Today we’d like to introduce you to Sabrina Hadnot.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Sabrina. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
Emily hired me to be her doula for her first surrogate birth. She had a scheduled cesarean section with her daughter and had never experienced labor before. After being fully supported during her birth she was inspired to become a doula herself and enrolled in two training organizations. One was online for the in-depth knowledge of the birthing process while the other was hands on to perfect her skills. After completing her training, we discussed partnering on births. I was burnt out from the on-call lifestyle while Emily was ready to start her new career supporting women. We decided sharing clients and splitting a call schedule would allow us to plan our lives while following our passion. Having both been proven surrogates, we recognized that there was a comfort for both the surrogate and the soon be parents having a doula who fully understood and supported the unique process that is surrogacy. We launched San Diego Doula Company as a partnership in April of 2016 and now have 5 doulas who support women all over San Diego County.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
We wouldn’t say the road has been difficult but it also hasn’t been smooth. I began attending births in 2007. By the time Emily delivered in 2015, I was exhausted from never being able to plan vacations, or always missing my daughter’s birthday. Our idea to share clients alleviated this, however sharing clients also meant our potential to earn income was cut in half. To make up for this we had to market so that people knew who we were and so that we would have enough clients to sustain both of our families. We reached out to obstetrician offices and numerous surrogacy agencies. It cost us a lot of time but we had some Ob’s and agency owners excited to have their patients and clients work with us. Because of their faith in us, our little business idea was finally born!
Please tell us about San Diego Doula Company.
We are excited because when we started we were birth doulas and I am a massage therapist who is certified for labor support. In addition to this, we now provide postpartum support offering both infant care and care specific to healing the postpartum body. We are placenta specialists offering services such as placenta encapsulation, and we offer bodywork and skincare. We stand out in our community because we are full spectrum birth attendants who love what we do and have a passion to learn more ways to support our clients and their families. We are incredibly proud of the team we have built because we know whichever doula attends a birth they are fully equipped to handle however things turn out while providing compassionate, no-judgmental support to every client. Our team is truly what sets us apart in this field. Regardless of where our client lives we have doulas within a close proximity to get to them quickly. We have had cases where clients have been transported to Mary Birch for emergent situations and their assigned doula happily steps down so that the doula closest to their client can begin providing immediate support.
If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
If we could have started over we would have planned a hiring process at the conception of our business. When we grew, it happened so quickly that we had to hire doulas immediately. Because we had not perfected our interview process we did end up with some unreliable doulas which translated into us attending more births than we were assigned to in order guarantee our clients were supported. Overall, we have learned a lot and have grown with our business which we are very happy about.
Pricing:
- Birth Doula starts at $1,100
- Womens’ Health Postpartum Package starts at $150
- Postpartum Doula starts at $40/hour
- Placenta Services starts at $260
- Massage $100 (travel fee may apply)
- Facials $80 (travel fee may apply)
Contact Info:
- Website: sandiegodoulacompany.com
- Phone: (805) 216-7079
- Email: info@sandiegodoulacompany.com
Getting in touch: SDVoyager is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
