Jacoba

(Elle/She/Them)

I am your Sexual and Reproductive Health Specialist in MuMoMA with over 15 years of experience. Welcome to our care!

 

Education

  • BA Minor in Sexuality, focused on Human Rights (2001 DECEP and AIPR PR)

  • MA in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (2009 WGSS)

  • Traditional Midwifery with Escuela Dar a Luz (2009-10 PR), the former Hermandad de Parteras de P.R.’s midwifery school (currently Asociación de Parteras de PR), as well as with Midwest Maternal Child Institute (2014-15 WI).

  • Certified Birth Doula by Doula Caribe (2008 P.R.)

  • Maternal and Child Community Health Educator, by Red Relahacupan (2010, Argentina)

  • Perinatal Educator, and Breastfeeding Consultant by Midwest Maternal Child Institute, MMCI (2013 WI).

  • Certified in CPR and NRP (every 2 years)

  • Reiki Healer with Borinken Reiki (2010, P.R.).

  • Trained and certified in Community Trauma Support (TRACC Healer Movement member 2019)

  • Trained in Somatic Sexual Education-Coaching (Institute for the Study of Somatic Sex Education ISSSE 2019)

  • Proudly Healer and Yerbetera (a person that works with herbs) since the days’ grandma Mama Niña said so.

Experience

I have been blessed by working in multiple positions in Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare:

  • Community Educator (since 200, P.R.)

  • Midwife Assistant Morocco (2004-05), Birth/Postpartum Doula (Since 2008, P.R.)

  • Ob/Gyne Assistant (2009-10, P.R.)

  • Student/Apprentice Midwife (2009-13, P.R.)

  • Direct Entry midwife (DEM)/2nd Midwife in IL (Since 2013) and WI (2014-17)

  • All Pregnancy Outcomes companion, Postpartum, and Alternative Conception support since 2012 to present in same locations. 

  • Co-creation of Chicago Birth Workers of Color (ChiBiWoCo in 2015), aiming to bring collective support to communities of color in Chicagoland with a fierce tribe of Birth Workers of Color.

  • Member of RSMLAC (since 2007 Red de Salud Mujeres Latinoamericanas y del Caribe).

Currently, I am investing all the love and passion to bringing collective support to communities and individuals as:

  • Somatic Therapy and Bodywork Specialist (level 1) with MuMoMA

  • Clinical Health Services Specialist (2014 to present, Chicago Women’s Health Center), Alternative Insemination (AI) Health Specialist (2015 to present Chicago Women’s Health Center)

  • Sex Health Community Educator bringing harm-reduction, body-positive, queer-inclusive, and gender-expansive Sex Ed at Latinx communities (Spanish), at refugees’ communities around Chicago (Spanish, French-Creole) with the Outreach and Education Program (2013 to present Chicago Women’s Health Center)

  • Directing comprehensive reproductive health clinic services at North Shore Health Center (FemHealthUSA).

Collaborations

In MuMOMa, we collaborate with amazing community members that make this world a more beautiful and just one, and you should know about them.We support training for:

  • Peer Health Mentors from West Africa, with Expanding Lives (Northwestern University, Evanston IL)

  • Mentoras de Salud (Health Mentors) with Taller Salud, Inc (Loíza, PR)

  • Abortion Companions with Las Mingas (PR),

  • Collaborating Queer-Trans Health centered community education with various community organizations

  • Health Mentors around isolated rural communities in PR and the Caribbean region with MuMoMA’s yearly fundraisers and initiatives.

We are obsessed with feeding people around our life, growing and mixing herbs between our place in Skokie, IL, and our mountain Cabin in PR, reading a pile of books at our hammock, biking around the community while laughing out loud with beautiful people, or Google-ing inexplicable science facts. Most of our days, we are holding people’s hands with love at any decision they make and experiences they live with their pregnancies (birth, postpartum, alternative inseminations, perinatal loss, or chosen abortion ) while doing our best try on being a living verb of what community means while returning home back and forth to serve our people, and grow food at the same mountains that saw us grow.

Aché!

“Ser humano y Mujer excepcional, de una sensibilidad activa y comprometida con la justicia y equidad en todas sus dimensiones sociales y ambientales. Con una capacidad en conectarse con los y las demás, de despertar en los que la conocen -a quienes brinda amor- una sensibilidad por la VIDA” -

Carlos Muñiz (Collaborator since 2013)