Academic & Professional Goals Update

I know these goals are going to evolve and change as I go through the program at MCU, but at this moment, these are the starting points. These are all large goals—long-term goals. There is not much to show for my progress toward these goals, but these are things that I constantly think about and let evolve in my mind as I learn in class and experience clinic. Every thought is a small brick that I hope leads to building a castle.

Goal 1

My area is a healthcare desert and even more specifically a desert for maternal healthcare with a high population of underserved. I want to have a practice that focuses on individualized care, what the person truly needs, Sonder Midwifery.

This goal has already changed. Up until recently, this goal pertained to opening a free-standing birth center, but if you go back to my update on my personal goals, I have had to learn how to step away from projects that were too much for me in this moment. The birth center was one of these, simply because we were at a point where going up against one of the biggest hospital systems in the state and that was not something I had room for emotionally, mentally, or physically. So this goal shifted.

It shifted to opening a practice after completing school and becoming a CPM called Sonder Midwifery.

My philosophy of care says, “I recognize the importance of creating an environment where the individual feels safe and heard, and where their unique needs and experiences are acknowledged and validated.” Every person has their own story, their own unique needs. Even if one client has a similar story to another, or there are similar symptoms, this is not a reason to ignore the fact that every person is an individual and there is always something unique needed to provide the best care for them.

Sonder Midwifery

Sonder: The feeling when you realize that everyone has a unique life just as complex as your own

Blue Orchids symbolize rarity, uniqueness, and beauty, as well as spirituality

Goal 2

Starting in 2022 I created a group called Thrive Together. The purpose of Thrive Together is to bring together a variety of professionals and learn how to work together to better care for families. I want to continue growing this group to connect professionals and bring full circle care to families.

In 2022 I held my first Thrive Together Professionals event. An all day conference that brought together a wide variety of professionals that may help families at some point throughout the preconception, pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and the first year periods. The goal of this event was to learn where one’s own scope of practice ended, where another’s began, and how to bridge the gap between the two to meet in the middle and guide the family to the help they need.

The beginning of 2023 I put together the Thrive Together Expo, which brought many of those professionals together for families to meet with and learn what they do and how they might help. There were also several speakers, a birth center midwife, a home birth midwife, a pelvic floor therapist, a support for PMADs, an IBCLC, and a doula.

I am hoping to be able to do more events like this for 2024, but balancing school and trying to put together such a large event is something that I need to do carefully without spreading myself too thin. Because I want to make sure these events are helpful and enjoyable, and that isn’t possible if it isn’t given the proper attention.

Goal 3

I don’t just want to go to school and graduate, I want to become the best midwife I can be by giving it everything I have. I want to complete school to know I truly worked the hardest I could.

I feel like I have been doing well and not well on this goal. I know I am giving it everything I have, and I feel as though my clinical skills and knowledge have been increasing. I feel like I am on the right path to being an amazing midwife and my confidence is growing in my clinical skills.

On the other hand, I have been having trouble with motivation to do assignments because of everything going on in my personal life and being busy with clinical work. Balancing when I need to rest and when I should be working on homework is a fine line. I have been working to take study breaks when I need to, but my motivation to go back to the assignments has been extremely difficult, made even more difficult by having ADHD.

Part of giving it everything I have is trying to work through these blocks, which I am doing by working with my therapist and will be going through a full neuropsychological evaluation to make sure I am working in a way that is best suited to how my brain works.

I also have been doing additional learning and workshops to make sure I am learning in a variety of ways. In the fall of 2023 I attended the Breech without Borders workshop which was a fantastic way to learn hands on skills. Then just last week I attended a 3 day Midwifery Wisdom Skillz & Drillz workshop and also took the suturing, episiotomy, & tear prevention class, the phlebotomy, IV skills, and pharmacology class, and the shoulder dystocia class in addition to the skills and drills. These workshops were amazing and allowed not only for an increase of hands-on skills and knowledge, but great networking and connection with new and old peers.