i truly cannot recommend sunshine enough…read more this was my first pregnancy and first labor so i went into it like "okay... i wont feel anything until im 8cm, my water will break and i'll sneeze my baby out" lmao, i was in for a humbling awakening and having her there helped ground me and improved the entire experience for me. i had a hospital birth and got an epidural, but something i really appreciated was that she still helped me advocate for myself the entire time and helped me avoid the "cascade of interventions" that can happen afterwards. i never felt judged for any choice i made, just genuinely supported and informed. my labor was longggg and honestly really painful and exhausting because the hospital was understaffed and i couldn't get the epidural for like 5 hours (after already being in labor for 12hrs), sunshine knew SO many positions, techniques, movements, counter pressure tricks, peanut ball positions, literally everything. every time something stopped working she already had another idea ready. there were moments where i was like "yeah i actually cannot do this anymore" and she stayed so calm and grounding through all of it. her postpartum support alone deserves its own review because my first day home from the hospital, i was delirious, sleep deprived, sobbing every 30 mins, my baby wasn't latching, and she came over to help me through everything with so much kindness and reassurance. she's incredibly informed but also just very chill and comforting to be around. nothing ever felt pushy or performative. i genuinely felt cared for as a person, not just "supported during labor." 10/10 highly recommend!!!!!!!!! she also took really beautiful photos to capture my delivery

From the moment I signed up for my first meet-and-greet to the moment my baby boy was placed in my…read morearms, ATX Doulas was truly exceptional. Every person my husband and I interacted with was kind, considerate, and incredibly knowledgeable. Sunshine was my birth doula, and even though we hadn't met prior to delivery, I can honestly say she was the best money I've ever spent. She helped me feel empowered throughout my induction--which was not my ideal scenario--and made sure I felt like an active participant in my birth, not just a "good patient." When the nursing staff was unavailable or less than ideal, Sunshine stepped in to help me find more comfortable positions and to encourage and educate both me and my husband during the toughest moments of labor. I cannot recommend her or ATX Doulas enough and would choose them again and again.

I truly don't even know where to begin when it comes to Chiminh, she was nothing short of a gift…read moreduring one of the most vulnerable and life-changing experiences of my life. From the very beginning, she didn't just "support" me, she empowered me. She took the time to educate me on every single stage of the journey: pre-birth, labor, delivery, and postpartum. Because of her, I didn't walk into birth feeling scared or uncertain. I walked in feeling informed, prepared, and confident. One of the most impactful things she gave me was the confidence to advocate for myself. She didn't just speak for me, she taught me how to use my own voice. That is something I will carry with me forever, not just in birth, but in life. She knew exactly when to step in, when to guide, and when to simply be there. And postpartum, she continued to show up with the same care, knowledge, and compassion. Calling her a doula honestly doesn't feel like enough, she felt like a fairy godmother in human form. Someone who walked beside me, lifted me up, and made me feel capable of something so powerful. If you are considering working with Chiminh, don't hesitate. She is truly special, and I am forever grateful to have had her by my side. We love you, Chiminh.

I can't say enough about how amazing our experience was working with Chiminh! From the very first…read morecall when I reached out to Chiminh, I was so impressed with her ability to make me feel heard and at ease. She was wonderful to work with leading up to our son's birth, and worked with me to manage my stress and expectations, and to give me the information, time, and space to come up with a plan for our birthing preferences for my second child's birth (paying particularly close attention to my fears and anxieties from my first birthing experience). She was so encouraging and reassuring, handling many anxious phone calls and texts from me! I also credit the successful VBAC experience to Chiminh! She was incredibly informative and encouraging, leading up to labor and working hand in hand with my OB and nurses during the delivery process. She provided emotional support to me (and my husband), continually offered advice on how to get comfortable, what to do to help progress labor naturally, different pushing positions to try, and overall reassurance throughout the process (even with some highs and lows). She also provided amazing postpartum support care - continuing to provide emotional support for my family and me, and advice/helpful reminders around newborn care. Anytime I started to get overwhelmed, she grounded me to help me enjoy my leave. We absolutely loved working with Chiminh and cannot recommend her enough!! One last note - she also took a bunch of photos for us to document the birth which was amazing to have!

Highly, highly recommend Empowered Beginnings!! Ciarra supported us through the arrival of our…read moresecond baby, and she is the best! Super informative and a wealth of knowledge, helping us to feel empowered and informed during the process. Many doulas wait for questions - not Ciarra. She was very proactive with checking in often and anticipating support needed. Her knowledge is gold and she's so generous with her time. Also, Empowered Beginnings presents a community of families and has a wealth of resources available. They are the best if you want genuine and caring support for one of the most vulnerable times for a family... 5 stars!

