Labor Day Picnic: Special Guest

We are delighted to feature Diane Tinker, birth doula from Des Moines, IA, as a special guest at our Labor Day Picnic and Silent Auction! Diane was recently published in an anthology titled Bearing Witness: Childbirth Stories Told by Doulas, and will be reading from that collection, as well as signing books, at the picnic. Books will be availabe for purchase. Diane says:

As a birth doula who has been practicing all over Central Iowa and beyond for nearly 15 years and having witnessed and supported women, their partners, and families through hundreds of births in both the hospital and home setting, I am very excited to have been choosen to be a contributing author of this book. It is a creation of poems and stories about birth written from a doula’s perspective. As doulas, we have an honor and privledge of being chosen to be part of a very intimate experience in a woman's life. We bear witness to one of life's greatest miracles - birth - time and again. In this process we also bear witness to the powerful forces of birth, the strength and capabilities of women and the the obstacles that are sometimes put in the way of a normal, natural process. This is a collection of our inside or bird's eye views from the birth space and our way of life as doulas that has been edited & authored by fellow doulas Lisa Doran and Lisa Caron.

More information about the collection:
Bearing Witness is an anthology of 50 stories about doulas working with birthing families. Stories of joy, awe, miracles. Stories that are gut wrenchingly funny and stories that are sad and difficult to hear. There is wisdom in these pages. These stories are presented here to you from the heart. The contributors to Bearing Witness are women who have made a lifestyle out of rising from their warm beds in the middle of the night to answer pages from their clients, of leaving their home and families sometimes for days on end. We do this because most doulas want to help change our birth customs. We want to educate women and advocate for natural childbirth so that they achieve a positive birth experience and feel strong and confident in themselves and will mother their babies in a healthy way. Birth needs to become human again. It needs to reclaim its wild primacy. Peace on earth does indeed begin with birth.