Natanya Champney is a dedicated midwife with over 17 years of experience, transitioning from a thriving practice in rural New Hampshire to her current role as the Staff Midwife and Clinical Director at The Addice Birth Center in North Houston, Texas. Throughout her career, Natanya has passionately provided compassionate care and support to families, helping them navigate the profound journey of childbirth.

Before moving to Texas, she founded and operated As It Was Midwifery in Littleton, NH, where she served over 300 families, gaining invaluable insights into the unique challenges and rewards of rural midwifery. Although Houston is vastly different from the life she led in Northern NH, Natanya and her two sons are thriving here in Texas. She is amazed at how seemless the transition has been.

Natanya is also an emerging author, currently writing a book about her journey into and through midwifery. This work seeks to illuminate her experiences, challenges, and reflections as she adapted from a rural practice to a bustling urban environment, offering inspiration and insights for fellow midwives and those interested in maternal health.

 

Natanya Champney

 

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Natalie Guzman, Chieko Babb, and Anna Demetra Badoian tell us about the premier screening of a film you don’t want to miss – Pacific Mother – plus the work they are doing. I will also be speaking with Christine Diaz, a member of the BIRTH Fair Leadership Team, who will share information about this year’s BIRTH Fair. BIRTH (Bringing Information and Resources to Houston) is sponsoring the Houston premiere of the award-winning film Pacific Mother. The film will make its Houston debut on April 22, 2026, at Cafe Brasil, located at 2604 Dunlavy Street, from 7 to 10 PM.

Natalie Guzman is a Salvadoran birth doula, student midwife, and ceremonialist, devoted to reclaiming birth as a sacred rite of passage. She is the co-founder of Aliento of Nacimiento – A school of traditional birth arts. It was the ecstatic homebirth of her son that opened the portal into birthwork for her. It was an initiation that forever changed her life and awakened a calling she couldn’t ignore. She also serves on Birth Fair’s Leadership Team and is a vital link between Birth Fair and spanish speaking families in Houston, Texas.

Chieko Babb is a Japanese-Puerto Rican licensed midwife and co-founder of Aliento de Nacimiento. Chieko believes her midwifery training instilled in her the importance of taking on leadership in communities for the health of future generations. Her practice of holistic midwifery care
is rooted in both evidence-based practices and respect for traditions. She brings all the tools of the trade she has gathered throughout her journey as a birth doula, herbalist, reproductive health ally, and home birth midwife into her practice.

Anna Demetra Badoian is the heart behind Of the Earth Holistic Care and Of the Earth Botanicals. These are spaces where she gets to share her passions as an experienced bodyworker, plant lover and birth worker dedicated to the wellbeing of womxn, wombs and the childbirth continuum. Her background includes over a decade of work in the Rolf Method of Structural Integration, Scar Work®, Arvigo Abdominal Therapy, Yoga/Functional Movement and Energy Healing. She is a gifted teacher and healer in our community.

Together, they are dedicated to spreading awareness of ancestral ways of birth, weaving workshops, ceremonies, and gatherings that honor tradition, culture, and the wisdom of the body.

Christine Diaz is a long-time supporter and volunteer with BIRTH. Her first BIRTH Fair was in 2005, when she volunteered in the maternity fashion show, and she has been involved ever since. This year, she is serving as the Sponsor/Vendor Coordinator. After experiencing the empowerment of having her three children at home with a midwife, she became dedicated to helping others learn about their birth options and supporting the right of every birthing person to shape their own experience.

Outside of her work with BIRTH, Christine has been active in community media, co-hosting KPFT’s Voices at Work for several years. She currently works full-time, enjoys fitness, and is a fan of Abbott Elementary. She is grateful to her partner, Gordon, for supporting her ongoing commitment to BIRTH Fair and its mission.

