Joyful Birthing & Beyond

10/31/2025

Kind of love this! 😂😂

imagine sq**rting your breastmilk at someone who told you to stop feeding, because you were “distracting her darling husband.”

that’s exactly what one mama did.

she was nursing quietly in public
when another woman marched over and demanded she move.
not because of noise.
not because of space.
but because her husband couldn’t stop looking.

so the mama gave her the answer she deserved:
a sq**rt of milk, straight to the face. 💦

let’s be super clear
babies deserve to eat without shame.
mamas deserve to feed without being policed.
and if a grown man is “distracted,”
that’s not on a breastfeeding mama.

what do you think, was she out of line, or a total mama legend.

share this if you're tired of women being shamed for feeding their babies.

p.s we’re still looking for the badass breastfeeding mama who did this tag a friend who *might* be responsible 😉

10/28/2025

I am so thrilled to announce that Melissa Thorne Pelletier has joined the Joyful Birthing & Beyond team of birth doulas!!

Melissa is a Certified Birth and Postpartum Doula, Advanced VBAC Doula, Certified Lactation Counselor, and Spinning Babies® trained birth professional. She lives in Kingston, NH with her husband and their two children, and feels deeply honored to walk alongside families during the transformative journey of pregnancy, birth, and postpartum.

With a warm, grounded presence, Melissa offers emotional, physical, and nurturing care through birth, infant feeding, and beyond. She loves helping families prepare in a way that promotes safety, calm, and confidence, creating space for a birth story that feels positive and meaningful. Before becoming a doula, Melissa worked for nearly two decades as a dental hygienist, where she specialized in helping patients feel at ease and supported. She brings that same steady, compassionate energy to her doula practice, creating a safe and welcoming environment for every family she serves.

Welcome, Melissa!! 😍

Learn more about Joyful Birthing's birth doula support here: https://joyful-birthing.com/services/boston-birth-doulas/

10/21/2025

Been there!! 🤣

A cartoon by Adam Sacks.

09/26/2025

!!

Parenthood is a series of fleeting seasons. The sleepless nights, the tantrums, the endless “whys” — they don’t last. And some days, that truth is the only thing that gets us through.

But neither do the little hands reaching for ours, the wide-eyed wonder, the sound of footsteps running down the hall. Those pass too — often faster than we’re ready for.

No stage of parenthood is forever. And that’s the paradox we live with daily: the relief of knowing hard moments will end, and the heartbreak of knowing the sweetest ones will too.

All we can do is hold both truths, let the hard ones deepen the sweetness, and quietly honour the gift of having lived it at all. ❤️

Quote Credit: Unknown❣️

Follow for more

08/27/2025

Learn more & reserve your spot today: https://joyful-birthing.com/services/boston-hypnobirthing/

08/07/2025

Seriously…!!

Make it make sense 😵‍💫

07/25/2025

Our culture has a long history of dismissing and ignoring women’s pain. Did you know that at least 8% of women experience significant pain during a cesarean each year in the United States? I didn't... until I listened to this podcast. If you're pregnant, this is a must-listen. Get informed, talk to your provider, and consider your options should you experience significant pain during a cesarean.

The Retrievals Season 2 pulls back the curtain, exposing the ways women’s suffering during cesarean is so often overlooked, minimized, or outright ignored by the very systems meant to care for them.

07/23/2025

Do you want a calm, empowering birth experience?

HypnoBirthing provides an alternative to the cultural belief that birth is a horrible, painful ordeal that women must endure and suffer through. It rejects the notion that birth is something women need to fear and provides women and their partners with a clear path to better, easier birthing.

I used HypnoBirthing for my three, unmedicated births and cannot imagine birthing without its foundation (this photo is of my third birth with my sweet son by my side).

Learn more here: The HypnoBirthing Advantage: Easier Birthing Explained: https://joyful-birthing.com/the-hypnobirthing-advantage/

Sign up for the Fall HypnoBirthing series here: https://joyful-birthing.com/services/boston-hypnobirthing/

07/20/2025

❤️❤️

“Do not ask your children
to strive for extraordinary lives.
Such striving may seem admirable,
but it is the way of foolishness.
Help them instead to find the wonder
and the marvel of an ordinary life.
Show them the joy of tasting
tomatoes, apples and pears.
Show them how to cry
when pets and people die.
Show them the infinite pleasure
in the touch of a hand.
And make the ordinary come alive for them.”
The extraordinary will take care of itself.

William Martin,The Parent's Tao Te Ching

Book:[ad] https://amzn.to/450Nk2p

05/29/2025

All so good! 💕

“Things I Wish I Knew at 30”
—By a grandparent who has learned

1. Time is your most valuable currency.
You’ll never get it back, and one day you’ll wish you hadn’t spent so much of it chasing things that didn’t matter. Invest it in people, in presence, and in peace.

2. Take more pictures—even of the ordinary.
One day, the background of that photo will mean more to you than the moment you were trying to capture.

3. Your kids don’t need perfection, they need connection.
Be there. Be silly. Be wrong sometimes and say sorry. They’ll remember the way you made them feel more than anything you ever bought them.

4. You can’t out-earn poor health.
The grind means nothing if your body can’t carry the fruits of your labor. Take care of it. Move more. Sleep more. Eat like you want to be around for your grandchildren.

5. Pride is expensive.
It’ll cost you relationships, apologies, and peace of mind. Learn to drop it before it drops you.

6. Most of what you’re worried about won’t matter in five years.
And the things that do matter—faith, family, friendship—deserve more of your focus today.

7. Say “I love you” more.
To your wife. To your kids. To your parents if they’re still around. Love unspoken can feel like love unfelt.

8. The moments you’ll miss the most are the quiet ones. Reading bedtime stories. Sunday mornings with coffee. Little hands in yours. Don’t rush through them. Let them linger.

9. You don’t need everyone to understand your journey. Just a few people to walk it with you. Keep them close.

10. One day, you’ll be someone’s memory.
Make it a good one. Not by being perfect—but by being present, honest, kind, and real.

05/08/2025

No digging big holes at the beach. Ever.