Welcome to my health blog. I hope you enjoy my research-based approach to natural fertility, preconception, pregnancy, birth, postpartum and baby’s first year! It’s time for autonomous health care and for women to regain their power in pregnancy and birth. I hope I can help you achieve this.
I am a licensed naturopathic doctor. I received my degree from Bastyr University, California. Prior to studying to become a naturopathic doctor, I was a registered nurse for four years, working in medical surgical, antepartum and mother-baby care. I accrued certification as a lactation consultant while working as a nurse.
I am also married and the mother of two beautiful, healthy boys. However, when we first got married, we were told we could not have children. Through the years my husband and I struggled with miscarriage and doubted we would ever be able to have children. I accepted adoption as our option until I fell pregnant with our first son. At the time, I was in my first year of medical school.
After the birth of my son, I became known around school as the expert on pregnancy, childbirth, and lactation, because once my son was born, I couldn’t stop talking about everything surrounding birth and babies. For these reasons, the remainder of my schooling, I became our campus’s mother spokesperson. I made sure we had lactation rooms on campus, I attended almost all the “Bastyr baby” births, and I started the family resource group on campus.
To add to my plate, I pursued additional education in autoimmune disease and neurodevelopmental disorders in children. Slowly, but surely, preconception care began to show up in each area of my studies. Everything from autoimmune to neurology, from gut health to Ayurvedic medicine. Every speaker would mention it at least once. I started to wonder why this was not a primary study focus in our education. If this is where life begins, is it not where disease begins? Isn’t this what we mean by preventative medicine? I thought so.
The defining question for me became: what if I was able to decrease the chances of a child being born with autism by simply helping a mother make the right choices before and during her pregnancy? This theory was enough to motivate me to pursue this in my career as an N.D. I am absolutely in love with the care that starts at preconception as well as pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. All of it–start to finish.