Peaceful Beginning Doulas
Our active doulas in the photo to the left, Rowan, Cheryl, Kelley & Tracie. Our doula practice is unique. We are all certified, experienced doulas with over 55 years of doula practice between us. We provide doula services for all of WNC and the Asheville, NC area. We provide birth AND postpartum support for all of our clients and with our practice you will get to know two of our doulas for your birth instead of having one primary doula and a backup doula. Also, two of our doulas provide postpartum doula support beginning the day after you come home from the hospital. Read each of our bios below.
Our Services
Birth Doulas- Cheryl and Kelley provide full time birth doula support working as a team with years of experience providing support for: successful VBAC births; high risk,
preterm and cesarean births; multiple births; natural and water births;
birth center and midwife births and births where women chose medication in order to have a more joyous birth. Cheryl originally studied with Penny Simkin (in video at left), physical therapist and a founder of DONA and Kelley has worked with births in hospitals for years. Both Cheryl and Kelley believe that it is important to work as part of the team with the woman's medical caregiver, the hospital staff, the laboring woman and the woman's birth partner and we have extensive experience working at Mission Hospital, Harris Regional and other hospitals in the area. We are hired by the woman and her partner so our primary focus is to support them and although we may make suggestions it is not our birth it is our client's. We also do not ever stand between hospital staff, the medical caregiver and their patient. Tracie will be providing some birth doula support with Cheryl and Kelley in the near future (see her bio below).
Postpartum Doulas-Cheryl and Tracie provide full time postpartum doula support beginning the day after coming home from the hospital
answering questions about the newborn, teaching special techniques to
comfort the new baby, providing breastfeeding support, helping siblings
adjust, preparing a nourishing meal and finally leaving the home feeling very "peaceful" with the new family relaxing together. Their goals as postpartum doulas are to “work themselves out of a job” and prevent
problems. They also aid the new mother's healing and provide
assistance to the family by doing household tasks, fixing family
meals and helping with baby care, breastfeeding support, teaching infant care and providing sibling care for the first few days and/or weeks depending on the families needs. Cheryl and Tracie have extensive experience working with families with new babies, with multiples and preventing or identifying postpartum depression. Cheryl and Tracie provide postpartum support 7 days a week with hours available all day, in the evening and through the night.
Breastfeeding Support-Tracie and Kelley have provided extensive breastfeeding support and education for many years and provide this service for all of our doula clients. Tracie is a certified breastfeeding peer counselor and educator and Kelley has taught breastfeeding classes for years as a certified childbirth educator and is also a breastfeeding peer counselor and educator. She has provided breastfeeding support to all of her students and clients for many years.
Labor and birth preparation- Cheryl and Kelley are certified childbirth educators and provide labor and birth education and/or review to all of our birth doula clients. With the comprehensive birth doula package they will provide an intensive childbirth class that can be a refresher for parents having another baby or a childbirth class in two parts for busy parents having their first baby.
Doula Trainings and Forums- Our doulas are committed to education of the public and to doulas about having a healthy and joyous birth and postpartum. Cheryl and Rowan have degrees in Health Education, Cheryl and Kelley are childbirth educators and Kelley and Tracie are breastfeeding educators. All four of these doulas participate in the Free Labor and Birth Forums for the public and participate in the doula trainings (LeAnne is in nursing school and raising four children).
Free Interview-We provide a complimentary one hour interview to all potential clients to explain our doula services. You can also meet our doulas at our FREE Labor and Birth Forums the last Thursday evening of each month in Asheville NC on the Mission Hospital campus. The next forum will take place, Thurs. Sep. 30, 7pm - The Importance of Movement for Labor and Birth. See our Labor and Birth Support Forum page for more information and directions.
Location and fees- Our doulas provide support in Asheville and elsewhere in WNC. Take a look at our prices and services on the Fees page and go to the Contact Us page and complete our contact form or call to get in touch with us for an interview. We want everyone to have a doula so we will work with you regarding payment. If you cannot pay at all we can refer you to one of the doulas we are mentoring that attended Cheryl's doula trainings. We look forward to working with you and your partner to help you have the most peaceful and joyous birth and postpartum possible.
Cheryl Thomas Orengo, BSBirth doula, postpartum doula and DONA approved birth doula trainer
Home office- 828-258-3327
Cell- 776-3327
Cheryl is passionate about birth and families and was originally trained as a doula and birth doula trainer with Penny Simkin,(shown above in the video) who was one of the founders of DONA International.
Cheryl is a certified: birth doula, childbirth and parenting educator, postpartum doula and birth doula trainer. Cheryl has taught childbirth and parenting education classes for 25 years, (including the past 3 1/2 years at Mission Hospital), has provided labor support for 22 years and has trained doulas for over 11 years.
Cheryl spent 30 years working in public health with the majority of those years working at the Buncombe County Health Department coordinating maternal health education. While there she founded and coordinated a volunteer doula program for over 12 years and decided to expand that type of program to make doulas available to all women in WNC. That program became DAMA, the Doula Association of the Mountain Area, in WNC, an association of independent doulas based in Asheville.
Cheryl has extensive experience with births of all types working together with physicians and midwives as well as the woman's partner as part of the birth team. She works hard to prepare the birth partner to take "center stage" but she is always available for assistance when needed so often becomes the "labor consultant" in the room. Cheryl uses a combination of prenatal preparation, unique comfort measures and labor positions, optimism and joy!
