Fort Worth celebrates 120 newly trained doulas who are working to make childbirth safer
Tiffany and Jeremy Hall have had three children together.
But the Halls, as newly trained doulas, hope to help many more children come into the world safely. Doulas support new parents during pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period.
The husband-and-wife doula team celebrated their graduation from the United Way of Tarrant County’s community doula program on Oct. 26 along with 118 other new doulas, representing a sizable expansion of doulas in Fort Worth.
The auditorium at the graduation ceremony was filled with doulas and their families, and the program included frequent interruptions by the graduates’ children, who interjected with squeaks, cries, laughs and occasional shouts of “Go Mommy!”
The United Way decided to launch the doula program in 2022 to address the United States’ worsening maternal mortality problem. Although it’s difficult to know exactly how many moms die from pregnancy-related causes, the best estimates show that the U.S. has the highest maternal death rate compared to other wealthy nations. The risk is not born equally. Black mothers and infants face disproportionate risk during pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period compared to other demographic groups.
Tiffany Hall, 36, signed up for the doula training program after learning about the greater risks that Black women like herself face during childbirth in the U.S. Black women are nearly three times as likely to die during or after childbirth than white women, according the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She also wanted to be able to support new moms in the postpartum period, a period during which Tiffany herself grappled with postpartum depression.
“I was not myself,” Tiffany said about her postpartum period. “If somebody would have recognized those signs, I think it would have been different.”
After Tiffany was trained as a doula and began working with her first clients, she realized that sometimes her clients’ partners, husbands and boyfriends connected more with her husband. So, she suggested that he become trained as a doula so that they could provide support for the entire family throughout pregnancy, the birthing process, and the postpartum period.
“He was like, ‘there’s no boys here,’” Tiffany joked when her husband started the United Way’s training course.
“And I was like, ‘It doesn’t matter,’” she said. “We can do this as a team.”
The reasons behind maternal deaths in the U.S. are complex, and include factors like access to health care, systemic racism, and health conditions or chronic diseases that occur because of or worsen during pregnancy. Research has shown that moms are more likely to report a positive birth experience if they worked with a doula, and additional research has linked doulas to a reduction cesarean deliveries and preterm births.
The United Way launched the doula training program in collaboration with the Child Poverty Action Lab, a Dallas nonprofit, and Yenny James, the founder and CEO of Paradigm Doulas. James developed the training for the community doula program and led the Halls and all other Fort Worth doulas through their training. The training is free for all participants.
The United Way will continue the training in 2025 and is considering other programs that could help trained doulas work in the community, said Regina Williams, the United Way of Tarrant County’s interim CEO and president. Because so many doulas are self-employed, Williams said the United Way is considering building a business academy to help newly-trained doulas start their own businesses.
In addition to training doulas, the United Way of Tarrant County also hired five doulas who provide free doula care to expecting parents in Fort Worth. As of early October, 94 clients have given birth with the assistance of a United Way doula. The program also offers scholarships for parents who want to hire a doula but can’t afford the full cost of doula services.
Williams announced a $1 million gift from an anonymous donor at Saturday’s graduation for the future of the doula program.
In its first year, the doula program focused on recruiting doulas and new parents from the 76104 ZIP code of Fort Worth. Research from UT-Southwestern and an investigation from the Star-Telegram revealed that residents of 76104 had the lowest life expectancy in the state.
In the coming year, the program will expand to include all of Tarrant County.
United Way will also continue training doulas in conjunction with the launch of Team Birth, a new communication tool that aims to allow new moms to better communicate with their doctor and birth team during childbirth. Seven hospitals in Tarrant County will begin using the Team Birth system in January.
Working on the doula-hospital relationship will be an ongoing priority for the community doula program, James said. Doulas help parents advocate for themselves with their doctors and medical team. Sometimes, that means that doulas and hospital systems can have a tense relationship. As more doulas have been working with Fort Worth hospitals, the experience has been mixed, James said.
“There has been a handful of (hospitals) really excited that the doulas are there,” James said. “And then the other half, where it’s kind of uncomfortable.”
Genesis Moore, a Fort Worth mom of two, worked with a doula during both of her pregnancies. Moore said working with a doula helped her decide that delivering her child in a freestanding birth center, instead of a traditional hospital, was a better fit for her. Her experience was so positive that she decided to get trained as a doula herself.
Like the Halls, Moore is excited to help new parents during the postpartum period.
“Everyone believers that postpartum stops at six weeks,” she said. “But it all depends on your support system.”
On Saturday, Williams, United Way’s interim CEO, urged the new graduates to look to the future that doulas could help bring to the Fort Worth.
“Tarrant County is about to have a paradigm shift when we think about Black and brown moms who deserve to have great experiences,” she said. “You all are the reason for that.”
This story was originally published October 27, 2024 at 6:00 AM.