 

Natalie Guzman, Chieko Babb, Anna Demetra Badoian, & Christine Diaz

 

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Charis Asher is a Business Operations and Leadership Strategist, Certified Christian Counselor, and Founder of Lady Power Inc., a nonprofit supporting underserved mothers through pregnancy, birth, and postpartum care. With over 17 years of experience and a background as a former Montessori school director, she helps organizations and families thrive through strategy, structure, and community-centered support. Her work is rooted in faith and lived experience, inspired by her own empowering birth supported by a midwife who was first a doula. Today, she leads a team committed to ensuring every mother has access to compassionate care and support.

 

Charis W. Asher, Black Maternal Health Week

 

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Kirsten Nottleson, Parent and Teacher Educator is the proud mother of 2 sons, aged 20 and 26. She has been playing and working with children, parents, caregivers, and teaching professionals for 32 years. She sees that most parents in today’s society are working under significant stress, with insufficient support. She understands that parents and caregivers want children to be happy, healthy, and have good, big lives and are better able to do that when they are seen, heard, and respected. She supports parents to understand their own history, to bring awareness to the context in which they are parenting, build a practical support network for themselves, and heal from their early wounds, so that they can feel more confident, connected, playful, and lead their families more consciously and effectively. She has been a preschool teacher, summer camp owner/ director, mentor for instructors and parents. She has worked extensively with young and teen parents, and families with substance use issues. She helped develop a Peer Education Parenting Curriculum which she brought into 14 Texas prisons, training inmates to listen to one another to help each other heal. Her work is based on the Hand in Hand Parenting Approach which she believes to be nothing short of Peace Movement in Action. She raised both her children using the Hand in Hand Parenting Tools and is eternally grateful for the shift in her parenting that was possible as a result. Young children KNOW when something is not right, they protest loudly, YOU protested loudly, yelled, cried, had tantrums, tried to let people know with indignation that something wasn’t right. And very few of us had an adult who could listen well to these upsets They were quelled or squashed in one way or another So we learned to be quiet

This pattern comes with us

 

Being heard helps to undo that pattern, helps us to see and feel that we are not alone with the current struggles, that others care Leading a Parent Resource Group Booklet which describes exactly how you can set up a group in your community Hand in Hand Parenting Foundations Course with Kirsten, 6 weeks starting April 7, 2026 FREE CARE PACKAGE for PARENTING IN DIFFICULT TIMES. Parent Consultations Opt-in here YES! I want to receive Kirsten’s infrequent newsletter

 

 

Kirsten Nottleson, Hand in Hand Parenting

 

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Zulgeil Ruiz-Gines is a midwife, educator, and advocate for culturally safe midwifery care and education. She holds licenses as a Licensed Midwife in the states of California and Florida, serving in community birth settings. Born and raised on the magical island of Puerto Rico, she earned her BA degree in Humanities from the University of Puerto Rico. Zul‘s journey into midwifery education began in Temixco, Mexico, where she spent nine months learning from an indigenous midwife who opened her vision, spirit, and heart to the world of midwifery.

Zul is deeply committed to the education and training of midwives and recognition and sustainability of midwifery. Her dedication has led her to various roles, including Midwifery Instructor at the Midwifery Program at Southwest Wisconsin Technical College, Midwifery Education Consultant, founder of KIBI Consulting, Research and Education and Executive Director of Commonsense Childbirth School of Midwifery founded by Jennie Joseph. CCSM is a national program that provides quality, practical, culturally-sensitive training and education that is integral to maternity health care systems in United States.Currently Zul is pursuing her masters degree in Oregon State University in Applied Medical Anthropology under Dr.Melissa Cheyney, PHd,LDM as her advisor. Her research focuses on the growth and sustainability of the accredited Midwifery programs for community midwives in the United States.

Andie Wyrick, CNM, DNP, is a certified nurse midwife and midwifery instructor. Andie has been in the Houston birth community for over twenty years. Her experience includes elementary school nursing, hospital L & D, birth center, and home birth.

She has been joyfully dating her husband of 24 years since junior high and has six children. She is the owner of Shire Midwifery. Andie is confident in a women’s ability to grow and birth their baby. She feels a partnership in care is empowering and always hopes to foster that relationship with families. She has done extensive work in birth after trauma and continues to bring light to informed decision making and autonomy. She is the owner of Shire Midwifery. Her passions beyond bellies, birth and breastfeeding are drooling over her hottie of a husband, reading period pieces and being a glutton for movie theater popcorn.

