moreas a first time parent, I was so worried and overwhelmed. From our first call, Serena was kind, thorough and asked all the right questions. She made time to come over within days, immediately pinpointed the issue, and created a clear feeding plan that gave me so much relief. She even reached out to our pediatrician right after and they called me the same day to schedule a weight check by end of the week! Serena's care doesn't stop at your session -- she checks in often and is always available by text, making me feel completely supported and never alone. She's warm, friendly, non-judgmental and turned a scary situation into something manageable. We're still working with her but I couldn't wait to share. Even though we're not out of the woods yet, I feel a million times better knowing Serena is by our side. If you're considering working with her, don't hesitate -- she's a gem!

I HIGHLY RECOMMEND Loving Arms Childbirth Services' birthing class! Jessica Cristen was our…read moreinstructor, and she was excellent! She's a certified midwife and lactation support specialist, with years of experience. Taking this class was the best decision I made for preparing for the birth of our baby girl. (even with the countless books I read and classes taken from Kaiser) My birth did NOT go at all as expected, but thanks to these classes I was super well prepared about all the possibilities that could occur during labor & delivery and helped my partner and I be on the same page (and have my partner know how he could best support me). Thus when things started to go different than what we prepared for in our birthing plan, we were really able to navigate the various options skillfully and have educated conversations with our care team. This made me feel way more secure when my health was declining during delivery. Even though I didn't have the birth I pictured for myself, I felt I had a wonderful birth story thanks to the classes from Loving Arms and our care support team. The class is very comfortable, super educational, and a good place to meet other couples about to have babies too. The instructors here really care about helping new families, and have years of experience and maturity. Again, best decision to take this class here @ Loving Arms. So glad I chose them!

We are so grateful we found Loving Arms and were able to take their childbirth prep class. I didn't…read morewant to have a doula and these courses helped me feel so knowledgeable about what to expect during childbirth and allowed my husband to know how best to support me. The lactation support and honest expectations about what to expect in the first few days with a newborn were invaluable. I ended up not having time to get an epidural and without this class, I think I would have panicked giving birth. However, armed with the knowledge from the courses, I was able to get through it and have a positive experience. Another plus is that we were able to bond with the other couples in the class and are still in touch now 9 months after our babies were born. Highly suggest!

Hiring Erin was one of the best decisions we made as first-time parents. From day one, she brought…read moreso much knowledge, warmth, and reassurance. She helped us understand our newborn's cues, feeding, sleep, soothing techniques, and so much more. No question was ever too small for Erin. She gave both my husband and me the confidence we needed as new parents. Her support during my breastfeeding journey was truly amazing. I went through mastitis that eventually developed into a breast abscess requiring surgery, and it was one of the hardest parts of my postpartum recovery. Her experience with lactation, practical advice, and constant encouragement helped me through one of the most difficult times. She also cared for our baby girl with so much love and tenderness, which gave us complete peace of mind. On top of that, she prepared the most amazing homemade meals. Her chicken recipe was so yum! We are so grateful for everything Erin did for us. If you're looking for a postpartum doula who is experienced, compassionate, professional, and truly passionate about supporting new families, I cannot recommend Erin highly enough.

There are no words worthy to describe how incredible Erin is. I was beyond lucky to come across her…read moreon my search for a doula. She was mentoring Julia at the time so I was able to have the knowledge and insight from these two incredible humans during my journey. Erin clearly demonstrates she has years of experience being a doula. The organized nature of Erin's practice continued from the introduction call all the way through each and every pre labor visit, and even after into postpartum care. Every session helped pave the path for my labor to become a dream (I know, some first time moms reading this might think it's hard to believe!). Erin was not only there for me weeks leading up to birth but also afterwards- guiding me through the newborn stage and with breastfeeding. I remember waking up one morning in tears as I was navigating one of my first nights of cluster feeding bouts and Erin came to help only a few short hours later. This type of support is unmatched during these desperate first few weeks with a newborn and this was such a shining example of Erin's compassion and true desire to help. What I love about Erin is her individualized approach, as you bring up issues/concerns, she employs her vast bank of tips and tricks to help you address issues of baby while factoring in the mental health of the parents to make the game plan doable in a time where you are merely trying to survive. I truly could not praise Erin enough and would 100% wish Erin could be everyone's doula because like my husband and I have said a million times we just couldn't imagine this era of our lives without her.

