The last birth I attended was in September.  It was a lovely birth and I knew it was going to be my last one for awhile.

It was going to be a busy/crazy school year

I didn’t think I could add the uncertainty of being on call on top of all the boys activiites and school.  So I had to make the decision to Just Say No to being a doula.

• My 2 youngest boys go to a charter school about 30 minutes from my house.  My youngest is in Kindergarten and so is only half day, which means up to 3 drives a day.  I do have an AWESOME car pool group, so I usually only have to drive 1 time a day, but I know they depend on me and so it felt like I needed to be counted on for that.
• My oldest son is in Jr. High and also in another GREAT car pool group, where I only have to drive 2 times a week.  But again, I felt I needed to be reliable for that.
• Then the activities.  This year the big one was T2 joined a Traveling Musical Theater group, which of course is by his school – I have a new best friend named Mini Van.  At first there were lots of practices, then there were shows.  I felt I needed to be reliable for that.

Dependability while on call?

You Can’t be reliable when you are on call.  Your priority will be the Birthing Mom – so car pool and Musical Theater gets thrown under the bus.   I couldn’t do that this year, the bus might have broken or worse a group of kids would have had to sleep at school.

In the end, it is good I wasn’t on call this school year.  See all of the above and then add on a mountain bike accident where my 14 year old breaks his jaw and arm.  It was better to be completely available to my family.

Repeat Client and Perfect Timing

I was enjoying life just being a mom when I got a call from a previous doula client.  She was pregnant and wanted to take Hypnobabies classes and wanted me as her doula.  I was so excited, but also worried about my commitments.  We talked and I told her I would check my calendar and get back to her.

Her guess date was perfect! I have a trip to the LDS Holistic Living Conference planned for the end of June, I finally get to meet all the other authors from my book!  Also the last Musical Theater competition was the middle of May.   Her guess date fell perfectly between them.  I could commit!  I also prayed and felt like everything would work out perfectly.  So I said YES!

It was fun having them in class and then once she was 37 weeks I found myself back on call after 8 months off.