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#BlackHistoryIsGlobal

Today’s La Vida En Black History Month features the Baby Catchers, Las Parteras, the doulas, the midwives.   These women keep our people alive… they do the work of nurturing our women through the single most important event of their lives: dando luz a un ser humano or bringing to light another human being.

On this, my very own born day I honor the long line of midwives from wence I come. My Aunty Nenen (Mother’s Older Sister) or Nurse Luces as she was known in Trinidad; brought hundreds of babies into the world as a midwife.

     Ironically Daddy’s mother, my grandmother    was also a Trinidadian Midwife.  Ada Machado was a force with which to be reckoned all over that island of my parents’ birth.  Nurse Ada Machado brought children into Trinidad during the Great Depression, initiating hundreds of women into Motherhood.  Doulas are a part of my historical DNA and celebrating that DNA is my mission in all the work I do.

So naturally an entire episode of the La Vida En Black documentary series will be dedicated to La Partera extraordinaire, Ynanna Djehuty, an Afro-Dominicana from the Bronx, NY.

This talentosa jovencita is a gifted writer, an emerging intensely powerful doula and a passionately motivated reproductive health activist. Ynanna Djehuty is THE spiritual midwife a pregnant woman wants in the room catching the baby; ushering her into the new life in the power and grace that comes with the Motherhood phase of life.  And Djehuty comes armed with an arsenal of knowledge and awareness of the African ancestors and that influence all that she possesses within her spirit.  A modern-day ” Aminata Diallo!

Ynanna is empowering women and  young people of the African Diaspora, intentionally through her Afro-Latina Identity.  Her experiences as a birth doula raise awareness on maternal and infant health for women, and ultimately shines a light on the crippling disparities in the healthcare system in the United States for women of color. She is a clear and present danger to the unacceptable status quo, a soldier of midwifery advocating for the woefully neglected low-income woman and their overall well-being.  Simply put Ynanna’s goal is to uplift the way we bring our humanity onto this earth.  I am honored to feature her in my La Vida En Black Documentary Series and as my La Vida En Black History Month feature today.. My Born Day!

Please Visit Ynanna’s site…
http://www.blackwomenbirthingjustice.org/#!Rethinking-Black-History-Month-by-Ynanna-Djehuty/c1cqn/B705A00B-4129-4D2E-AF34-347D7EFB41BF
Specialties: AfroLatina Identity, Womyn’s empowerment, Spoken Word, Childbirth & Women of Color

An Excerpt from Ynanna Djehuty “While our Black/Latino male counterparts are active in the fight to defend black and brown lives against police violence, they seldom acknowledge the attacks on our reproductive capacities experienced by women of color. What is more important for humanity than the ability to bring and sustain life on the planet? Who can deny that the most valuable resource in making that happen is women?  Therefore, calls to reinstate our homegrown midwives and healers, improve the conditions our women experience in the hospitals and create spaces for comprehensive reproductive healthcare are imperative to the survival and thriving of people of color in this world.