The Christian Childbirth Blog is authored by Jennifer Vanderlaan of Birthing Naturally and Tammy Ryan of Baby Matters. It is our great pleasure to provide this source of information and inspiration to you.
Jennifer and her family
Jennifer began working as a childbirth educator after the birth of her daughter in 1999. After the birth of her son in 2001, she added doula to her list of services and began a volunteer doula organization through her church. She authors the BirthingNaturally.net website and a collection of books about Christian Childbirth including Teaching Christian Childbirth, a full childbirth preparation curriculum.
In 2007, Jennifer was challenged to organize a day of prayer for childbearing families. This event, which continues annually, brought her face to face with the needs of birthing women around the globe. With a clear vision from God and the support of her family, Jennifer began nursing school and made plans to study midwifery. Her goal is to open midwifery schools and centers in developing countries.
As part of this goal, Jennifer traveled to central Africa in 2008 to provide an advance doula, beginner midwifery training for volunteers from rural areas in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Brundi. Tammy joined her on that trip, and they have been working together ever since.
Tammy Explaining Cycle Beads
Tammy’s heart beats for the childbearing families in her community and around the world. She answered the call to childbirth in 1993 when she began attending births. In 2003 she earned her certification with DONA International. By 2007 Tammy was mentoring other doulas as a Birth Doula Trainer for DONA. She now travels throughout the United States holding DONA doula trainings.
Tammy has enriched her skills by becoming a certified Prenatal Parenting instructor, a Happiest Baby on the Block instructor and a Christian Childbirth Educator. In 2009 she also became an approved TENS instructor for DONA. In addition to her work as a doula and a doula trainer, Tammy has completed training as a credentialed pastor.
She serves her local community as Vice President of the Board of Directors for the Brighter Futures Maternity Home in Davenport, Iowa. She has appeared as a guest speaker on the subject of childbirth in a variety of venues. In 2008, Tammy worked with me as we traveled to Burundi, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo to train rural women as community midwives.
