ANNOUNCING: Solace for Mothers Online Community

Since Willem's birth, I have been looking for ways to prevent and help other mamas who have been traumatized by their birthing experiences. I am pleased to say that I've been able to partner with Jennifer Zimmerman, a mother who experienced a traumatic birth 3 years ago, and Sharon Storton the excutive director of Solace for Mothers to create an online community for women suffering the effects of traumatic birth.

Here is the official announcement:

This message is to announce a new online discussion board called Solace For Mothers, An Online Community For Healing Birth Trauma. It is for women who have experienced trauma around the process of giving birth. For these women, giving birth has left them feeling deeply disappointed, traumatized, or even violated. We want these women to know that they are not alone, that birth trauma is very real, and that other women have had similar experiences and feelings. We have created an online community as a place for women to begin or continue their healing journey.

In the online community, there are different categories and forums, and the topics covered are issues that often come up for women dealing with birth trauma. It is our hope that women can virtually support each other on their healing journeys in this online community, and perhaps eventually connect with each other in the real world if they choose.

There is an introduction page here; http://www.solaceformothers.org/forum.html, and from this page you can register for the discussion board. Due to the very personal nature of this subject, we have made an effort to keep this community private, and women must register before being able to enter or view posts. If you do not fall into the category of a woman suffering from birth trauma, or if you would like to see a preview of the community before joining, you may visit this link to do so; http://www.solaceformothers.org/preview.html. This link is not the actual community and you will not be able to view members' posts from there, it will simply give you an overview of the topics covered.

We are sending this message out via email and posting it to online communities and to lists in order to reach these women. Please send this message to anyone who you feel may benefit from it.

Sincerely,
Jenne Alderks and Jennifer Zimmerman
Creators and Moderators of the discussion board

Supported by Sharon Storton and the Solace For Mothers team

Finding my Niche: Volunteering with CIMS

Since my initiation to birth activism after the traumatic birth of my son, I started searching for my niche in the birth community. The order of activities I considered was midwife, then doula, then Trust Birth facilitator, researcher, blogger, donor to birth advocacy organizations, Birth Network facilitator, website administrator for a maternity care rating system, and support group leader for women with PTSD after childbirth. One by one, I evaluated the resources and ability I had to do those activities; knowing I couldn't do all of them and be a mom, and a wife and a graduate student. I chose to do what I could in the meantime and that's when I started this blog. Someday, I may pursue more specialized training in the area but I'm aware that this is not the right time in life for me to do so. Then I discovered the Coalition for Improving Maternity Services (CIMS) and decided to work as a volunteer with them.

CIMS is currently working on the Transparency in Maternity Care Project, also known as the Birth Survey. This is what the website says about the purpose of the project:

We believe that women of childbearing age must have access to information that will help them choose maternity care providers and institutions that are most compatible with their own philosophies and needs. We hope that the Transparency in Maternity Care Project will provide information that will help women make fully informed maternity care decisions.

At the heart of the project is an on-going, online consumer survey, The Birth Survey, that asks women to provide feedback about their birth experience with a particular doctor or midwife and within a specific birth environment. Responses will be made available online to other women in their community who are deciding where and with whom to birth. Paired with this experiential data will be official statistics from state departments of health listing obstetrical intervention rates at the facility level.

A few days before I discovered this project, I had thought to myself that expecting families needed to have a consumer feedback system in place for maternity care providers in the US, so families could have experiential information and recommendations from other mothers who received care from maternity care providers in their community. So I started searching the web to see if anything like I was envisioning already existed (I'm good at coming up with ideas that are already in the works, and there's no point in reinventing the wheel to find out someone has a better model than me). I was pleased to learn that CIMS has had this project going for the last two years.

They are currently running a pilot of the survey in New York City and plan to make the survey available in August of this year to every women in the US who has given birth in the last 3 years. Women looking for maternity care will be able to view customizable reports once others have completed the survey.

I am pleased to be able to put my interest and skills to work on this project. CIMS is also looking for volunteers across the country who are interested in publicizing the project and its importance for childbearing families. Bloggers, community and online forum participants are encouraged to get the word out to women.

To become a volunteer contact: CIMSGrassroots@yahoo.com.

Cookies for Prisoners

In the New Testament, Jesus was known for spending most of time among the sinners and the poor. He particularly focussed his ministry on the people who needed him most and gave them love and compassion and offered them a way to change themselves. I feel if Jesus were alive today, he would be in similar places in our society: the slums, prisions, the projects, pretty anywhere that was considered "the wrong side of the tracks."

Even if you are not religious and do not recognize Jesus as divine, you still may see the wisdom in being compassionate to those most in need of mercy, especially society's mercy.

A group who need that compassion most, as well as an invitation to participate fully in society, are those whom society have removed from its populace: those in prison. Why do something nice for prisoners? To invite them back into our communities with a renewed conviction of benefitting our communities rather than finding ways to hurt them. After there prison sentence is over, their punishment ends and its up to each member of the community to welcome them back and encourage them to do good.

The Kairos Prison Ministry is working on this concept. They are enlisting volunteers to bake cookies that are given to prisoners.

Its a simple act of kindness that can speak volumes to prisoners and they may feel that returning to their community can mean a new life for them, whether as Christians or as functioning citizens.

If you are interested in baking cookies for this purpose, the guidelines can be found here.