 

Zulgeil Ruiz-Gines & Andie Wyrick, CNM, DNP

 

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Anna Demetra Badoian of Earth Holistic Care and Of the Earth Botanicals. Her background includes a decade of work in the Rolf Method of Structural Integration, Scar Work, Maya Abdominal Therapy, Yoga/Functional Movement and Energy Healing. She works with plant energetics, herbal medicines, sound healing and ceremony. You can reach her at www.annademetra.com or www.oftheearthbotanicals.com

 

Anna Demetra Badoian

 

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Holly Milkowski is a local birth worker who just celebrated 7 years in business as owner of Your Labor Neighbor. Here, she offers Birth Boot Camp classes, placenta services, and doula care.

Holly served on the Board of Directors at The Intact Network, ran a global Top 20 “Best Of” breastfeeding blog to raise awareness of biological parenting norms, recently earned certification as a lactation support provider, and has been involved in local advocacy since 2014, while raising her two children.

She has a degree in journalism so naturally her favorite pasttime is writing. In her spare time, she hangs out with her animals and trains in pole fitness at Revolve Pole Studio.

Associated websites to learn more:

YourLaborNeighbor.com
MamasMilkNoChaser.com
SavingSons.org
TheIntactNetwork
BirthBootCamp.com

 

Holly Milkowski

 

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Catrice will give us information on the history of African American midwives and how we can address and implement changes to socio-economic and cultural barriers that contribute to the healthcare disparities in African Americans and other underserved populations.

Encouraged to support women after the birth of her own daughters, Catrice Harris has been helping families with childbirth education, labor & birth, postpartum and lactation support since 1992. Her initial Lactation training was through the University of Texas Health Science Center and City of Houston WIC Programs. She continued to embrace caring for women and children by becoming certified as a birth and postpartum doula. After observing many challenges faced by women who did not feel enabled to advocate for themselves during childbirth, it seemed that the only next step was to pursue midwifery. Taking the leap away from Corporate America in 2012, she embraced birth work full time. Growing into a midwife has been a journey that constantly presents new opportunities for growth in many beautiful ways. Currently, with a solo home birth practice, Catrice also trains and mentors doulas through a grant funded program seeking to provide birth support to underserved communities in Houston, TX. Having supported over 365 families with the births of their babies as of 2023, she is truly grateful that this work found her.

Contact her at babysbeststart.org

 

Catrice Harris, CPM, LM

 

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Shafia Monroe is deeply devoted to reproductive justice as the crux of Human Rights. She
is a Master of Public Health, author, traditional midwife, doula trainer, motivational
speaker, and a lover of people. Her spiritual calling to midwifery began as a teenager,
inspired to reduce the high infant mortality rate in her city. Mama Shafia is a guardian of
African American birth traditions and postpartum rituals. With over four decades of
experience, she has researched the lives of 20th-century African American midwives and
traveled nationally to interview and observe them, learning traditional postpartum
practices. Honoring her Alabama roots, she practices the laying on of hands with pregnant
and postpartum women, newborns, and families.

For over 30 years, Monroe has been an active organizer for reproductive justice. In 2011,
she led the Oregon Coalition to Improve Birth Outcomes (OCIBO) in a study investigating
the use of doulas to enhance birth outcomes. This initiative led to the creation of legislative
concept HB3311, making Oregon the first state in the nation to reimburse doulas’ services
through Medicaid. Shafia Monroe continues to shape a world where equitable healthcare
enhances maternal and infant health, and birth workers become pillars in their
communities. She is the CEO and founder of SMC Full Circle Doula Birth Companion
Training, LLC (SMC Doulas), which created the first led Black doula curriculum in 2002. She
has trained over 5,000 doulas and mentors hundreds of individuals to embrace their roles
as healers, midwives, doulas, and leaders.

