Hello and welcome to the Developing Doulas Course Materials. Kick off your shoes and get comfy!
This place will be accessible to you forever, and is, in effect, your course manual. We are constantly amending and adding to this content as we develop (in true DD style!) so do check back regularly throughout your doula career.
You will see that at the bottom of some pages is an audio file – we are slowly going through and speaking the written content in order to make this more accessible to those who prefer to listen.
We are so pleased you’re here and we do hope you enjoy reading and watching this content.
There are places in this online content where we refer to activities you will be doing with your cohort of trainees. If you are reading this before your zoom sessions start, just skip those bits and carry on. There are no expectations that you finish working your way through this stuff before your sessions with your cohort begin. Work at your own pace – this is your journey, to tailor make as you see fit.
Can I introduce our centre mandala. Here is a picture of it on day one, with some of the manual pages spread out on it. This is the place where we gather at times during the course, to sit close and share deep feelings and thoughts. If you are doing the online version of this course, being unable to touch doesn’t mean we can’t still connect in this place and create a power-circle of wonderful people who feel driven to support birthing families.
We hope you’ll enjoy the course. We know what a leap of faith it is to embark on a doula course and we promise to work hard on making sure that faith is justified! If you have any worries or questions during the course, do feel you can talk to your course facilitator.
During this course you might have preconceptions, opinions or prejudices challenged. This might be painful or inspire regret, anger or defensiveness. Remember, this is a safe place to express those feelings, either in the group or privately.
So let’s get started! Dive in and enjoy! Once you’ve completed a section, just click on to the next bit.
It goes without saying that the content you’ll read and watch in this course belongs to Developing Doulas (apart of course, from the external links to other resources). We trust that you will not take this material and present it as your own, or plagiarize it in any way. You are welcome to quote things from the course, just please, please remember to credit Developing Doulas. This is practicing kindness, consideration and the ethical behaviour we expect of high quality doulas.
DDoula Love, Maddie, Laura, Katie, Aimee, Becky and Verina x
