Episode 31 Privilege in Birth Work with Sabia Wade

Birth Trauma Training for Birth Workers

Could you even count on one hand the people in your life who are willing to challenge your ego and call you out on your desire to just stay comfortable in your life? To draw your attention to things that you take for granted? Who make a point of saying “ok here’s this thing you say you don’t agree with – what are you doing to put that belief into action?”

My guest today began our interview by asking me lots of questions. Questions about the climate of racism in Australia and what’s happening in terms of activism for maternal mortality for marginalised groups, and it was clear that I really don’t know a lot. I don’t claim to know much, but it is really easy as a white woman who birthed in a private hospital in Australia to forget about my privilege and not have to think about these things too much. And that’s good to acknowledge because growth is not a comfortable process, and we don’t make changes by just appealing to each others’ egos, right?

Sabia Wade is someone who can encourage us all to be less quiet about privilege in birth. Sabia is a Radical Doula, Educator, Coach, Reproductive Justice Advocate & the founder of For The Village and Birthing Advocacy Doula Trainings. For The Village provides doula services to under served families in San Diego with an emphasis on marginalized groups, such as people of colour, LGBTQIA and low income families.

So we start our conversation with me referencing the so-called flora and fauna act. I was under the impression that up until the 1967 referendum, aboriginal people in Australia were classified as animals rather than human beings. In researching this topic, it may appear that this is inaccurate information. As in, the idea of Aboriginal people being classified as fauna was not part of a formal act, but refers to a speech in the seventies given by Aboriginal filmmaker Lester Bostock.

However, can we sit in collective agreement that historically, and currently, Aboriginal people have indeed been treated like animals.

Sabia and I have a cross-cultural chat about birth and privilege and then we end up with a conversation about koalas and chlamydia. You’ll love it.

You can find Sabia at www.theblackdoula.com and on Instagram @theblackdoula

You are more powerful than you know. If birth workers and the people they serve remember that they are powerful, then we will change the world.

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