Birth doula

Compassionate and respectful support

Traditionally women across the word were giving birth supported by women, whether a relative or a friend. At this time, couples are often without family support.

I am an experienced London doula who has supported many clients over the years. I am a Croydon based doula and I can offer the support you need without bringing in own thoughts or experiences. Every client is different and every birth is unique. I will support you in your chosen birth and walk this path with you holding your hand and giving you unbiased information. This will ensure you can make an informed decision at all times.

I have an experience in supporting both single moms and women with partners. I wholeheartedly respect partners and also help them to enjoy the birth of their baby to the fullest.

I am also available for private online consultations where we can discuss your individual needs. I offer unbiased information and doula support so you can make the right decision for your baby and family. You may like to talk about birth preparation methods, induction, medical interventions or place of birth.

If you need a doula shoulder, I am here.

Get in touch

About me

“It is not only that we want to bring about an easy labor, without risking injury to the mother or the child; we must go further. We must understand that childbirth is fundamentally a spiritual, as well as a physical, achievement. The birth of a child is the ultimate perfection of human love”

Dr. Grantly Dick-Read, 1953

Birth doula package - £1850

I am here to support you, your partner (if you have one) and your baby. I believe that with the right support, women can achieve a positive birth.

Whatever decisions you make during your pregnancy, I am here to respect you and offer you unbiased information. My goal is for you to feel empowered, confident and happy with your choices.

I offer non medical support to my clients. I have a vast experience and training to show you all possibilities available to you. I don't only work with the mother but often partner is involved. Family is to be supported as a whole and we can talk about worries and issues that your partner may have or you as a couple need to go through.

I offer initial online meeting to see if we "click" and then we meet in person and start working together.

The summary of my doula package

In pregnancy:

Free online introductory meeting (45mins)
Two to three home visits before the birth. Usually between 60 - 90 minutes session.
I will explore your birth preferences and assist you in writing them to add to your notes, learn how to get the best from your midwifes and consultants, explore ways in which your partner can support you and we can support him too, relax, work through any anxieties or issues you may have, discuss your coping techniques for labour, etc.
I will be available for you through your pregnancy from the moment you decide to hire me.
I also offer a reading list, websites list and useful articles to refer to during your pregnancy

For the birth of your baby I will be:

On call 24 hours per day for your due period from week 38 until the baby is born
During your labour I will join you whenever you feel you need a support and accompany you from home to birth centre/hospital or help you bed-down before the midwives arrive if you are planning a home birth
I will offer you continuous emotional, physical and informational support from when I join you in active labour, until you and baby are settled

After the birth:

I will return to see you. This visit is useful to process your birth experience and offer any other practical, information or emotional assistance you need
Support you by phone, email or text, in the early days with questions about the postnatal period, baby and breastfeeding, or other areas for 14 days after your baby was born

Backup Doula:

This is quite rare… but remember I work with doulas from London Bliss Doulas team so if needed, there will always be another doula available.

Do you want to know more or talk to me?

Contact me

Work with me

Shared doula package - £2250

I also offer nurturing shared care doula package. That means that we will be 2 doulas looking after you, your needs and wishes. It will always be me and either Thando or Alexa (London Bliss Doulas). You will get to know both of us well and we will split our doula support half half. We will initially meet all together online in introductory meeting and if hired, we will schedule a meeting with you privately to support you further.

As a bonus we also offer one to one online private meeting with each of us to go through different aspects of pregnancy and birth - or maybe you would just like to do relaxations or visualisations to help you prepare for the birth of your baby.

So what happens for the birth? I will (for example) be on call for two weeks (38 to 40 weeks) and Thando or Alexa will be on call for the rest of the "being on call period" (40 to 42 weeks). Whoever attends your birth will come and see you postnatally and prepare placenta remedies for you (if you would like that).

We believe that that we can really give you the best of both of us so you can feel nurtured and looked after. We share the same doula values and have been working together for few years. We beautifully compliment each other with our knowledge and experience. Between us we do almost anything you can imagine. From pregnancy yoga, to Hypnobirthing, Dreambirth, Spinning babies, Rebozo, EFT to pregnancy massage, perinatal psychology and postnatal rituals, breastfeeding support and placenta remedies.