Savanna was amazing my lactation consultant. She listened to what I had to say, thoroughly examined…read morehow I was breastfeeding and the latch, and offered different techniques and options for me so that I could decide what works best for me and my baby. She is very personable, communicates consistently, and follows up including what we had discussed during the appointment. I highly recommend her.

My husband and I have been to 3 lactation consultants provided by the hospital before seeing molly…read more They did not work for me. I thought the amount of pain that I was experiencing while breastfeeding was somewhat a given and that I just needed to get through the first couple months. I went from using S&S when I didn't have enough milk my first week, to getting my baby's tongue tie snipped, to nipple shield, to getting clogged ducts, to removing the nipple shield and getting blood blisters and peeling of the nipple skin. Breastfeeding became something I dreaded everyday. When my husband would ask If i wanted to breastfeed, I kept postponing hoping that my nipples would have enough time to heal. A friend of mine recommended seeing Molly. Even though insurance didn't cover it, I wanted to give it one last chance before deciding to exclusively pump. With Molly, I had a breakthrough. It's only been 2 days since I've seen her and my son is able to latch deeply several times without giving me pain. She was able to point out how to help him latch deeply and also provide tips on how we can bottle feed in a way that would help transition him back to the boob. We started practicing this right away. The way she communicated was unlike other lactation consultants that I've seen. She was quite friendly, understanding, and encouraging. She took the pressure off to get breastfeeding down- unlike like my third consultant who would say it's "breastfeeding boot camp". She encouraged me to try and practice at least once a day. It didn't feel as overwhelming and it took a huge burden off my shoulders. I highly recommend seeing Molly if you're struggling with your breastfeeding journey! Thank you Molly!

We had an extremely rough start with breastfeeding (our baby had a tongue tie, trouble latching,…read moretrouble opening her mouth wide enough, I was exclusively pumping, I got mastitis multiple times, it developed into abscesses, etc.). Molly's pragmitism-meets-optimism helped us make it through this extremely trying time. Her technical expertise is beyond compare, but what makes her care extra valuable is her unwavering understanding of what it takes to support people who are struggling. I think I told her this at some point, and it probably sounded like a sleep-deprived thing to say, but she is like a protectress from Arthurian times, defending the magic of breastfeeding for as many mamas and babies as possible.

I have received multiple massages from Gracie during pregnancy and postpartum and they have all…read morebeen fabulous. Especially when I was 9 months pregnant, she did a fantastic job making sure I felt comfortable and helping relieving the physical pain of the third trimester. During postpartum, I have received a couple of massages for back pain related to breastfeeding and I always leave feeling rejuvenated and more aligned. Highly recommend

I reached out to Brilliant Births to find a birth doula. They offer a matching service and…read moreconnected me to 3 doulas who work independently (not employees of BB). We were really fortunate to find our birth doula (who we love!), but the other 2 candidates were not very impressive. The first doula missed our appointment with no follow-up communication. We were initially confused and thought she was the coordinator for BB, because she only communicated by text. The actual meeting was just by telephone so there was no face-to-face interaction, which felt strange. We could've easily FaceTimed or Zoomed. So communication and reliability were not great. The second doula abruptly canceled our half-hour appointment when we were 10 minutes late for a 30-minute appointment due to my husband wrapping up a Zoom meeting. During our appointment time, she was responding to my emails (in which I apologized for being late), but insisted she could no longer meet with us. I thought this was a really bad sign about what she would be like to work with - labor and delivery is rarely precisely timed and some flexibility is needed. In addition, her email said that she lives in Portola Valley, but we live Berkeley (also where Brilliant Births is located). This also struck me as strange, because it would take 1.5 hours for her to arrive to meet us at the hospital, which is not ideal.