Her contributions are highlighted in the books “Granny Midwives and Black Woman
Authors” and “Wings of Gauze: Women of Color and the Experience of Health and
Illness.” In 2016, Madame Noir recognized her as the “Queen Mother of a Midwife
Movement” for her pioneering work in the 1970s, which introduced midwifery and home
birth services to Boston’s Black community in Massachusetts. In 2022, Scientific Americanfeatured her as one of four individuals nationally recognized for “People Who Are Making
Health Care Fairer.”

Monroe has received numerous awards for her work, including five Lifetime Achievement
Awards. She is a board member of the National Black Midwives Alliance, the Oregon Doula
Association, the Oregon Community Doula Association, Black Mamas Matter Alliance, and
the National Muslim Business Coalition. She served for eight years at the Oregon Health
Authority Office of Equity and Inclusion: Cultural Competency Continuing Education
Advisory Committee.

She is a wife, a mother of seven, a grandmother, and a great-grandmother. In her spare
time, she enjoys cooking for family and friends, walking, gardening, studying herbal
medicine, singing, praying, writing, dancing, fishing, and horseback riding.
On January 27, 2026, Monroe launched her book, “Mothering the Mother: African American
Postpartum Traditions, Recipes and Healing,” a heartfelt book for Black mothers, providing
guidance for healing after childbirth with time to bond and enjoy their baby. Mothering the
Mother is especially vital for Black women who are disproportionately affected by maternal
mortality and morbidity. Reclaiming culturally rooted postpartum care is healing and
lifesaving.

Mama Shafia wants this book to be in every person’s hand who wants to see new mothers nurtured, celebrated, and thriving.
Learn more about the book and author at www.shafiamonroe.com

 

Shafia Monroe, MPH, DEM, CDT

 

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Jackie Griggs, CNM, is a Certified Nurse Midwife who has been practicing in the Houston/Beaumont area for the past 35 years. She is a mom of 5 grown sons, 3 born at home with the help of midwives. – Three grandchildren are the light of her life. She has helped mainly with home and birth center births, but has worked in the hospital some as well. She is the owner of birth center of Beaumont, and also helps with home births in the Houston area. She has been on the Board of Directors of the American Association of Birth Centers, until just recently, and still is a very big advocate for midwifery care at a birth center or home, for the women of this country. She is also focused on training new midwifery students and helping to increase the number of birth centers in Texas and the United States.

Toni Kimpel, CPM, LM, is the owner, Director and Senior Midwife at Jubilee Birth Center. She earned an undergraduate degree from the University of Mobile, where she achieved a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics and Business Administration, with a minor in Biology. Her mathematics degree is actually used in midwifery in figuring angles and vectors for getting babies to come out, her business administration has been helpful in running a business, and of course biology is involved in the science of midwifery. She has been a midwife since 1985. She completed the certification process to become a Certified Professional Midwife in 1996. She currently holds a Texas Department of Health Services Midwifery License. She opened Jubilee Birth Center in 2012 in Bryan, Texas. She gave birth to eight children between 1977 and 1998. And adopted a daughter in 2004. So,she raised nine children and now have 21 grandchildren and 6 great grand-children. She delivered five of her grandchildren and 2 of her great-grandchildren.

Diana Nash, CPM, LM, and her husband, Don have been married almost 25 years. We’re a blended family of 6 grown children – 5 boys and 1 girl – and have 13 grandchildren, ages 16 years to 3 weeks! She was a late bloomer and didn’t start her Midwifery training until 2005 with the Association of Texas Midwives and graduated in 2007. Since then, she has worked in both home and birth center settings in Texas and Arkansas, but returned to the Piney woods of East Texas 5 years ago. She serves a large area surrounding Polk County, much of which is a maternity desert. She is in the process of starting a freestanding birth center in Livingston, TX. She offers twin, breech and VBAC delivery and recently had the joy of attending her 500th birth!

 

Jackie Griggs, CNM, and Toni Kimpel, CPM, LM, and Diana Nash, CPM, LM

 

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