My name is Danielle Adams and I serve the Mississippi Gulf Coast and Keesler Air Force Base as a provisional doula through B.O.C.E.S., Birthing Options Childbirth Education Services. B.O.C.E.S. is a certifying organization for childbirth assistants and educators. Provisional doula is a trained doula who is completing the certification process.

My services include 2 prenatal visits (one must be with your care provider), assistance with creating a birth plan, labor and birth support up to 16 hours,and 2 post-partum visits for nursing instruction and mother care. I offer a birth photographer for all the mothers I attend at no extra charge. I also offer childbirth education classes and belly casting at a discounted rate to my doula clients. Breastfeeding consultation for first-time nursing mothers, baby-wearing demonstration with a sling, co-sleeping,child-led weaning and non-circumcision  information all come free with my doula care. I am also available 24-hrs a day for phone consultation about any pregnancy issues you may be experiencing. 

Before I moved to Biloxi, MS, my family was stationed at Offutt A.F.B. in Bellevue, NE. I got my start in birth work as a post-partum doula for friends. I cleaned houses, babysat so mother could sleep, brought meals, encouraged nursing, and learned to "mother the mother". Because the birth of my first child had been attended by a nurse-midwife and I had attended nursing school some years before, I was very interested and felt a keen desire to become a midwife. I devoured midwifery textbooks and looked for every oppurtunity to serve the women I knew. Before we moved from Offutt A.F.B., I found friendship in a traditional midwife who took me under her wing and allowed me to assist her in homebirths. She taught me to be a better doula and what it meant to know the calling of serving mothers in my community. I believe birth is sacred and attending to women in labor and delivery is a calling from God. It is a spiritual experience for the birthing family as well as for the doula and midwife. I take my calling very seriously and try to walk worthy of this calling. My desire to serve birthing mothers is so great that I can not find fault with their birth choices. I only want to support them in whatever way they want to give birth. I am trained to serve women who want to birth naturally as well as those mothers who feel they need or want an epidural or who must go through a cesarean. I do not abandon families because they do not choose the birth I would want for myself! This does not mean, however, that I will not educate my mothers and fathers in all their birth options. If there is a better way, I will teach it to you long before you are in labor and too distracted to think clearly.My goal is to teach you and then coach you through a natural birth for a healthier baby and a healthier mother. This is one of many ways in which doulas are needed by birthing families.