Jes at Empowered Beginnings was so great!!! I had such a positive experience with her for overnight…read morecare and would definitely recommend her and Empowered Beginnings to anyone with a new little one looking for some help. Getting someone that is the right fit for taking care of your newborn is so important, and it was great knowing I had someone so caring and trustworthy to make sure I could catch up on sleep the nights I needed it! Plus she's just awesome. Love her and working with Ciarra on the back end was always easy and straightforward!

We used Austin Born prenatal and postpartum services. As new parents, the prenatal classes we…read moreattended were very informative and empowering. Unfortunately, we could not obtain maximum benefit of support groups and attend all classes due to pregnancy related illness. We did, however, feel a huge value of using Austin Born, was in the communication and correspondence with our Doula, Kim Borchert. She answered many emails, texts and calls in a very open-minded and timely manner. We were referred to amazing pregnancy specialists such as chiropractors, twin trainers and also given pain relieving techniques which greatly reduce the discomfort and frustration of carrying twins. As new parents of twins with no family nearby, our postpartum Doula service was important. Austin Born was holistic in every sense and we felt that we had not only one awesome doula checking in and supporting us in our home each day but also had a team of doulas with vast experience behind the scenes. Without Austin Born and our doula, Juanita Sawyer, we are not sure how we would've survived. From small suggestions of types of bottles to breast-feeding struggles to reflux management solutions, there is no obstacle this team can't fix. Now that our babies are older, we look back and realize the value Austin Born services is not in how many classes were attended or how many hours of doula services were provided. The value is most definitely in the knowledge, resources, accumulated experience and open-minded approach. In short, they were amazing and invaluable to us.

The Post Partum Doula support we received from Austin Born's amazing Stephanie was simply perfect…read more Seriously. Perfect. Stephanie is a doula and a lactation consultant, plus her sense of calm and reassurance helped us first time parents relax a little--which is saying a lot! We arranged to have Stephanie come on our first night home from the hospital with our beautiful baby. She provided lactation advice and created a priority list for me which we hung on the master bathroom door: 1. Feed baby 2. Feed Mommy (eat/drink) 3. Sleep Seems pretty simple, but after a week of sleep deprivation, the list helped stop my "one-more-thing" syndrome. For the first time in my life I was responsible for a needy, helpless, endlessly adorable baby--my baby. Who had time for sleep? Once I got into bed I was so amped up on adrenaline I couldn't shut down. My husband had to hold me tight to turn off the humming in my mind and body. I was finally able to sleep for an hour--it was a gift. My first nap after baby, along with Stephanie's unwavering, consistently calm, reassuring presence through those first days, gave me room to breathe and think again. She was there for many other firsts too in person, via phone, and via text. And I'm thankful for all of the support. There's nothing like having an expert to guide you through this miraculous journey--hopefully you'll get a chance to be as grateful as I am. Cheers to Austin Born!

Austin Doula Care is truly exceptional…read more From the moment we began working with Chelsea, Kim, and Chrys at Austin Doula Care, I felt deeply supported, informed, and cared for. Chelsea was our primary doula during pregnancy and birth, and Chrys supported us postpartum. Chelsea's presence during pregnancy and birth was grounding, empowering, and steady. She listened without judgment, shared knowledge without pressure, and held space in a way that made me feel calm, capable, and strong. She helped me trust my body and myself. Chrys's postpartum care was just as transformative. They cared not only for our baby, but for me: My healing, my emotions, my confidence as a new mother. They normalized the hard moments, celebrated the wins, and helped me feel healthy, supported, and seen during such an important time. If you are looking for doulas who are knowledgeable, compassionate, emotionally intelligent, and deeply respectful of your journey, I cannot recommend Austin Doula Care enough. I will forever be grateful for them!

From the moment I met Chelsea and Rachael, I knew I made the right choice in coming to Austin Doula…read moreCare. Their support extended far beyond childbirth support, from pregnancy check ins, the multitude of programs and classes at the office, as well as postpartum help, made my husband and I feel well cared for and confident about the journey of pregnancy and postpartum. Rachael's support during my pregnancy and childbirth was instrumental in me feeling empowered about every decision I made. She was a sounding board for each step of the way, helped me ask the right questions when needed, and assisted in crafting a birth plan and walking through all scenarios to make sure I felt prepared and confident. I am beyond grateful for her presence during my labor and baby's birth, as well as her postpartum help as I navigated things when my husband went back to work. A huge thank you to Rachael and the whole team at Austin Doula Care, I couldn't recommend their support more.

