We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Callie Hodge a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Callie, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Was there a moment in your career that meaningfully altered your trajectory? If so, we’d love to hear the backstory.
As a retired federal employee, I knew that I wanted to retire before I actually did however, I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life once I did. I’m still young so I didn’t want to just “sit around.” I didn’t know what a doula was until my church had the opportunity to co-sponsor a Community Baby Shower with MOM TOURS. While attending the meetings, we were educated on what a doula is and how important their work/presence is in the birthing space. When we were told that they had just receive a grant to train/certify more Black doulas, I immediately signed up. Part of the certification was to attend three births from prenatal through postpartum. That experience changed everything for me. I had found my passion and purpose. I finally knew what I wanted to do when I retired. My doula business has taken off if leaps and bounds, my federal job was actually in my way of “shining.” I’m a hands-on person and I love to advocate for what’s right. Hearing the statistics that Black and Brown women die at a rate of 3 to 4 times more during pregnancy than White women was unnerving to me. As a Black mother of 4, I felt that could have been me or that could be my daughters. This space allows me to combine my love for advocating for justice and being hands-on into one field. Education is key…when a mom knows how her body changes during pregnancy, she can intelligently discuss what she needs with medical professionals. Additionally, it gives her the courage to make her voice heard.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I am Callie E. Hodge, a retired Library of Congress professional with over 35 years of federal service, including 15 years as a Copyright Specialist protecting intellectual property rights for authors and artists. My career gave me deep expertise in administration, human resources, training, and copyright law.
Following retirement, I shifted my focus to community health and family support more specifically, birthwork. I am the founder of Essence of Peace Doula, LLC, where I serve as a certified prenatal, labor and delivery, and end-of-life doula. I am also a certified Community Health Worker, Mental Health First Aid Instructor, and CPR/AED/First Aid provider, currently pursuing certification in Maternal Mental Health.
My background includes work in crisis intervention, supporting individuals experiencing housing insecurity, domestic violence, sexual assault, substance abuse and end-of-life care. Across all of my roles, I remain committed to compassionate service, holistic care, and advocating for the dignity and well-being of others.
Other than training/knowledge, what do you think is most helpful for succeeding in your field?
I think having a willingness to be present, empathic, genuine, patient and caring are needed to be a doula. This isn’t a profession that you can get into thinking you’re going to “get rich quick” in; you may make just enough some months to cover you living expenses, some months may be a struggle. But the reward is seeing birthing persons stay Earthside and babies come Earthside healthy and then living a thriving life together with knowledge, expectancy, and joy that they were given the same opportunity to survive as others.
If you could go back, would you choose the same profession, specialty, etc.?
If I could go back in time, I would definitely choose this specialty again but much earlier in life. I would have gathered a lot of information from the elders in my community about holistic living, herbal remedies, healing powers from various herbs and how storytelling really impacted our communities.
Image Credits
These images were taken by me.