What it’s like to run a doula business: A guide for new doulas

What is it really like to be a doula and run your own business?

I am often asked this question by new doulas. I see this as a two-part question. There is the part that makes you a successful business owner, and the part that makes you a good doula. So I have decided to share what my experience has been.

First of all, it's hard. Super hard. It takes an incredible amount of work, sacrifice, and emotional maturity to be successful in this business.

In the three years that I have owned Mahina Birth Support, I have supported 130 births (which is a TON of births!), supporting people in birth is the absolute best part of this work. It is an honor to be a part of the raw, unfiltered, honesty of birth. I have held women and snuggled babies. I have reached across hospital beds to reassure partners. I have laughed and I have cried with clients. I have wiped brows, squeezed hips, and changed pads. I have quietly held both the hopes and the fears of my clients with care.

I have also learned to build a website (and rebuild it over and over until it was good enough), learned about SEO, created content, written blogs (this is huge, I'm dyslexic!), designed business materials and logos, created systems and workflows, crafted contracts, made pamphlets and documents, learned about marketing and branding, formed relationships with other doulas and birth workers, researched, read, taken classes and workshops, learned to keep my books, file taxes (holy crap this part is hard!), gotten licensing and insurance, been certified, responded to tons of emails and text messages (shout out to voice to text!), driving all over the city for appointments and consultations, invested in therapy (for self-growth, trauma processing, ego checking, and anxiety management), retrained myself to be a photographer in the extreme lighting conditions of birth, answered phone calls at 2 AM and driven home from 18-hour births at 4 AM, and I have been on-call for three years straight.

All of this is to say, that there is an enormous amount of work and dedication going on behind the scenes to have a successful doula business.

What does it take to be a GOOD doula?

Sometimes I think I am crushing it and others I think it is crushing me! I have felt insecure, unsure, grateful, scared, uncomfortable, challenged, proud, loved, absolutely exhausted, appreciated, validated, confident, conflicted, nervous, intimidated, strong, and knowledgeable at different points on this journey. I think it is healthy to feel a wide range of emotions. In fact, I think it is this emotional awareness that is the key to being a good doula.

You have to be able to accept yourself exactly as you are in this business. You are supporting people in their most raw and vulnerable state, and in order to do that well, you must be able to meet them there. You have to be ok with YOU in that raw and vulnerable state. You have to be non-judgmental even with yourself. Before you can ask your clients to face their fears, you have to face yours first. “Track your tigers” (recognize your fears) and know your triggers. The challenges that you have faced in your life will often give you greater levels of empathy and awareness, but you have to have done the work so that those challenges no longer determine how you relate to your environment. You can not let the big emotions in birth trigger your own unresolved stuff. Before you can ask others to do brave things you must be willing to do brave things. Before you say someone’s voice has power, you must believe that yours does too.

You need healthy boundaries. This part is tricky because I think when people hear this, they think you mean build walls, and that is the opposite of what I mean. You need to stay open and vulnerable as a birth worker, so walls are the opposite of what you need. Boundaries as a doula often mean emotional boundaries. It means not taking on the role of the savior or protector in a birth. Those roles can lead you to project (often unintentionally) what you think is best and it creates an unequal power dynamic. Healthy boundaries are offering options, information, support, and genuine care, AND allowing clients to be independent and in control of their own bodies and choices. It is letting go of the idea that you know what is best for them. That is ego talking…. and in the famous words of Elsa, you have to “let it go 🎵”. Ego has no place in birth. Because of the intense emotions during birth, there are tons of opportunities for unhealthy attachments (codependency, trauma bonding, emotional vampires,…) so simply be aware and make healthy choices.

This work is not for the fragile or the broken, it is for the brave. Birth is all of the big emotions rolled up in one. Birth work is heavy work in every way and it is absolutely worth it.

I tell my clients all the time “you can do hard things” and I will tell you, new doulas, the same thing. Being a doula is not easy, do it anyway. Being a doula carries great responsibility, so take the time and do it well and you will be rewarded with a lifetime of beautiful memories and life-changing experiences.