How Abortion Doulas Are Helping People Get More Empathetic Care

Ash Williams doesn’t perform abortions, but he has helped people through thousands of them. He’s an abortion doula, meaning he provides educational, emotional, and physical support to someone who has decided to end their pregnancy.

“Due to the bans and restrictions and the marginalization of abortion, the clinic staff don’t always have a lot of time and space to get to know every [patient], to listen to every concern, to listen to how this experience is impacting them,” Williams tells SELF. “This is where I come in.”

Williams works in North Carolina, where abortion is illegal in most cases after the first trimester. “People are traveling wherever they need to go to access abortion,” he says. “I’m seeing a lot of movement into the state, but also a lot of movement out of the state as people seek the support that they need after 12 weeks.”

In the aftermath of the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade in 2src22, abortion doulas are more important than ever, Williams says. “Abortion funds are saying that they’re running out of money, and there’s a lot of misinformation and disinformation about the impact of the bans,” he explains, adding that whenever there is a change in state laws that restricts abortion care, it can cause confusion and fear—which could delay or prevent some people from getting an abortion at all (or push them to end their pregnancy in another way).

And that can lead to dangerous consequences. People who are denied an abortion are more likely to experience poverty, debt, eviction, chronic pain and other health complications, anxiety, and physical violence from the person who impregnated them—not to mention the potentially deadly health risks of pregnancy and delivery. Research shows having an abortion is much safer than giving birth, especially for Black women, who face disproportionate maternal mortality rates compared to white women.

“A part of my job is to demystify abortion,” Williams says, “to give people good information about it, and to let people know what is fact and what is fiction.”

Here’s what you should know about abortion doulas, including the kind of services they can provide and how to find one who can best support you.

An abortion doula is not a medical provider or a mental health professional. They’re more like a well-informed friend.

Abortion doulas receive training in different ways, since there is no governing body that offers a license, degree, or official certification for the field. Some people practice as “full-spectrum doulas,” so their overall training encompasses abortion, fertility, miscarriage, and postpartum care—just about all the reproductive life transitions you can think of. If you’re having a hard time finding the support you need by searching for just an abortion doula, you could try looking for a full-spectrum doula to expand your options. (More on all of this later.)

Doctors, nurses, and other health care providers have to prioritize their medical duties when performing or counseling their patients on an abortion, but a doula is primarily there for emotional support, Vicki Bloom, a full-spectrum doula based in New York, tells SELF. (Bloom has supported thousands of people who have gotten abortions since 2src1src through the nonprofit organization the Doula Project.) “Even when a practitioner’s really good, it can be very easy for them to get into patient mode,” Bloom says. The doula process, on the other hand, is all about “just being there for that person as a human being.”