KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Gloria Lemay
Gloria is an author, teacher and grandmother. She has worked in the childbirth field for the past 40 years, (17 of those as a midwife) and has had experience with over 1500 births.
Gloria's film “Birth with Gloria Lemay” has sold over a thousand copies.
Gloria has written many articles and has been published in Midwifery Today magazine and she is a popular online blogger at www.wisewomanwayofbirth.com.
Gloria is a passionate advocate for the bodily integrity of boys and girls. She lives in Canada and travels all over North America in her role as a teacher and speaker.
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Robin Lim
Robin (named Ibu Robin, meaning 'Mother Robin' by the women she cares for in Indonesia), is a Filipina~American~Micronesian grandmother midwife, Doula and founder of Bumi Sehat NGO which maintains clinics in Indonesia and Philippines.
In 1990, Robin lost her younger sister, Christine, to a complication of pregnancy which could have been prevented with better care. Her sister’s passing cemented Robin's destiny to become a BirthKeeper.
Robin's passion is cultural safety, respect, in Childbirth, and healthcare as a human right.
Robin has helped thousands of women give birth and is the author of many books, including 'Eat, Pray, Doula', 'After the Baby’s Birth', 'Wellness for Mothers', 'Ecology of Gentle Birth', 'Awakening Birth', and "Placenta - The Forgotten Chakra'.
Robin was awarded CNN's Hero of the Year in 2011 for her tireless dedication to improving birth outcomes for women through the work of her clinics and foundations.
Robin is a mother of 8 and a grandmother of 6 children born gently into her hands.
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Stuart Fischbein
Stuart J. Fischbein MD is a community-based practicing obstetrician and an Associate of the American College of Obstetrics & Gynecology, published author of the book “Fearless Pregnancy, Wisdom & Reassurance from a Doctor, A Midwife and A Mom” and peer-reviewed papers Homebirth with an Obstetrician, A Series of 135 Out of Hospital Births and Breech birth at home: outcomes of 60 breech and 109 cephalic planned home and birth center births. After completing his residency at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, CA, Dr. Stu spent 24 years assisting women with hospital birthing and, for the last 13 years, has been a homebirth obstetrician who works directly with midwives. Dr. Stu travels around the world as a lecturer and advocate for reteaching breech & twin birth skills, respect for the normalcy of birth and honoring informed consent. Follow him on Instagram @birthinginstincts and at The Birthing Instincts Podcast with midwife Blyss Young as he offers hope, reassurance and safe, honest evidence supported choices for those women who understand pregnancy is a normal bodily function not to be feared.
Dr Stu is sadly unable to be here in person, but will be joining us via Zoom
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SPEAKERS:
Rhea Dempsey - Birthing Wisdom
Rhea Dempsey needs no introduction, but we'll give her one anyway!
Rhea is a Birth Educator, Doula, Trainer, Counsellor, Speaker, Activist and Author. Her books 'Birth with Confidence' and 'Beyond the Birth Plan' have been a valuable resource to birthing women and their families.
Rhea has been a passionate woman of birth for over 40 years and we are honoured to have her presenting at this year's conference.
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GeorGina Kelly - The Art of Mindful Birthing
GeorGina Kelly graduated as a midwife in 1996, and has practised as a community midwife in London, and rural England, and most happily and aligned, as a homebirth midwife both in the UK, and in Australia for the past twenty years. She began attending homebirths in 1995, and her own three children were birthed at home. GeorGina is passionate about homebirth.
GeorGina is the creator of 'The Art of Mindful Birthing' and has been facilitating courses and workshops since 2005. She has also been co-facilitating Deepening the Journey retreats for birth keepers alongside Lianne Schwartz since 2016.
GeorGina has also worked over nine years as a university midwifery lecturer. She especially relished being course convenor over several years teaching a trauma informed postgraduate course on sexual health and wellness. What was close to her heart was emphasising safety, self-knowing, pleasure and embodied consent.
GeorGina is currently training as a Somatic Experiencing™ Practitioner, and is grateful to be expanding her understanding and tools on working with trauma, nervous system regulation, and how to cultivate a sense of ease, aliveness and wholeness in the body.
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Catherine Bell - The Birth Map
Catherine Bell is the creator of Birth Cartography, author of 'The Birth Map: Boldly going where no birth plan has gone before' and inventor of The Game of Birth. She is currently a PhD Candidate at the University of Canberra, with a vision for Woman-led Maternity: where care providers work together to support women, assist if needed and honour and respect the immensity of matrescence. Her mission is to provide all women with the means to make informed decisions regarding their pregnancy care, labour, birth and parenting.
In becoming a Mother, Catherine shifted from the Marine Biology path into Science Communication. Training as a doula and breastfeeding educator in 2011, sparked a feminist fire, as she identified the glaring hole in the shape of maternity. Frustrated at the need-to-know nature of the maternity system, and the limited information provided when facing decisions, Catherine developed birth cartography. Her website, birthmap.life evolved to provide access to this concept, resources and training for birth workers.
