I tried.

I have to be content with the fact that I tried.

At the beginning of this year I decided this was the year I would get back into the birth field.

After 4.5 years of recovering from my traumatic birth I was ready to slowly jump back in.

I made calls, sent dozens of emails, and rejoined Facebook groups.

I ordered business cards, printed my childbirth education curriculum, attended networking events, and planned a schedule out with my husband on when to teach classes.

Nothing worked out.

This was disheartening to say the least, but then unexpectedly I had an opportunity arise outside of the birth community.

An opportunity I thought would be 100xs harder to get than to relaunch my doula business.

I’m excited to announce I have accepted a professional body piercer position at Scarecrow Galleries Tattoo in Wylie, TX.

These two passions of mine are wildly different and the schedules do not mesh well at all, so one has to go.

I fought with myself for a long time trying to accept that birth work was only a phase for my life, an incredible life-changing 5 year phase. But it is not meant to be my life’s work. I don’t like to say “never” because we don’t know what the future holds, but the plan is to hang up my birth worker’s hat for good.

So today I leave the Facebook groups, I pack away my supplies, and I take the auto renewal off my website.

Last week, in a symbolic moment I didn’t even plan, I got a tattoo of my BBB logo on my son’s 5th birthday.

Proof to myself that Bump Birth Baby will forever be a part of my life.

Proof that I loved being a doula, a childbirth educator, and birth photographer.

I pray it will spark discussions. That I will still be able to speak positively about birth to people and that their curiosity will be peeked when they hear the word “doula”. It is a way to stay connected to a field that I’m no longer actively a part of.

Thank you to anyone who has followed my journey and all my ups and downs.

And thank you most of all to the dozens of families that allowed me to serve you during such a life changing season of your life.

Sincerely,

Kelsey