Calina

Meet Calina | Certified Postpartum Doula, Sleep Coach, Placenta Encapsulation Specialist, Trained Midwife

As a certified postpartum doula Calina has supported hundreds of new and growing families since 2005. Framed by completion of midwifery studies at Birthingway College of Midwifery in 2015 Calina brings a wealth of knowledge, skills and talents to her work. Her gentleness and calm demeanor make her an easy fit to have in your home. Her ability to problem solve through tough situations and match families with comprehensive resources and services is informed by her education and experience as a community health worker.

Calina also has a Bachelors degree in nutrition and loves to create nourishing meals for new parents to keep them energized and help increase milk supply so they can focus on recovering and bonding with their newborn and achieve their feeding goals.

Calina is a skilled support person to any family: she can soothe fussy babies with ease, help navigate feeding issues, offer sleep support and give guidance on postnatal nutrition. She truly understands and empathizes with families recovering from a tough pregnancy, a difficult hospital experience, or a disappointing birth or challenging baby.

Although Calina had planned for unmedicated water births with each of her two children, she endured two urgent cesareans. She experienced first hand the demanding physical and emotional recovery that accompanies cesarean and after processing the trauma and disappointment, she realized that surgical birth is a significant rite of passage to becoming a mother and should be honored and celebrated.

After recovering from the first surprise cesarean and some sleepless nights of her own, she was ready to add serving other new moms back into her life and decided to join forces with ABC and Women’s Healthcare Associates as a postpartum doula and community health worker.

Although the WHA program ended during the pandemic, Calina was able to focus on supporting families through struggles with soothing their baby, sleep issues, and specifically helping families in the crunch time of late afternoon/early evening during the “witching hour".” This is when many families need the most help, and when a doula and sleep coach can be really effective at bringing calm to chaos.

Calina so enjoys helping exhausted and overwhelmed families find the tools needed to teach their babies how to sleep. Calina utilizes a gentle “sleep shaping” approach to teach and implement healthy sleep habits from the start when supporting parents with young infants, helping lay the foundation for a solid sleep routine. When baby and parents are ready a more expansive plan can be devised with each baby and family’s unique needs and circumstances informing the process. This sleep routine includes strategies to encourage self soothing, infant massage instruction and many other helpful tools and tricks, one that helps parents feel comfortable and empowered with lots of support and encouragement along the way.

Calina is also our provider of placenta encapsulation, and brings her doula and midwifery talents to the homes of fresh new families who are looking for the benefits of placenta capsules. She will not only sanitize your kitchen in preparation for the placenta processing, she will leave it sparkling clean afterwards, with a jar of capsules waiting for you.

Make sure while she is there preparing your placenta to ask her any questions you have about your physical recovery, breastfeeding, or newborn adjustment, as she is a wealth of information and expertise.