Listening to Your Clients Roleplays

When speaking with clients, we need to be sure we have not only heard, but also really understood the emotion behind their words. Paraphrasing can be useful checking techniques to aid your understanding. 

By briefly summing up the main points of what she has told you, or bringing the emotion you think she is experiencing into the open, you check your understanding and often help her clarify her own thoughts. For example:

Activity – Pair work – Doula and Client Role Play

If you are doing the online version of this course, when we do our zoom sessions your course facilitator will invite you to find a partner in the group. You can use the facebook group to do this. You can then find a time to chat on the phone. If you are doing the face to face version, we will practice this roleplay during our time together.

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Decide which of you will take each role. After you have role-played the discussion, talk about how it went, how each of you felt, and overall how successful the doula was in supporting the women and understanding her feelings.

A. Doula – You are at home when your client calls you. She has been to the hospital for a routine appointment and was asked to discuss induction. (She is 36 weeks and this is her first baby)

B. Client – You’ve just come home from an unsettling hospital appointment. The midwife told you that they routinely book an induction date for 12 days past due date. When you asked why, you were told that going too far overdue can be risky. You would prefer not to be induced as friends have told you it’s horrible. You don’t know if you can refuse to be induced, or how dangerous it is to go overdue. You hope your doula can advise you.

A. Doula – You arrive at your PN client’s home one morning to be greeted by a visibly upset client holding her 2 week old. Her mother has come to stay and has told her that because the baby seems to constantly be at the breast that her milk must have disappeared. 

B. Client – You mother has told you that she thinks you don’t have enough milk to feed your 2 week old baby. He was very fussy last night and seemed to want to be at the breast all evening. He’s calmed down a bit now, but you are worried your mother is right. You want to ask your doula how to make up bottles.