You really have a special opportunity here so if you would like a strong and nurturing birth team, then get in touch!

The summary of our shared care doula package

In pregnancy:

Free online introductory meeting (45mins) with both of us
One home visit before the birth with me. Usually between 60 - 90 minutes session.
One home visit with Thando or Alexa. Usually between 60 - 90 minutes session.
One online private meeting with me
One online private meeting with Thando or Alexa
We will explore your birth preferences and assist you in writing them to add to your notes, learn how to get the best from your midwifes and consultants, explore ways in which your partner can support you and we can support him too, relax, work through any anxieties or issues you may have, discuss your coping techniques for labour, etc.
We will be available for you through your pregnancy from the moment you decide to hire us.
We also offer a reading list, websites list and useful articles to refer to during your pregnancy

For the birth of your baby we are:

On call 24 hours per day for your due period from week 38 until the baby is born
During your labour one of us will join you whenever you feel you need a support and accompany you from home to birth centre/hospital or help you bed-down before the midwives arrive if you are planning a home birth
We will offer you continuous emotional, physical and informational support from when we join you in active labour, until you and baby are settled

After the birth:

One of us will return to see you. This visit is useful to process your birth experience and offer any other practical, information or emotional assistance you need
Support you by phone, email or text, in the early days with questions about the postnatal period, baby and breastfeeding, or other areas for 30 days after your baby was born
Online session with the other doula that wasn't at your birth at your convenience.

Backup Doula:
This is quite rare… but remember there is a third doula in London Bliss Doulas team so if needed, she will be called to support you. If one of us is able to relieve her at some point we will.

If you would like to read more about us: London Bliss Doulas

Do you want to know more or talk to me? Get in touch!

Client testimonials

Michaela was my birth doula and she was amazing. I needed to have a c-section and thought that doulas would only work with you if you had a natural birth - until I met Michaela. She was key in helping me prepare emotionally and psychologically for that moment, she was kind and understanding, extremely knowledgeable about the process and the options that you have as an expecting mother and she helped me understand step by step the procedure that I was going to go through. This meant that when I came to the operation room I was free of fears, I could focus and relax, I was able to express my birth wishes and I was the best version I could be at that point in time to receive my baby. I’ll always be thankful because not only did I have a good and empowered experience, my son’s birth is a memory I’ll keep dear in my heart. I feel that having a doula for a cesárean is as important if not more important than for a natural birth. Because the mother is going through a fully medical process it’s easy to have fears and to feel that you have no options and that everything is a decision of the doctor. This is only to an extent, there are so many ways of having a cesárean and more than the actual physical process, your emotional and psychological state are key to have a good birth. This is transmitted to everything - your baby and the environment where you are. It’s easy to feel that because you are having a cesárean you don’t have to prepare but in my experience it was completely the contrary. Lots of love Michaela and thank you always!
Claudia

Dear Michaela, as Maria Julia's first birthday is approaching it makes me feel very grateful of how her birth was and still is very important to me, to us! So, I wanted to take this opportunity to thank you once again from the bottom of my heart for being so supportive and for have given me the strength to search and choose the best birth option for us. It has made me stronger, happier, a much better person and even better mum for her and specially for my beautiful Bella, who I finally connected with like I was supposed to when she was first born. It was like we were all born again. I really hope that you can continue to bring that joy to amany families in the future. I am very thankful that you have crossed my life's path back in 2007. Who could have predicted that you would play such an important role in my family's life?! Much love
Juliana

Dearest Michaela, Tom and I would like to thank you for your devoted support during the birth of our first son. Good things are hard won, after 40+ hours labour and a c-section, this gorgeous little boy entered our lives. Your help throughout was beyond the call of duty as Doula and more like guardian angel. It was a beautiful birthing experience. We are the happies parents and so blessed with your little boy. With all our love
Louisa & Tom

