There is something incredibly meaningful about having someone beside you  during some of the most vulnerable moments of your life. Someone who understands what you’re experiencing, recognizes when you need a little extra reassurance, and is willing to walk alongside you even when things don’t unfold the way you had imagined. Pregnancy, birth, and postpartum can bring so many different emotions, and while these experiences are often surrounded by excitement and anticipation, they can also bring uncertainty, anxiety, and fear. For families who have experienced pregnancy or infant loss, those feelings can become even  more complicated. 

One of the things that we are passionate about at This Little Light is helping families understand the resources available to them. We want families to know that compassionate support doesn’t have to begin or end within the walls of a hospital, and that we have people in our community who have dedicated their lives to caring for women and families throughout pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. That support can become especially meaningful when someone is navigating an experience that looks different from what they had hoped or expected.

As part of our ongoing interview series, our Local Resource & Mental Health Coordinator, Stephanie Horacek had the opportunity to sit down with Betsy Pool, owner of Thrive Together Doulas, to learn more about her work and discuss how doula support can benefit families, including those navigating pregnancy after loss. Their conversation explored everything from Betsy’s introduction to birth work and the importance of individualized care to the emotional realities that can accompany pregnancy, loss, and postpartum recovery.

Betsy has been a doula for approximately ten years, but her journey into birth work began with her own experiences as a mother. During her first pregnancy, she found herself researching pregnancy and birth, exploring her options, and eventually discovering the role of a doula. She decided to hire one for her own birth, not yet realizing just how much that experience would influence her in future.

On the Thrive Together Doulas website, Betsy shares additional details about that first birth. She labored for 27 hours at a birth center. She described the experience as long and exhausting and that her baby’s positioning contributed to the challenges she faced. Through it all, she had a friend and doula beside her, offering encouragement and helping her find the confidence to continue. That same doula would eventually support her through the birth of her second child as well. 

During our interview, Betsy reflected on what having that support meant to her. “I just felt like having that extra support person who had been through birth recently and could kind of guide me just left me feeling more confident and empowered throughout the whole experience.” She went on to explain, “Instead of birth happening to me, I felt like I was a very active participant in the birth.”

 I think there is something important in that distinction. Birth is an incredibly personal experience, and while we cannot always control how it unfolds, we should still have opportunities to participate in decisions surrounding our care. Feeling informed, supported, and respected can make a tremendous difference in how someone experiences and remembers their birth, even when circumstances change or difficult decisions have to be made. 

After the birth of her second child, Betsy found herself wanting to provide other women with the same kind of encouragement and support she had received. She remembered asking her own doula how she could become on herself, explaining, “I want to do this too. I want to empower women.”

According to her professional biography, Betsy became a Certified Labor Doula through Childbirth International in 2016 and has since supported over 100 births. Her experience has continued to shape her approach to birth preparation and postpartum care. Following the births of her third and fourth children, she pursued additional training as a Certified Body Ready Method Pro, postpartum doula, and childbirth educator. Her work now incorporates education surrounding physical preparation, comfort measures, and individualized support throughout pregnancy and recovery. 

Eventually, Betsy recognized that the kind of support she wanted to provide families also needed to extend to the doulas doing the work. 

Birth doesn’t happen on a predictable schedule. Labor can begin in the middle of the night, last much longer than anticipated, or overlap with the responsibilities a doula has within her own family. Providing continuous support to others requires a dependable support system of its own, and that realization helped shape Thrive Together Doulas. 

“I’ve always worked with a very small team of doulas because you can’t do this work alone,” Betsy explained. She went on to share, “I started Thrive Together Doulas because I really wanted not only for our families to thrive, but for our doulas to have a team so that they can thrive in their work.”

Today, Thrive Together Doulas serves families in Topeka, Lawrence, the greater Kansas City area, and surrounding communities. Their team provides birth and postpartum doula care, childbirth education, and additional preparation resources. The collective’s website emphasizes individualized care that respects each family’s values, preferences, and circumstances, with a focus on helping parents feel informed and supported throughout their experiences.

As the conversation continued, Stephanie and Betsy discussed what a doula actually does. Betsy explained that doulas provide emotional, informational, and physical support throughout pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. Unlike a physician, midwife, or nurse, a doula is not responsible for providing medical treatment or making medical decisions. Instead, they offer another layer of support which is helping families understand their options, prepare for what may happen, and feel more confident communicating their needs. 