I truly can't say enough amazing things about Kati of BebeMoon Births, both as a Doula and as a…read moreperson! I had such a difficult first birth and was really fearing my second. The moment we decided Kati would be our Doula, I started to feel relieved. She listened to my entire story, all of my fears and all of my hopes. She helped me move beyond my first birth, embracing this second birth as uniquely as the child that would come from it. She didn't dismiss any feelings I had but instead validated and soothed me. She is a wealth of information on pregnancy and birth and her knowledge and guidance helped me avoid an unnecessary induction with questionable medications! With Kati by my side, I was able to welcome my second Son into the world and have the most amazing natural birth. The birth I had always wanted! My Husband and I had had a different Doula with our first birth and we had both taken Bradley method classes. Even though we were educated and prepared Kati still had come up with multiple ways to soothe my labor that we would have never considered. Our experience with her was so much more personal and satisfying, she doesn't just show up to do her job. She builds a relationship with you during pregnancy so that by the time you give birth- you trust her as deeply as a childhood friend. That makes ALL the difference! It takes a special person to be able to act on knowledge, experience, empathy and intuition as Kati does. She new exactly what I needed when I needed it, supporting me physically, emotionally and spiritually. She was my strength when I was weak and ready to give up. She is so wonderfully honest that when she tells you everything is going to be alright, you can actually believe her! Warm, compassionate and funny, she is everything a Doula should be and more. You can train as much as you want for the marathon that is birth but having someone by your side who is your champion and also your greatest resource is absolutely indispensable. I would never have another birth without her by my side!

Kati was very helpful and knowledgeable answering the questions I had during my pregnancy, labor,…read moreand postpartum. While doing my birth plan, Kati made me aware of all the options I had during labor. I didn't realize I had so much input when it came to delivering my child in a hospital setting. I highly recommend hiring Kati as your doula. To have somebody that is professional, trust worthy, and on your side to help you have the best birth you can is amazing. If I didn't have Kati's expertise and support I don't think I could have had the natural birth experience that I had when I have birth to my first child on June 24th 2014. Thank you Kati!!!

We found Anya through the Central Texas Doula Association and she was the first doula we met with…read more My husband and I felt almost instantly that she was the doula for us! Her passion for her work, for mamas and babies, is contagious and so comforting -- we knew we would be in the best hands through the prenatal journey and birth of our first child. And we were right! Anya was there for us every step of the way. She dedicated herself to getting to know us, getting to know our worries, wants, and wishes. I loved preparing for the arrival of our little one with her -- she shared so much wisdom and made me feel at ease both physically and mentally (the one-on-one yoga session included in our package was such a nice treat!). We were so ready when the day arrived to deliver our baby! By day, I really mean days... Anya was with us through an incredibly LONG natural labor that ended at the hospital. (But we still delivered vaginally and I owe so much of that to her!) Our journey began at the Austin Area Birthing Center on Monday night and ended on Wednesday morning. She spent every minute of that time encouraging me, supporting me and my husband (literally, like physically supporting me), standing up for and reminding me of the things I wanted and needed, and helping us make some really tough decisions. She was basically like family to me for all those days. It was bittersweet to go our own ways at the end -- sad because she had just shared with us the most momentous occasion of our lives and that kind of connection is so real, but sweet because she needed to rest too!!! Could we have done it all without her? Sure. Would we have wanted to? Absolutely not. I cannot recommend Anya enough if you're looking for a little extra support through your own prenatal/birth/postnatal journey. She's a force. You'll get so much more from your relationship than you ever expected!! We sure did.

Anya is an AMAZING force. I interviewed several doulas, but I went with Anya because of her energy…read more-- she was the perfect balance of confident, non-judgmental, calm and wise. I wanted someone who would help prepare and support me through a natural birth, but who wouldn't judge me if I changed my mind in the end. I'll never forget the thing she said to me in one of our prep meetings that really put me at ease, "There IS something -- a position or a technique -- that will help bring you relief during birth. We'll practice some options now and when the time is here, we'll find the exact one that will work for you." And we did just that. I can say for certain that there is no way we would have been able to avoid an epidural without all the prep she did with me and my husband ahead of time and without her calm, supportive presence in the room. We met with her several times ahead of the birth and she was super thorough with us, never rushed the process and made sure that we as first time parents were as confident as we could be going into this. She lent us books we could peruse if we wanted, but honestly her guidance ahead of time was so thorough and we were so ready for the big day even without taking a formal birthing / breathing class. She even did a prenatal yoga class with me in my home a couple of weeks before our baby arrived. We also hired her for the placenta encapsulation -- it was wonderful having someone who already knew us well do that for us and we opted for her to do it at our home, which sounded strange to us at first, but she scoured the kitchen before and after and in the end, it was a really cool learning process!