"Michaela was exactly the person we needed as we planned for a HWBAC. She worked with us to reduce my anxiety, and recommended resources to help me prepare. As it turned out, we had a complicated situation with my waters breaking several days before labour began but wanting to wait for labour to start without intervention. Throughout that time, Michaela supported us as we conveyed our views to consultants and midwives. Her knowledge of alternative therapies also really helped us, from aromatherapy and reboxo to EFT and recommending I see a reflexologist. When labour eventually started in earnest five days later, we felt calm, happy and relaxed - even excited! Michaela's support for the birth itself was invaluable, and alongside our excellent community midwives she helped to create an atmosphere of calm support in which I could just let my body and my baby work together. Our daughter's birth was a joyful and healing one and Michaela was a big part of making that happen!"
Serena

I booked Michaela as a doula for my second birth. My first birth I relied on my boyfriend to be my birth partner and it didn't go well. I booked a home birth and ended up in hospital having emergency caesarean. This time around I was determined to have my home birth and there was no medical reason why not. I'd read that having a doula made the chances of a caesarean decrease by 40%. When I met Michaela I felt comfortable and at ease. I just had a feeling that she'd be the right person for me. After I booked her she showed me some excercises and showed me how to sit to help get the baby in a good position. I truly believe this is such an important step in setting up the birth and could see immediately where I made mistakes with the positioning of my first baby. During pregnancy Michaela stayed in touch and we met regularly. I wasn't expecting my baby until the beginning of April as my first was born at nearly 43 weeks. My second arrived at 37weeks. I was so convinced I was having Braxton hicks practice contractions that when I called Michaela I was insistent this wasn't the real thing. She wasn't meant to be on call for me for another 3 weeks but she still came over in a taxi at 2amto help deliver my baby boy. "Theo, my son, was born after a quick labour in the bath. Having Michaela there doing EFT tapping on my back and reminding me of my birth plan and warning me when medical professionals were about to go against my wishes with vitamin k so I could remind them I didn't want my son to have the injection was very helpful. Also just having her experience there and being prompted during birth about touching the baby's head as it popped out and catching the baby myself in the water made a much richer birth experience. She also took some fantastic photos at my request so I have these forever. My only regret is not having a video done as well! So I would definitely recommend Michaela. The birth I had was a water hypno home birth after caesarean and it was a fantastic experience."
Michelle

My mother raised me to the idea that giving birth is the most wonderful thing, that it is not painful and that society had impregnated our mind with the wrong idea. You always hear horrific stories about birth and people usually blame it on the NHS. True, the Nhs has all these protocols that are needed to look after thousands of women, but ultimately I believe it is a woman's responsibility to have a positive experience, like running a marathon, you have to prepare yourself. And so I did everything to get ready, from yoga to hypnobirthing to learning all about NHS guidelines and read medical papers, everything! I came to the conclusion that an experienced doula would be invaluable to support me and help my birth wish list come true.I chose Michaela because she has done a lot of training with prominent personalities, she has knowledge on fetal positioning which I believe is fundamental for a good labour. However, it was not only her knowledge but her energy that was so helpful, her presence brought calmness and confidence throughout the process and I had a wonderful birth. Michaela helped me remain focus, for instance when being assessed to go to the birth centre, doctors believed the heartbeat was not constant, she helped me breathe and the monitoring was successful. After having the first examination the midwife mentioned the baby hadn't dropped, she helped me with some spinning babies exercises and the baby had dropped by the next examination. When things started turning in a different direction her tapping technique was wonderful and even after the delivery, I had trouble emptying my bladder and it helped me release the fear that was stopping me from doing so. But the most important thing was that she didn't allow me to ignore my intuition, I felt the baby was struggling and she supported me on what I thought was the best and helped us refuse the augmentation that doctors were pushing me to have. My intuition was right, the baby was almost 4.5kg and had I followed doctors advice I would very likely had a horrible experience. Instead I feel my C-section was genuinely needed as I tried everything and she even tried to make it special, she reminded us to ask for immediate skin to skin and pressurise on the delay cord cramping, she made sure and I quote her that we made sure "it would be as best as possible". She was there when the operation was over and helped us with the breast crawl, she took amazing pictures and video, she made sure they kept the placenta and that it reached a fridge as soon as possible, she did the encapsulation and well she basically made sure that all my wishes were respected so that my encounter with our son was healthy and magical. I will always be thankful, for the advice, the support, help and the fun!
Alaide