“A doula is someone who provides that emotional support you might be looking for, and just more information and knowledge because a doula has experienced a wide range of normal when it comes to pregnancy, because every pregnancy is not going to look the same. Every birth is not going to look the same.”

No two pregnancies or births are exactly alike. Even someone who has experienced birth before may find themselves facing entirely different circumstances the next time around. What one person finds reassuring might not be helpful to another, and what someone needs during early pregnancy may be completely different from what they need in the middle of labor. That is part of what makes individualized support so valuable. 

Betsy also spoke about the importance of supporting partners, recognizing that they bring their own strengths into the birth room, but they may not always know what to expect. “Even though your partner might be the expert in you, they know what your triggers are and all of that, they don’t know what birth can look like.” A partner may know the laboring person better than anyone else. They may recognize their fears, understand their preferences, and know how to comfort them during difficult moments. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they understand the different stages of labor, which positions might be helpful, or how to respond when the experience becomes overwhelming. Having a doula present can provide additional guidance while allowing partners to remain involved in supporting the person they love.

Throughout their discussion, Betsy emphasized the importance of establishing relationships before labor begins. Thrive Together Doulas incorporates prenatal meetings and educational opportunities into its birth support, allowing families to get to know their doulas, discuss concerns, and prepare for the experience ahead. Their website describes several birth support options, including prenatal guidance, birth planning, continuous labor support, and postpartum follow-up. Families can also access classes covering physical and mental preparations, labor stages, communications and advocacy, birth positions, breastfeeding, newborn care, and postpartum recovery.

These resources are intended to help families prepare for the experience they hope to have while also understanding the options available if circumstances change. Betsy explained during the interview that different families benefit from different types of support. “Some people really want hands-on support. Some people want more encouragement. Some people want the forecasting like what is coming next, how am I going to survive this type of support.

I think that is something worth remembering when we talk about compassionate care. Support isn’t necessarily about providing the same information or comfort measures to every person. It’s about taking the time to understand the individual in front of you and recognizing what would be most meaningful to them. 

As the conversation shifted toward pregnancy after loss, Stephanie brought a personal perspective to the discussion. Pregnancy after loss can be an incredibly emotional experience, and that isn’t always easy for others to understand. A family may be excited about another pregnancy while simultaneously carrying fear from a previous experience. Appointments that once felt routine may now bring anxiety, and milestones that might have been celebrated without hesitation can become reminders of what happened before. 

Betsy acknowledged that she has encountered these feelings through her work supporting pregnant families. “As I have been working with pregnant moms, of course, there are moms that are experiencing pregnancy after loss, and so oftentimes they just have a bit more anxiety or more fear around their pregnancy.” 

Stephanie then shared her own experience, explaining that after having two children, she experienced three pregnancy losses before becoming pregnant again and eventually welcoming another baby. During that subsequent pregnancy, she recognized that she needed additional emotional support and made the decision to hire a doula.

“I very quickly hired a doula myself because I needed so much extra support just emotionally to make it through my own pregnancy.” Her experience brought an important perspective into the conversation. Pregnancy after loss isn’t simply another pregnancy. The memories of previous experiences don’t disappear with a positive pregnancy test, and the excitement of welcoming another baby doesn’t erase the grief of losing one.

For some families, the reassurance of having someone who already understands their history can make an enormous difference. Betsy explained that Thrive Together Doulas asks families about their previous pregnancy and birth experiences during the intake process. This allows their doulas to begin understanding each family’s history before discussing what additional support may be beneficial.

“Families that come to us with a loss often want more check-ins,” Betsy shared. She also emphasized the importance of recognizing significant dates and milestones. “If you know those times when they might have had that miscarriage or that loss, those dates can be triggers for them and so just knowing that in your care for them is going to make a huge difference.”

For someone who has experienced pregnancy or infant loss, a date on the calendar may carry a significance that isn’t immediately visible to anyone else. It might be the gestational age when they learned their baby had died, the anniversary of their loss, or a milestone they never had the opportunity to reach. Sometimes those dates are anticipated for weeks, while other times the emotions surrounding them might be more unexpected. Having someone who understands why those moments matter, and who recognizes that additional reassurance might be needed, is a meaningful part of providing compassionate care.

The conversation also brought attention to how exhausting it can be for families to repeatedly explain their experiences to new people. When someone has already taken the time to learn their story, that understanding can create a sense of familiarity and emotional safety. A family shouldn’t have to repeatedly justify why they are afraid, why an appointment feels overwhelming or why a particular milestone is difficult. Their experiences deserve to be acknowledged, and their babies deserve to be remembered. 

