During my wife’s pregnancy, I have found one specialty that I’m pretty good at, and that’s foot rubs. And if an expectant father has just one specialty, foot rubs are a good one to have. I’m telling you fellas; you could come home with a prostitute, but after a good foot rub, your pregnant wife might even let her stay the weekend. It’s like Heroin Cheesecake to them. Say, I should put that on my list. NOTE TO SELF: Purchase ingredients for Heroin Cheesecake.
Since I have but one specialty, thankfully, when she’s ready to give birth (my wife, not the prostitute), we’ll both have a coach in the delivery room; someone called a “Doula.” Now, when I pictured the delivery room, I never pictured a Doula. I pictured a doctor, a couple nurses and, for some reason, Alice Cooper, but I never knew that Doulas existed.
Turns out “Doula” is a Greek word meaning “woman who serves,” but, from what I understand, it’s quite different from Hooters.
They’re not doctors or nurses or midwives, but rather they’re women who assist the mother (my wife) and the partner (me) with the mother’s needs during labor. Now, I had always thought that the “mother’s needs” were to “get the baby out of her NOW,” but apparently it’s more nuanced than that.
According to the website dona.org, a doula is a woman who:
– Recognizes birth as a key experience the mother will remember all her life.
– Understands the physiology of birth and the emotional needs of a woman in labor.
– Assists the woman in preparing for and carrying out her plans for birth.
– Stays with the woman throughout the labor.
– Provides emotional support, physical comfort measures and an objective viewpoint, as well as helping the woman get the information she needs to make informed decision.
– Facilitates communication between the laboring woman, her partner and her clinical care providers.
– Perceives her role as nurturing and protecting the woman’s memory of the birth experience.
– Allows the woman’s partner to participate at his/her comfort level.
Clearly, the husband is woefully ill-prepared for this job. I mean, come on, “emotional needs?” “Communication?” “Nurturing?” Who am I, Oprah?
Now, to be fair, the website doesn’t specify that a Doula has to be a woman, but I’m sure it helps. A male Doula sounds like an oxymoron. Why add one more clueless individual to the mix? And what’s to stop the male Doula and the father from sneaking out to watch “SportsCenter”?
Basically, the Doula will be telling my wife and me to do things; she’ll communicate and provide support to my wife and, when my wife is too tired, the Doula will swear at me and say hurtful things on my wife’s behalf.
My wife loves the idea, so I guess I do, too.
I do have one question: Do you tip a Doula? Is she like a waitress or a valet? She is, after all, “a woman who serves.” And what would one consider 15-20 percent? The placenta maybe?
And does she have a line on Heroin Cheesecake?
