By Maureen Darcey, CNM
Thirty-six years ago, when I first moved to North Carolina, I met an amazing woman who changed my life. I was a brand-new graduate of midwifery school, here in Chapel Hill for my husband to go to school, no job, no friends. I found out about the Women’s Resource Center (now the Compass Center) and attended a meeting about birth options. That’s when I met Svea Oster!
She was a home birth/nursing mom, a childbirth educator, a doula, and a home birth assistant to various “underground” folks who were attending births. As our friendship developed, she taught me to trust my instincts and trust the process of birth. She encouraged me to start attending births of folks she knew through her friendships and with women who were getting care at the Chatham Family Birth Center (CFBC).
CFBC, the precursor to WBWC, was started by two CNMs: Linda Glenn (my personal hero) and Debbie Stanford. Linda had been doing home births in the area, but stopped to open the CFBC. Svea and I attended births for almost a year before I “got caught” – attending home births was illegal per state law. (That baby has purposefully gone on to have her baby at WBWC. She was the last baby I caught before I stopped taking call shifts!)
Svea and her husband Arnie were instrumental in getting the midwifery law passed that opened the doors for CNMs to attend births in homes, birth centers, and hospitals. Arnie worked on the study bill for two years, showing the safety of out-of-hospital births with skilled practitioners. Svea helped me open the Birth Center twenty years ago when we met with people from the Carolina Association for the Advancement of Midwifery and were able to get a state grant. Svea continued to teach childbirth education classes in the community and at WBWC until she retired a few years ago.
Svea was the birth assistant at the birth of my own daughter thirty-four years ago, and I was the CNM at her daughter’s birth at home thirty-three years ago. Over the years, we have continued to travel in the same “birth circle.” I had the pleasure of delivering the first child of both her son and daughter at the birth center. Her daughter-in-law was also born at the CFBC.
Thank you, Svea, for all you have done in the birth community over the years, and for letting me freely participate in the “circle of life.”
Thanks to Swea and thanks to Maureen for both of your wonderful assistance in the birthings of our children and our grandchildren. You are blessed legends!
Thank you Maureen for such a lovely tribute to Svea. She has done so much to support safe and peaceful birth in our area.
I still remember, more then 29 years ago, when I was in labor, looking into Svea's eyes and thinking "Oh my god, she did this twice." That helped me know I could do it too.
Svea was a force of nature – a courageous advocate for women and their babies. Svea helped me become a mother in so many ways. I am every grateful. Thank you, Maureen, for lifting up Svea’s life in this way – and making a space for the rest of us to contribute.