Fund free doula services for Black women

I’m June Eric-Udorie, and I am a Black, disabled, working-class feminist, activist, and birthing justice advocate based in Durham, North Carolina. Over the past decade, my work has focused on accessing justice and equality, especially for marginalized women. I’ve done this work in a number of ways, as a writer of a critically-acclaimed anthology published by Penguin on the power of intersectionality that was reviewed by The New York Times, as a researcher studying women’s lives after deportation in Mexico, and as a volunteer at a homeless shelter serving families. You can read more about my work here . 

Ever since learning about the fatal maternal mortality rates for Black women in America, I have been restless. Racial bias within the healthcare system is contributing to the high numbers of pregnancy related deaths and complications among minority women. If high-profile celebrities like Beyoncé and Serena Williams are not immune to racial injustice and misogynoir within our healthcare systems, what about poor, working class, marginalized, incarcerated, undocumented, trans women who may not have access to those resources?

Over the course of the last year, I've been thinking and wondering: what can I do? I felt powerless just sitting back, knowing that hundreds of Black women and women of color could die prematurely this year due to inadequate care. 

And so I decided to train as a birth doula. Last summer, I completed a birth doula training at Cornerstone in San Francisco: a Culturally Diverse Birthkeeper Training for POC Birthworkers, where I was taught by and learned with Black women. I also completed Cornerstone’s training: Supporting Trans and Gender-Non-Conforming (GNC) birthers.

Doulas have been show to statistically improve birth outcomes, especially for women of color. During Fall 2019, I attended my first 8 births, serving Black women and women of color that were working class, queer, refugees and more, and saw firsthand the impact that doulas can have on women, families, and the wider community. Not only do doulas reduce the risk of maternal mortality, they also ensure that women and birthing folks leave their birth experiences feeling empowered and coming away supported to begin parenthood. As a doula, on top of the routine doula appointments (creating a birth plan, going over labor positions, childbirth education, etc.) I go above and beyond – taking a social work approach to birth work – and seek to help my clients with a range of issues, including but not limited to housing support, therapy, crisis counseling, financial counseling, connecting them to social workers, providing resources for breastfeeding and lactation support, organizing donation drives and much more. This is crucial, as most of my clients are living in poverty, in abusive relationships, or experiencing homelessness. 

And that’s why I’m raising $20,000 — so that I can provide this service to another 20-25 women in need in 2020 for free. Given how expensive doulas are, they have become a luxury for the white, rich-upper-middle class, and for so many vulnerable women, they are not an option. Funding this project means providing a necessary service for the women for whom birth has become a life and death circumstance.

I hope this gives you a sense of me and my commitment to this work, and I pray you’ll join me on this journey. Thank you for taking the time to read this and support me to make sure all mothers are safe and empowered through birth, postpartum, and beyond.