Cheryl has taught parenting education for 25 years, raised two wonderful daughters to adulthood (her youngest is a labor nurse at Mission Hospital) and has worked as a postpartum doula for over 4 years. Cheryl also has extensive training in prevention and identification of postpartum depression with a degree and experience in social work and training and experience in health education and wellness.
In her spare time Cheryl enjoys cycling tours with her husband, gardening, yoga, hiking and spending time with her adult daughters, friends and pets, especially her new puppy Lucy who is heading for a "career" providing pet therapy with kids in the hospital.
Kelley Thomas-Hill, BSBirth doula and breastfeeding specialist
828-736-1897
Kelley is a certified birth doula and ICEA certified childbirth educator and has been teaching childbirth classes, early childhood education and attending births since 1997.
Kelley is a true educator and prepares our clients well for the rigors of labor and attends both hospital and home births. Kelley thoroughly enjoys birth and has extensive experience with births from water to cesareans. Kelley also has additional training in breastfeeding support and provides this support for all of our clients.
Kelley believes that helping women find their way and their choice is important. She likes to keep in mind that natural birth is probably the safest for the majority of moms and babies. However, there are times a woman may need or want to make a choice outside of natural birth and having a doula when making these decisions is an important aspect.
Kelley takes special care in supporting a woman's birth partner so that he or she can remain in a supportive role at their own comfort level. She also uses special measures and skills to help women and their partners work with labor.
During postpartum Kelley is available to provide breastfeeding support to our new families. With years of experience breastfeeding her own children and providing breastfeeding support for 13 years, Kelley is the perfect person to assist our doula clients with infant feeding.
In her spare time Kelley enjoys spending time with her husband Tom, her two adult children and her two dogs. She also enjoys spending time outdoors and being with her friends.
Introducing our newest partner Tracie!
Tracie T. Coyle, BS
Birth doula, postpartum doula,
breastfeeding educator and multiples specialist
828-768-2327
traciecoyle@greendiaperpail.com
More photos coming soon!
Tracie was trained as a postpartum doula while living
in Austin before DONA had a postpartum certification program. Tracie trained in Texas at St. David’s Hospital in a
facility sponsored, postpartum doula training program by a DONA certified
instructor. She has 10 years of
experience working as a postpartum and birth doula in Austin and Asheville.
After the postpartum training Tracie worked
in the newborn nursery at St. David’s Hospital feeding and caring for special
needs babies and supporting parents using kangaroo care with their NICU newborn
children. Shortly after training as a
postpartum doula in Austin, Tracie trained and became a certified birth doula
and did much of her birth doula work at the Austin Birth Center providing birth
and postpartum support to her clients there.
While in Austin, Tracie became especially interested
in initiating breastfeeding immediately after birth so she took the State of
Texas phase one and two breastfeeding training modules and became a certified
breastfeeding educator. She continued to work as a postpartum doula in the
city of Austin, and had the opportunity to work with families with twin and
triplet babies. Tracie was drawn to serve the community of parents of multiples
in Austin, and fortunately enough became pregnant with twins while performing
service to this community.
After the birth of her twins, Lilian and Madeline,
Tracie’s new family moved back to her home city of Asheville to be closer to family. A couple of years later Tracie became president of the Asheville Mothers of Multiples AMOM
providing support and referrals to families of multiples during her two year
term. During the same time, Tracie began again working with families as a doula
assisting in birth and postpartum care. Tracie took a hiatus to
enjoy the birth of her third child, Aidan, with the assistance of Cheryl Orengo as her doula.
Two months after the birth of Aidan, Tracie started
the Green Diaper Pail, a full service cloth diaper company. She has enjoyed
working with, and educating families about cloth diapering and other types of
infant care for the past three years. In addition to successfully running the
Green Diaper Pail, Tracie is currently working toward becoming a certified
lactation consultant, works part-time as a breastfeeding peer counselor at the Buncombe County Dept. of Health and has recently accepted an invitation for a second term
as president of the Asheville Mothers of Multiples and to join Peaceful
Beginning as a doula partner.
In her spare time Tracie is continuing academic studies to complete her 2nd degree in Health and Wellness Promotion at UNCA, she works in her garden and enjoys camping with her husband Michael and her 3 children.
K. Rowan Lischerelli, BSPeaceful Beginning forum leader, doula trainee mentor and doula training group leader
Rowan is a certified birth doula a trained postpartum doula with DONA and she holds a degree in health and wellness. Rowan leads our Labor and Birth Forums along with Cheryl, Kelley and Tracie, works with doula trainings, helps to mentor new doulas and provides some backup. Rowan is temporarily inactive as a practicing doula due to a wonderful, new and demanding full time job.
LeAnne Marrs, CNA and Nursing student Peaceful Beginning advisor
LeAnne is a certified birth doula and childbirth educator and is a trained postpartum doula. She is currently a full time nursing student working toward her goal of becoming a Labor and Delivery nurse and eventually a Certified Nurse Midwife while she is raising 4 children. LeAnne is inactive as a Peaceful Beginning doula but lends her support as a wonderful adviser. We look forward to her return as a doula after she has completed nursing school.
“When we truly care for ourselves, it becomes possible to care far more profoundly about other people. The more alert and sensitive we are to our own needs, the more loving
and generous we can be toward others.”
Eda LeShan
