Postpartum Doula Portland ·
Night Doula & Newborn Care

Overnight support, newborn care, and postpartum doula in Portland, Oregon

Wildwood Birth is here to support your transition as soon as your baby arrives home and throughout the fourth trimester as your postpartum doula in Portland, Oregon.

From day one, we are normalizing the experience of the fourth trimester. Our postpartum doulas are newborn care specialists who will build your confidence so you can thrive as parents as you welcome your new family member.

Our goal is to work our way out of a job — to ensure that you become the best parents you can be, as quickly as possible, and enjoy the journey!

What does a postpartum doula do?

Babies go through 4 major developmental leaps in the first 6 weeks of life, so they are actually changing overnight! All of those changes packed into such a brief period of time can be frustrating or overwhelming as a new parent because as soon as you figure something out, your baby changes!

To keep up with all those changes, what a postpartum doula does often changes from day to day. In the early weeks, your postpartum doula will:

• Hold and comfort the baby so you can shower, eat, and sleep, or spend quality time with an older sibling.

• Help you with your physical recovery from birth, whether vaginal or cesarean.

• Help you navigate the intense hormonal changes you will go through by offering informational and emotional support while screening for signs of postpartum mood disorders and providing professional resources.

• Assist in breastfeeding by helping to determine when baby has a good latch, suggesting position changes, advising on safe milk handling guidelines, and providing professional lactation consultant resources.

As the weeks go on and you become more confident in your new role, we will continue to support your emotional and mental wellbeing while shifting our focus to logistical support. During these weeks your postpartum doula will:

• Work with your baby’s sleep cycles to maximize rest for everyone.

• Perform light housework duties such as washing dishes and folding laundry. There's nothing like a fresh set of sheets to help have a great rest!

• Streamline household systems to work well with a new baby and support your new relationship dynamics as a triad (or more!).

• Prepare nutritious meals full of protein, good fats, micronutrients, and galactagogues (foods which promote lactating) while following your unique diet requirements and the guidelines presented in “The First Forty Days”.

How much does a postpartum doula cost?

How much your postpartum doula will cost is dependent on the time of day of their visit (see below). We also offer package discounts based on the number of hours you book. Discounts are combinable.

Daytime postpartum doula visits

Our daytime postpartum doula rate is $50 per hour.

Our standard 4 hour postpartum doula visit is $200.

Daytime sessions can rage in length between 3-8 hours, depending on your needs.

Night doula visits

Our overnight postpartum doula rate is $55 per hour.

Our standard 9 hour* night doula visit is $495.

Overnight sessions can range in length between 8-12 hours, depending on your needs.

*We recommend at least 9 hour visits to ensure you have the opportunity to get a full 8+ hours of sleep.

Other fees

When supporting multiples, our rates increase by $5 per hour.

Please note that there is an additional travel fee each time we visit locations more than 10 miles from downtown Portland.

Postpartum Doula Packages

Wildwood Birth offers customization of postpartum doula packages that you can purchase prior to the arrival of your baby, or as soon as you decide that you need more support.

All of the visits in these packages can be scheduled to fit your needs and desires for support. For example, they can be bunched together in the first week or two after your baby arrives or spread out over the course of the entire three months of your fourth trimester. 

Customized Postpartum Doula Packages

We are happy to offer customized postpartum doula packages to fit your specific needs.

Our standard rate for postpartum support is $50/hr for daytime support (minimum of 3 hours between 8am-8pm) and $55/hr for overnight support (minimum of 8 hours between 8pm-8am).

Your custom package can include any number of hours and combination of day and/or night doula visits

We also offer 10% off of creative services like newborn photography when you bundle them with any postpartum care package. We are happy to offer payment plans upon request.

Postpartum In-Home Meal Preparation

Are you primarily interested in having help to ensure you’re being fed delicious, nutrient-dense food in the fourth trimester? We will come to your home once or twice a week to make several meals tailored to your family and nutritional needs for the fourth trimester. We can even source the ingredients* for you so you don’t have to leave the house!

*for an additional fee

Why hire a postpartum doula?

The overwhelm of chaos, joy, and huge hormonal fluctuations can put new parents in a place of sheer survival. But successful newborn care starts with successful self care. So beyond caring for your new baby, your postpartum doula will help you get back to the basics: sleep, eat, and drink water. Taking a mental health break, a nap, or getting a full night of rest can change your entire experience. Scheduling postpartum doula visits provides new parents with the physical, emotional, and informational support they need in the first few months after childbirth.

What is a postpartum doula?

A postpartum doula is a trained newborn care specialist who provides informational, physical, and emotional support to new parents in the first three months following childbirth. The nurturing, non-judgmental support provided by an experienced postpartum doula eases a family’s transition into parenthood. A postpartum doula is also a teacher who uses their specialized, evidence-based education to empower new parents to identify a baby’s cues and needs, make informed decisions and become the kind of parents they want to be.

Define Post-Partum doula

The term postpartum comes from the Latin phrase “post partum” which means “after childbirth”. The “partum” half of that phrase derives from the Latin word parere which means “to give birth to, to bring into being”. So the work done by a post-partum doula is the work done after the birth of a new being.

How to become a postpartum doula

Wildwood Birth’s team of postpartum doulas is growing! If you are interested in learning how to become a postpartum doula, we’d love to talk to you and let you know all that it entails.

You might find that you’re more drawn to becoming a lactation specialist or offering comprehensive sleep care for newborns once you know the full extent of the postpartum range of services. You might even find yourself teaching newborn care classes someday soon! We love what we do and we love helping guide new postpartum doulas into the profession regardless of which corner of the postpartum doula world they choose as a specialty.

We can point you towards the best postpartum doula training option in Portland, Oregon or make recommendations for online postpartum doula training. We can also help you understand a typical postpartum doula contract and answer any questions you might have like “What does a doula get paid?”, “Is a postnatal doula the same as a postpartum doula?”, and “How much are doulas making at different experience levels?”. You might find yourself providing doula care as a Portland postpartum doula and making newborn home visits sooner than you think. Please reach out and start the conversation!