Big news!
In the upcoming busy season, we will be welcoming back one of our favorite women, Marinda Shindler!
“I have been drawn to birth, babies, and healthcare for as long as I can recall. In my teen years, I thought I wanted to be an obstetrician. When I got pregnant with my son I did what my mother had done, I went to the OB practice at our local hospital. This was how she and my older sister had birthed their collective 8 children and I followed suit. I remember feeling disconnected and almost disoriented after the hospital birth. I had always thought birth was going to be a powerful experience. Instead, I felt like an object that things were done to rather than an active participant in my birth, and that the experience was fundamentally very wrong. These feelings stayed with me for years to come and eventually led me to midwifery.
I started studying Midwifery as an active member of a local Richmond study group in 2009. There were 10 members in the study group, 7 of whom have attained the CPM credential and one that has become a CNM. The following year, in 2010, I began Midwifery school at The Virginia School of Traditional Midwifery and was offered my first apprenticeship with a homebirth midwife in the Richmond area. I have been actively attending home and birth center births as an apprentice midwife and midwife’s assistant since, attending over 200 births with 12 midwives in 6 practices across Virginia. In December of 2018 I earned my CPM credential and was licensed by the Virginia Board of Medicine in March of 2019. I maintain current certifications in CPR and NRP as well as regularly participating in conferences and workshops to further my knowledge and skills.
Some of my midwifery training was done here at Brookhaven in 2017 and 2018. I enjoyed the relationships with the families I served and the incredible staff here and look forward to working with you all again as a part time staff midwife.”