Maris James

Maris James, CD, CBE (DTI), CBC is a certified Birth and Postpartum Doula, Childbirth Educator, and Breastfeeding Counselor serving families throughout New York City. Having attended over 300 births, she approaches every family she supports without judgment or expectation, but instead with warmth, understanding, and a sense of humor. Maris holds a BA from Smith College and an MFA from Sarah Lawrence, and is currently pursuing an MS in Clinical Mental Health Counseling. She jumped into birth work while pregnant with her second child in 2015. She was educated through DONA and Doula Trainings International and has pursued additional training in massage, acupressure, and counter-pressure techniques specific to birth support, optimal fetal positioning and body balancing through Spinning Babies techniques, trauma-informed care practices, supporting families through loss, harm reduction, and more. Maris has given birth twice, first without a doula and the second time with a doula, and both experiences deeply inform her practice and approach. Maris loves connecting with and bearing witness to expectant and new parents during these times of profound transformation in their lives. She is passionate about supporting all parents, including single-parent and LGBTQIA+ families. A parent of two, she also enjoys helping families who are approaching birth for the second (or third or fourth!) time, navigating the unknowns of a new birth experience and the shifting family dynamics that accompany the addition of a sibling. Her experience includes accompaniment through home births, unmedicated hospital births, planned epidurals, hypnobirthing, inductions, cesarean births, high-risk births, VBACs, expected loss, twin births and more. A native New Yorker, Maris lives in Brooklyn with her family.