*Midwife

I am fiercely passionate about my profession. For me, midwifery is a personal identity, a belief system, a soapbox, a rallying cry, and my life's profession. I believe wholeheartedly in the role of midwives in providing holistic sexual and reproductive healthcare, supporting bodily autonomy and empowerment, creating shared-decision making and power-sharing models of care provision, and building community with other providers to optimize care at all risk levels. I am a midwife who has worked hard to create space and a persona identified for its conversation and critical thinking.This blog has been an incredibly humbling experience in navigating these ideas. My writing over these past six years, and serving in leadership positions, have been whole-hearted learning opportunities in ways to build community and open conversation on difficult topics. I started this blog anonymously, was abruptly and publicly outed at my hospital as the "angry midwife" after a post about working with residents, and though it has been many years since I've put my name and face to this writing, I am still both so nervous and so appreciative when people come up to me and connect my face with my writing. Uncertain in how exactly I've managed to do so, I'm grateful that both experienced and older midwives support my "role" in the community alongside newer and younger midwives who may see my writing and presence as challenging the status quo (whatever that continues to mean).Part of the nervousness that persists with identifying myself with the writing has been the masked existence that being a writer and social media person online allows: I can say things from behind my phone and my computer screen that challenge folks, mic drop and walk away or respond when I choose to, and carefully plan what to say and when and how. When I'm outed in person as the Feminist Midwife, generally that has gone well, but sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes people feel personally attacked and like my writing is divisive. I've been in spaces where I've heard my name or the blog whispered and then disparaged: to that I say "glad the writing is reaching you regardless!" When I hear nasty things said about my writing about midwifery and queerness or trans / non-binary care, I feel personally offended, and disheartened that those ideas persist, but still strong in my place to write and discuss those topics, and be out as a member of and believer in my family and community. When people speak negatively about my views on abortion as a midwife, which is often, I'm not bothered in the least: rather, I'm strengthened in my resolve to speak publicly about my belief in abortion as midwifery care.The past year has been challenging. Figuring out what personally I'd like to do with this space, taking a read of the field as it stands and what others might want from it, and drawing and re-drawing the Venn diagram of how those two needs overlap. I've done a few mini-tours of some lectures that have been fulfilling and personally challenging, on sex positivity and trauma-informed pelvic care. I've been considering how and where writing and speaking might be most importantly received or challenge new kinds of folks, and figuring out in the field of online midwife personalities, where I best fit. I still haven't quite figured it out yet.Stepping outside of my introverted comfort zone, I have met in-person and on the phone with many students and new midwives over the past few weeks, and opened my mind and heart to whatever questions they have. I'm grateful for those moments, as their questioning and exploration have helped with my own self-reflection about where I am with my midwife identity. I talked about my hesitancy in how big this blog platform has become and being seen as a voice for midwifery as a white cis femme woman in a sea of the same, and the best way to optimize the space that I've created. I talked about people reaching out and asking me to write things, letting me know that the community has a need to be in discussion about something, and feeling honored to be seen as someone to tread the waters of controversial topics. I talked about breaking down power hierarchies on Boards, what is next in the midwifery movement, reproductive justice and being a white person consistently trying to align with the movement, and self care amidst it all.It was on one of these phone calls that I finally said out loud that I feel that now is the time to draw hard lines. I'm grateful for the years I've spent opening dialogue, creating discussion, and building community. But there are some things that I'm going to write soon that draw hard lines. I am going to unapologetically, boldly, and loudly write things that people will not like, that some people will feel incredibly challenged by, that some people may feel personally attacked by, and that won't go over well. It's time. There's too much at stake for all of us: midwives, cis-women and queer folks and transgender and non-binary folks, brown and black folks, immigrants and migrants and anyone with a citizen status that people think they can question, students, hourly and underpaid workers, imprisoned and criminally-targeted people, disabled and differently-abled people. All of us.There are some who are vocal in saying I've already been divisive, that my writing and my views have isolated conservative viewpoints or hushed people who want to ask questions and aren't sure if the blog is a safe space. To the former: good. To the latter: continue to bring your questions, and grow.There will be plenty of folks who will reach out to tell me it's always been time, that it took too long for me to figure out that hard lines are the only way to clarify people's positions and separate the woke from the sleeping or obstinately wrong, that drawing hard lines is not brave but required: I welcome that feedback. There are plenty of life circumstances in which I've been comfortable and so haven't been challenged to step forward on behalf of others: it is one of the countless benefits of privilege that I had the luxury to have the time, to have been blissfully ignorant, until sometime affected me or those in my circles to ultimately call me to step forward. I am consistently a work in progress and always welcome an opportunity to be called out or in. I am doing my best.There will be others who tell me that hard lines divide community rather than bring us together, hard lines stop dialogue rather than open it, and hard lines risk the progress that has already been made rather then moving things forward. There are those who will say that the community and respect I've build with experienced and older midwives will be risked. To this I challenge those gut reactions. There's no reason a hard line can't still create conversation, allow people to really consider their beliefs rather than exist in a gray space of 'open dialogue,' and out themselves and ask those around them to be outed. Now is the time. Start doing your best, whatever that means for you.This is both a review of where I've come, and an intro to where I'm seeking to go. I am a midwife with an * that stands in for writer clinician feminist preceptor queer speaker leader reproductivejustically. I speak for myself in this space, and need to continue to do so completely. With my writing, I seek to strengthen my midwife identity. I seek to start conversations as always, but also challenge people to identify themselves and their beliefs in difficult topics in which I've identified myself by choosing hard lines. I welcome you to continue to engage, persist in challenging yourself and others and me, and out yourself once you've determined where you stand. Now is the time.