Why I Do What I Do.

I’m always a little bashful when it comes to talking about myself, because my purpose and my practice is really all about you all. But I do want you to understand why I am doing what I am doing.

When I was 10 years old my oldest sister went off to college, so I got my own room. Someone gave me a Scorpio poster. It said something about being “passionate” which sort of embarrassed me. I was only familiar with that word being used in terms of an intimate relationship. 

Later would it come clear to me that I indeed was passionate, in terms of having strong feelings and fierce determination.

As a college student at University of Georgia, I avoided taking biology because of its brutal reputation. After 2 years at the university I had no idea what I wanted to study so I took a break from school.

Living on a bank teller’s wage quickly helped me realize the value of a college education. So I went back to school, this time at the local college.

I couldn’t avoid biology anymore. Surprise! I found it captivating, and easy. It made sense to me. Once I realized this, I went straight to the administration office and signed up for nursing school. Everyone in my family had always expected I would be a nurse. As a matter of fact, I did have a nurse’s cape and hat as a kid that I was quite proud of.

Nursing school was a bit of a blur. Just months into it, my Daddy was diagnosed with lung cancer. He was pretty quickly terminal so I moved home to help care for him. 

I had one really confirming experience in nursing school that has always stuck with me. I was assigned to an elderly woman who was quite sick. When on short notice she threw up, I offered my hands as her emesis basin to avoid the upset of throwing up on herself. She was grateful. And I knew at that moment that I was doing what I was meant to do.

My father’s brother asked why didn’t I go to medical school to be a doctor, instead of nursing. I told him I didn’t want to work with sick people. I wanted to help people be well. 

With my first child, I had a C-section after 24 hours of labor. I used techniques I’d learned from my friend who taught Bradley childbirth class to remain unmedicated, but my doctor had a time limit on pushing. After that, my friend helped me to become a Bradley childbirth educator myself. 

Bradley was all about women knowing their options and relaxing sufficiently to navigate labor and vaginal birth without medication. I worked as an RN on the postpartum unit during this time. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised to find that Bradley was not popular with the all-male OB doctors at University Hospital in Augusta, Ga in the late 80’s. They were not interested in women opting out of IV’s and epidurals in order to walk around in labor. Horrors.

In frustration, I ultimately wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper. I had heard one too many women tell me that her doctor told her she didn’t need childbirth class because he was going to take care of everything for her. I wrote in the letter about babies being “sucked out, dragged out, and cut out” though their mothers had been told not to worry about anything, the doctor would take care of everything. 

Not long after the letter was published, I was fired from my nursing job. The other hospital in town wouldn’t hire me. The blood bank wouldn’t hire me. They all knew what had happened. I was blackballed in Augusta.

So, at 8 months pregnant with my second child we moved to Charleston, SC for me to go to nurse midwifery school. By this time, I knew I was “passionate” about women having say in the way they gave birth. And I needed to do something about it.

Because I only had an associate degree in nursing, it took 4 years to complete a Master’s degree in nursing, specializing in nurse-midwifery and women’s health. 

In 1994, with 2 children in tow, we moved from one coast to the other. I took a position as a CNM at a small hospital in Florence, Oregon. I had never been west of Alabama. The Pacific Northwest was beautiful, and rainy. But the practice there was small, and personal. The consulting OB docs were an hour away over the coastal range. We had 5 family practice docs, 2 CNM’s, 2 nurse-anesthetists and 2 general surgeons. Just what I’d been looking for. I started out with a firm grounding in midwifery. After 3 years there the practice made some changes, so we moved to sunny Fort Collins, Colorado.

The rest is history. I held several employed positions as a nurse midwife until 2010 when I got up the nerve to start my own practice providing home birth services. I could finally speak freely with women, not limited by hospital or physician employers.

By this time I began to understand and be able to verbalize my “passion”. I knew I was here to help women promote their own health and that of their families. When mom knows how to care for herself and her family with minimal, natural means everyone wins. This was what I was meant to do.

You know the rest. For 10 years, I was on call 100% of the time and had the privilege of working with 400 families spread over the northern front range of Co and SE Wyoming. 

I still found that I didn’t know enough to help women who increasingly were suffering with thyroid problems, anxiety, excess weight, PCOS and more. My conventional medical midwifery training and self-study of herbs, nutrition, natural health, homeopathy, and essential oils was just not enough to give these women the real and lasting answers they needed.

I had to go back to school.

This is why I slowed down and ultimately stopped doing home birth. I completed an intense one-year program in functional medicine to broaden and deepen my knowledge base. I chose the particular program due to its commitment to food and lifestyle first, supplements short-term if needed, prescription medications and/or medical intervention as last resort when indicated.

I would love to work with women pre-pre-pre-conception so they have solid health before pregnancy. This greatly increases the likelihood of a normal, healthy, joyful pregnancy, birth, baby and postpartum recovery. Parenting is a physically, mentally and emotionally demanding job. I want you to be healthy and happy so you are equal to the demands. 

I am also focusing on promoting health during and after the child-rearing years. Currently many women are drudging along with fatigue, pelvic or joint pain, brain fog, poor sleep, thyroid issues, low libido, heavy and irregular periods and more.

Middle age to early aging, and maintaining full brain function, is also a critical area of interest that I am beginning to address.

I am driven to know as much as I possibly can. With just a little help you are your own best healer. I am passionate about helping women gain and maintain health with the most minimal and natural means possible, so they can live joyfully!

This is the “why” behind 13th Moon Functional Medicine for Women. 

Contact me so I can help you regain health and joy!