We had the pleasure of working with the Team at StorkATX for both Birth and Postpartum Doula care…read more From our first experience with Leah and Katie, we felt supported and cared for as they were extremely responsive and our needs were taken into account at every step of the way. They treated our family as part of their own family. We met with two doulas for initial interviews. Both really listened and focused on our needs and were non-judgmental of how we envisioned the birth to go. We were fortunate to have Savannah support us as our Labor Doula, and were matched with Taylor for our postpartum care. Our birth experience would have been very difficult without Savannah. She was responsive, so caring, and provided ongoing support in helping us navigate what turned out to be a very challenging day leading up to the birth of our daughter via emergency C-section. The nursing staff was fantastic, but Savannah acted as a personal advocate before, during, and even after our delivery. After we returned home, we felt like we bonded closely with our Postpartum Doula, Taylor as well. We feel very lucky to have had Taylor support us during our first few weeks home, particularly as we had a few unforeseen medical issues for mom arise. She was also knowledgeable, caring, and flexible to our needs and supportive of us in the transition to becoming parents. We don't know what we would have done without StorkATX, Savannah, and Taylor through our daughter's birth and supporting us as new parents. There are not enough words to speak highly enough of the overall care they provided, and overall quality of professionals who helped us during such a special time.

I absolutely recommend using Stork for your Doula needs. Randi was great at helping me understand…read morethe services offered. They worked diligently to find the right postpartum doula for our family, and boy did they! We love Christina-she is amazing. She is thoughtful, kind, and thorough. She reached out regularly to check in, even on days we weren't scheduled to have time together. Not to mention, she was great with our son! If we are lucky enough to add more children to our family in the future, we will definitely be asking for Christina again!

This was my third labor and first time using a Doula. It's one of those things that once you try -…read moreyou can't imagine another birth without one. I sort of want to fake going into labor again so I can get a massage from Kate;) My situation was a little different as I was a surrogate. It was important to me to have help and comfort as I labored, but also to have someone to explain things and keep the birth parents informed throughout the process as natural birth can be a little overwhelming if you've never experienced it. Both Kate and Jerrika are excellent at what they do, but Kate was on call and ended up as my rock during labor. She was the calm voice in my ear during each contraction, she knew the exact spot that I needed the pressure, and she just has an overall aura of calm that was especially comforting during my labor. I would highly recommend PBC to any expecting mama!

A few months before my due date and after having met and interviewed a dozen or so potential…read moredoulas, we hired Kate and Jerrika of PBC to serve as a birth doula. It was an excellent decision! Kate and Jerrika were warm and encouraging when I first met them and explained that I was planning a VBA2C. They are clearly passionate about their work as doulas and were enthusiastic about helping me achieve the birth I had planned. I especially appreciated knowing that, thanks to their call schedule, one of them would certainly be available when I went into labor. As it turned out, it was 4 a.m. when I called Jerrika and asked her to come to my house as I was in early labor and in need of some help; she answered right away and was at my house soon after that. Throughout my labor, Jerrika did a lot of the physical work of comforting me (e.g. applying counterpressure during contractions) and this was a huge help to my husband. He and I both also benefited from her calming presence during labor. When I would begin to feel antsy about the pace of my labor, Jerrika was able to reassure me from her experience that my labor was on track and happening as expected. I feel sure that Jerrika helped me to continue to labor at home for at least several hours longer than I would have done if we were left to our own devices, and this saved me from being in the far less comfortable hospital room for a significant portion of the labor. Ultimately, as I continued to labor into the late evening, it was nearing the hour when Kate would take over for Jerrika, and so Kate arrived at my delivery room at the hospital. Happily, they build in some time to overlap at the labor rather than have an abrupt 'shift change,' and as it turned out in another 30 minutes or so, my baby was born with both Jerrika and Kate there, assisting and cheering me on. It was a wonderful birth experience, and I am grateful to them for the many ways they supported me and my family that day. Thank you, PBC!