It's 8pm on a Saturday night and I am relaxing on my couch having a glass of wine. My little man…read morehas been sleeping in his crib since he fell asleep there, ON HIS OWN, SEVEN minutes after we put him down - without a peep. You read that right. Since I have such ample time, this review will be a long one. I gave you fair warning. I'm not so rigid to think or expect that every night will unfold like tonight. There will be teeth! walking! talking! more regressions to come. However, a month after starting this process, it has become a reasonable reality for me to expect that on more days/nights rather than not (meaning NAPS and bedtime), he will go to sleep. It is a work in progress, but Dahlia guided us through it with the confidence and clarify we ourselves needed to provide to our son for the process to work. The backstory: At 11 weeks old, my son morphed from our lovely sleeping newborn waking twice a night to waking EVERY HOUR, needing to be soothed back to sleep...while sleeping in our bed. As the weeks dragged on, it became clear he was not going to outgrow this hiccup in an amount of time that would preserve my sanity (or marriage lol), and things were snowballing from bad to dreadful (more on that below). He eventually settled on a pattern of waking 4-7 times per night; however, he started having negative sleep associations to most every soothing trick in the book. I won't waste time listing such strategies or the gimmicks I bought on Amazon. Well-meaning folks always shared their soothing strategies. Well, if you can envision it, we tried it. Don't start to tell me about white noise and black out shades. Eventually, NOTHING WORKED except the boob. So sleep - meaning all naps and bedtime plus the night wake ups - became an hour long battle with raging, screaming, kicking, tears. All of which did not guarantee an outcome of sleep in the end! This was a vicious cycle on repeat at least 4 times daily which went on for almost two months (give or take some days where baby was so exhausted he slept well for a night or two). On top of this, I had impending abdominal and oral surgeries. Just icing on the cake. We knew we had to sleep train. After pouring through blogs and books about the various sleep training techniques and studies, I still had reservations (and extreme anxiety subjecting my baby to this), and needed someone to lead me through its ups and downs. Alright I'll be honest - sleep training is mostly down. It is painful. Gutwrenchingly PTSD painful if your baby is anything like mine. Enter Dahlia. She is honest, positive, supportive, respectful, and above all, will use her knowledge to SEE YOU THROUGH IT. She makes herself available and genuinely wants to help you. I cannot thank her enough and I definitely promise you will not get that from a blog. So dread. I used to DREAD naps and bedtime. The clock would hit 5:30pm and my heart would sink a little. My soul would wail a sad song. Now, I think about the time I can spend writing long reviews and blogging while he's sleeping. And the biggest plus? The little man wakes up RELAXED and RESTED and happy to see me. THANK YOU DAHLIA!

Dahlia is the BEST! We hired her for 3 months of postpartum work, which is no small task with…read moretwins! She was so caring, nurturing, and gentle with our babies, her experience was only outweighed by her sweetness and profound gift for "twinning". I feel so lucky to have had her work with us, she taught us (first-time parents) so much, from swaddling to bathing to infant massage! Every morning when Dahila arrived it was a ray of sunshine and positive energy, my babies responded so well to her songs, her feeding techniques, and her cuddles. We were so sad to say goodbye to her when it was time, and are almost jealous of the next family that gets to work with her! :) :)

Sarah provided me with compassionate and expert support in my journey feeding my kiddo. I greatly…read moreappreciated her warm, non-judgmental approach and her wise advice. She was able to meet with me on short notice, followed up via text to check in on me after our first appointment, and has fielded several questions via email, even while she was traveling. I am very grateful for her support and would highly recommend her!

At 5 days postpartum, I was feeling incredibly stressed and overwhelmed, but Sarah came to our home…read moreimmediately to help. She spent several hours with my husband and me, teaching us everything from the basics of breastfeeding and milk supply to the specifics of breast anatomy. Her calm demeanor was exactly what we needed; she completely eased my anxiety and gave us the confidence we were lacking. This was truly the most helpful support we've received since coming home from the hospital. If you are looking for an expert who is both knowledgeable and deeply compassionate, look no further.