K.
I did not have a professional doula but I did have my mom, a CNM, act as my doula. What I wanted was: labor support, contact ahead of time and matched expectations about how the child's birth will go (ie I wanted an intervention-free VBAC). some education about what to expect if necessary. During the birth itself she helped by giving me another point of view with options and suggestions either made by her or a doctor or nurse. (e.g. changing positions, what the pros/cons of a particular choice I had were, etc). The key thing that my mom did was that she reminded me and my birth attendants of key things in my birth plan as they became relevant. For example, I wanted to catch my own baby, but would not have remembered this as I was busy pushing. But about a minute before my baby's head emerged, my mom said, "K., do you still want to catch your baby?". This meant that everything happened exactly like I wanted. I tihnk esp. in the case where mom is being pushed to have an intervention that she isn't sure she wants, a doula can suggest that she ask for 30 minutes or an hour to think about it and give mom and her family some room to make an informed versus impulse/coerced decision.
