About Me
Jane Sawyer
I am a local Darwin Registered Midwife and owner of small business, Fulfilling Birth. I have practiced in the Darwin Homebirth Service, Community Midwifery Practice (Birth Centre) RDH and DPH so have a good understanding of the services offered to pregnant women in the NT.
I completed prmiary and secondary schooling in the NT before moving to Victoria to complete teritary education. I completed a Graduate Nursing Program at St. Vincent's Hospital Melbourne before embarking on my midwifery journey. I completed a Graduate Midwifery Program at The Royal Women's Hospital Melbourne and also practiced in South Western Vic. I returned to the Territory in 2005.
I believe all women should have access to childbirth education, allowing them to be well informed to make decisions that are right for themselves and their family. This encourages women to trust their instincts, which, is empowering and facilitates a gentle transition through the journey of pregnancy, labour and birth into motherhood.
Midwifery Practice Review is a peer review process through the Australian College of Midwives Inc. It is now required as part of a Midwife's professional portfolio to maintain registration with the Nursing and Midwifery Board. For more information please see www.midwives.org.au
An extract from my 2008 MPR:
My Midwifery Philosophy Embraces
- Informed choice for women
- Woman centred, family orientated care
- Individualised compassionate care
- Culturally sensitive practice
- Homebirth as a safe, healthy option
- Midwife advocacy as required
- One to one midwifery care in labour for all women
- Midwifery should be holistic in its approach and encompass support, care and advice during pregnancy, labour and the postpartum period including breastfeeding and early parenting
- A midwife is a responsible and accountable professional whose role is tremendously significant in a woman’s journey into motherhood
- All women should have access to midwifery care regardless of pregnancy risk or geographical location
- Developing a partnership and trusting relationship between woman and midwife
- Midwifery is an art and science and is greatly influenced by collective and individual experience and by intuition
- Women’s intuition to know what is right for themselves
- The sharing of information and skills to enhance individual knowledge
My belief is that all women should have access to midwifery care, and that the experience of pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding is a healthy, intimate life event for the majority of women.
I also believe that continuity of midwifery care and continuity of carer allows women to be well informed to make decisions that are right for themselves and their family. It encourages women to trust their instincts which is empowering and facilitates a gentle transition through the journey of pregnancy, labour and birth into motherhood.
My care is individual and unique to each woman encompassing her physical, physiological, psychological, emotional, spiritual, and cultural layers.
I am the Birth Preparation Educator at the Childbirth Education Association and am the instructor for the soon to begin Pregnancy Relaxation Classes. I also have a new role as President of the Childbirth Education Association Darwin, an unexpected privilege. I value the organisation and all it has to offer families during their childbearing journey.
I look forward to sharing with you during your special time
Jane Sawyer
Qualifications
Registered Midwife - Ballarat University 2003
Birth Skills Practitioner - Dr. Shari Read 2010
Reiki Practitioner I, II & III - Darwin 2008-09
Registered Nurse - Deakin University Geelong 2001
Reflections
What is advanced or essential midwifery knowledge may depend on who your authority is. Know to be humble, realising we are a part of a miracle, but not allowing ourselves to believe by action or thought that we are the miracle maker.
Know our place, much like the birthing woman: here, but not here. We may guide our clients to be the final decision makers, being artfully appropriate and bringing a gentle balance.
Know how to facilitate empowerment by guidance and example. We need to exemplify faith, freedom, discretion, credibility and integrity, being careful with our own spirituality.
Who we are is imparted. Strive for excellence; it shows. Know we teach by living example, not just words. And most of all, know to love unconditionally, without judgement.
You can know the answers, get straight As in all your midwifery classes, know the right clinical manoeuvres, details of a woman’s history, community protocol and on and on. But what is this to anyone without the warmth and love you give or the spirit you carry, helping women experience within themselves the transformation this rite of passage can give?
~ Carol Gautschi, Midwifery Today Issue 69