Stephanie and Betsy also discussed how doulas may be able to support families who are actively experiencing pregnancy loss. While doula care is often associated with preparing for the arrival of a living baby, most of the same emotional and informational needs can exist when a pregnancy ends in loss. Betsy explained that medical appointments can be overwhelming, particularly when families are trying to process difficult information. “When you’re experiencing a loss or just when you’re pregnant in general, sometimes it’s just hard to retain all the information that’s given to you at the appointments or to ask the questions in a moment that you had before.” 

There can be so much information to absorb in such a short period of time, and when someone is receiving news they never expected to hear, remembering every question or understanding every explanation can become incredibly difficult. Having another support person present may provide an opportunity to ask questions, revisit information, and feel less alone during an experience that can be incredibly isolating. That person doesn’t replace medical care or make decisions for the family, but they may be able to offer emotional support while the family navigates those conversations.

Betsy also recognized that partners may not always be able to attend every appointment or remain present throughout every part of the experience. “Maybe your partner doesn’t get time off when you experience a loss.” It’s a reality that deserves consideration. Families experiencing loss are often navigating far more than grief alone. They may also be managing work responsibilities, childcare, medical appointments, physical recovery, and countless other things that don’t simply stop because their world has changed.

That is one reason we believe connecting families with community resources is so important. There may not be one person or organization capable of meeting every need, but when compassionate professionals work together, families have more opportunities to receive the care and support they deserve. 

Another meaningful part of the conversation centered around postpartum recovery. When we think about postpartum support, we often imagine a family at home with their newborn, adjusting to feeding schedules, sleepless nights, and the many changes that come with welcoming a baby. But the postpartum period is so much more than caring for a newborn. It is also about caring for the person who has experienced pregnancy and birth.

And the need for postpartum care doesn’t just disappear when a baby dies.

Stephanie brought attention to the physical and emotional realities that can follow pregnancy loss, including the hormonal changes and grief a family may be experiencing without their baby in their arms. It’s an important reminder that postpartum recovery deserves attention regardless of the outcome of a pregnancy. Families experiencing loss may still need physical care, emotional reassurance, practical assistance, and opportunities to process what has happened. 

Betsy also discussed the role postpartum doulas can play in helping families navigate recovery and the transition into parenthood. Thrive Together Doulas offers daytime and overnight postpartum support, with services described on their website including feeding assistance, newborn educations, meal preparations, light household responsibilities, and opportunities for parents to rest.

“Having somebody else there to maybe do some of the heavy lifting, maybe help you so that you can really rest and focus on what is right there in front of you.” For families welcoming a living baby, those services may help make the early weeks of parenthood more manageable. For families navigating loss, the needs may look very different. 

What does remain true in either circumstance is that physical recovery and emotional well being matter, and no family should feel that they have to manage every aspect of those experiences entirely on their own. 

As the interview came to a close, one thing continued to stand out for us and that is the importance of being known. Doula support is not just about having someone nearby who understands pregnancy or birth. It is about having someone on your team who has taken the time to understand you. Someone who knows your preferences, recognizes your concerns, and remembers the experiences that surround how you approach your pregnancy, birth, and postpartum.

Betsy’s introduction to birth work began because another woman provided support that made feel seen. It made her feel confident and involved in her own birth experience. She wasn’t just a bystander. That experience inspired her to become a doula, and eventually to build a collective where families and birth workers could receive support from one another.  Her professional journey, along with Stephanie’s personal perspective on pregnancy after loss, helped create a conversation about different ways that support can matter.

At This Little Light, our mission is rooted in the belief that families experiencing pregnancy and infant loss deserve compassionate care, meaningful resources, and opportunities to honor and remember their babies. Part of that work is helping families become familiar with the professionals and organizations within our communities, so that when they need support, they know where they can begin looking.

We are grateful to Betsy for taking the time to share her knowledge and explain the work being done through Thrive Together Doulas. We also recognize the importance of conversations like this one, where experiences that are often difficult to discuss are given the space and attention they deserve. 

Sometimes, just knowing that someone is willing to walk alongside you can make all the difference. 

Learn More About Thrive Together Doulas

Families interested in learning more can visit ThriveTogetherDoulas.com to explore their services, meet their team, or request a free consultation.