Elizabeth Mangum Sarach is a doula, childbirth educator, clinical social worker, and owner of BirthFocus NYC. She is a long-time friend of DTI co-founders Tara Brooke and Gina Giordano. Elizabeth, Tara, and Gina were doula colleagues in NYC for a decade and have remained friends over the years. Later, Elizabeth relocated to Austin, Texas where Gina and Tara continued their working relationship. When they first met they were all childless doulas and today, they have seven children between them! Gina was even present at the birth of Elizabeth’s youngest child.
DTI is excited to announce Elizabeth’s newest “baby,” Nurture(Bklyn), a place for connection, education and play. DTI has the pleasure of hosting a doula training there next week and is looking forward to celebrating this opening alongside our friend and colleague. We caught up with Elizabeth earlier this week to hear more about plans for this project.
Tell us more about your vision for the space.
Nurture(Bklyn) is here for pregnant and expecting families and beyond, from 0 to 3, and we’ll be offering a wide variety of services for that range, including lactation support, childbirth education, massage, Reiki, therapy services, and more. All of the services are offered by independent health and wellness therapists.
It’s also a place where new moms can drop in and connect with other moms. We’ll have more and more offerings for partners, but at the moment it’s mainly about moms and their journey. The space is very kid-friendly while also being about and for the parents. We will also have offerings for birth professionals. On Sundays we’ll be offering advanced doula trainings. I’ll be teaming up with a midwife named Kimm Sun to offer a home birth workshop for doulas and we’ll have a date for that soon. We’ll also be hosting meet-the-doula events in the space through BirthFocus, where families can meet more than 30 birth and postpartum doulas.
What’s it like to be in the space?
When you enter there’s a nice big living room with a couch, love seat, and fireplace. There’s a big kitchen where tea is always available and there’s a cozy reading nook for the kids. There’s a big play area and we’ll also have a nice outdoor space for hanging out and playing. The therapy rooms will be available for anyone booking services like lactation support, massage, or Reiki.
Where can we find you?
Our grand opening is this Sunday on Mother’s Day from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. There will be a pony coming (it’s my daughter’s favorite pony from a stable that has been in operation since the 1800s), and we’ll have refreshments served all day. There will be a story time or sing-a-long at 2 p.m. We are located at 78 East 2nd St. Brooklyn, NY. Looking forward to seeing lots of you there!