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Ingula Rinkevičienė- International Academy of the Art of Midwifery
Ingula is a young traditional midwife from Lithuania, a nurturer of traditional birthcare. During the prosecution of the only traditional midwife in Lithuania while she could not attend homebirths - Ingula plunged into the world of childbirth in her stead. While expecting her third child, she began to help with home births to other women in the community. The snowball has been spinning for almost 12 years now.
During this time, she organized countless seminars, conferences, family camps, lectures for expectant families in Lithuania, and actively participated in various international conferences and worked closely with the traditional midwife Angelina Martinez Miranda in Mexico.
Recently, the short documentary "Birth Haiku" was shot and conference attendees will have the honor of being the first to see the film.
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Jessie Johnson-Cash
Jessie Johnson-Cash is a Lecturer in Nursing and Midwifery at the University of the Sunshine Coast. She is passionate about safe, holistic midwifery care, supporting and promoting physiological birth and exploring the social and cultural power dynamics within midwifery practice, with a professional and research interest in student support and the influence of health care providers' emotional wellbeing on the sustainable provision of woman-centred maternity care.
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Hayley Wilson
Hayley Wilson is a self-led, matriarchal birth worker and business mentor who wants every woman to access her inner depth, intuition and power. She believes in embodying matriarchy and uses a range of heart-led energetic practices to guide women toward their internal wisdom. Hayley supports her clients to unlearn and live in feminine alignment so they can curate the births and businesses of their dreams.
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Natalie Rees - The Renegade Mama
Natalie Rees is a mother of 3, podcaster and a voice for freebirth and sovereignty. Her podcast The Renegade Mama has over 38 thousands downloads and has been listened to in over 91 countries. Guests have included Michel Odent, Rachel Reed, Yolande Norris Clarke, Jane Hardwicke Collings and most importantly many strong and sovereign birthing women. She has had a homebirth transfer with midwife and 2 freebirths herself. Her core values are sovereignty, intuition and free thinking. Natalie's other interests include biological breastfeeding, elimination communication and home education.
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Gold Coast Birthing Centre
We, Robert Biter, Shellanda Eller and Franziska Alderton, have formed a unique project team early this year, which is currently in the early planning stages of a holistic private birthing center for the Gold Coast in Queensland. Shellanda, creator and founder of Birthing Mum, is a Private Practice Midwife and HypnoBirthing International accredited practitioner on the Gold Coast. Robert is an internationally known holistic Obstetrician and Gynecologist, founder of the worldwide nonprofit Seaside Giving and CEO of Babies by the Sea and Dando A Luz Birthing Centers. And Franziska is an engineer with 15 years of project management experience and a passion for uplifting the standard of maternity care and facilities across Australia.
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Fiona O'Shaughnessy - Hygieia Health Ltd
Hygieia Health's mission as a non-profit organisation is to bring about a transformative change in maternity care in Australia. Our primary focus is to reduce the incidence of birth-related trauma and promote safe and empowering birthing experiences. We believe that birth is a sacred rite of passage that deserves respect and dignity, and it is our commitment to uphold the sovereignty of birthing women. Our vision is to create a world where birth is recognised and valued as a transformative experience, where the cycles of life are honoured, and the rights of birthing mothers are upheld.
Fiona is a childbirth educator and doula and has been a passionate supporter of Hygieia Health since its birth in 2020 amidst the chaos of lockdowns. She has been working closely with the Hygieia Health founders; Jane Hardwicke Collings, Sequoia Glastonbury, Raven Abdulhawa and Bo Kowalenko, to bring the focus projects, and ultimately the vision to life.
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Skye Stewart - Djarima Consultancy
Skye Stewart is a Wergaia and Wemba Wemba midwife, researcher and mumma, living and working on her own Country. Skye works tirelessly in the space of stillbirth, SIDS and SUDI prevention as well as bereavement (Sorry Business) care when Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families lose a bub. This work is for people who work with community as well as community themselves. Having a cultural role and responsibility to do what they can to ensure Aboriginal parents and their babies stay safe, well, alive and together drives Skye in all aspects of her work. Acknowledging that whilst Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families have poorer health outcomes for mothers and babies, there is strength and resilience that can support a stronger future – self-determination is the key.
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Jacqui Solomon - RCP Institute
While Jacqui was doing a PhD in Engineering alongside starting her family, she found that she was much more interested in researching pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding. She has experienced both low and high risk births, through a birth centre transfer, three homebirths, a traumatic 13 week miscarriage and risked out of homebirth with a choleostasis diagnosis for her 6th pregnancy. Determined to restore her liver function to avoid induction and give her baby the best chance to thrive, her research lead her to the Root Cause Protocol. She trained as an RCP practitioner in 2017 and leads the RCP Alumni Research Group as well as tutoring and working on content development for the RCP Institute. She also has a Cert IV in Breastfeeding Counselling. Through her business Nurtured Life, she empowers women to have healthy, thriving babies.
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Tani Paxton - Australian College of Midwives
Tani's proudest achievement is her four strong and beautiful girls. Tani had a profound moment just after her last baby was born. She felt the calling to become a midwife. With a Bachelor of Midwifery, Master of International Public Health and Master of Primary Maternity Care, Tani is a Midwifery Advisor to the Australian College of Midwives and has found a way to pursue a passion for the environment and homebirth combined.
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