Yoga and holistic birth support are potent therapeutic tools to empower the birthing journey from pregnancy to parenthood. This internationally recognized training program will ignite your journey to support healing and transformation during pregnancy and beyond. Sacred birth focuses on nurturing conscious pregnancy and parenthood while addressing the medical, political and spiritual considerations of birthing. Sacred birth is an 85+ hour dual certificate training. This training equips yoga teachers with tools to empower and support pregnant women throughout their pregnancies and labor. We encourage participants to explore and awaken to the radically healing potential of yoga and holistic birth support as therapeutic tools to empower the birthing journey from pregnancy to motherhood. After the completion of this course, yoga teachers will feel confident accommodating pregnant women in their regular classes, as well as be equipped to teach prenatal, couples workshops and postnatal yoga classes.

Julia Forest

Julia is an international yoga teacher, birth doula, women’s health advocate, and closet artist who is passionate about health, environmentalism and empowered birth. She is co-creator of the Sacred Birth Yoga & Doula Training, is founding director of Awakened Spirit Yoga and co-founder of the Wellkind Foundation, a non-profit that focuses on community empowerment and wellbeing through the lens of permaculture. She also created the Sacred Earth Yoga Training, the first yoga teacher training program that combines yoga, mindfulness, permaculture and leadership to transform lives and communities.

During the past 20 years, Julia has been practicing and studying with extraordinary teachers in North America and in India and deepened her practice in several lineages such as classical hatha yoga, mindfulness meditation, vinyasa, Scaravelli inspired, yoga therapy and kundalini. A solo journey to Spain sparked a 10 year pilgrimage to Rishikesh India, where she taught and studied yoga and meditation in ashrams and monasteries.

A self-proclaimed anatomy geek, she draws from more than 16 years of experience in body-centered therapies and physical rehabilitation and has taught individuals of many ages and abilities including teens, women who are pre- and post-natal, elders, as well as people living with MS, fibromyalgia, cancer, osteoporosis and chronic pain.

The emphasis in her classes is on alignment, yoga as a tool for transformation, the healing qualities of inner stillness, movement and breath for the cultivation of inner peace, health and wellbeing. Her approach is trauma informed and accessible. She teaches from the heart and creates an environment in which her students can explore and discover their inner wisdom and potential. She believes that we all have within us what we need to heal ourselves and is passionate about honoring source tradition while exploring the potential that yoga has to offer in everyday life.

Julia has been deeply influenced by her many teachers and mentors such as Thich Nhat Hahn, Jetsumna Tenzin Palmo, Monica Voss, and Judith Hanson Lasater. She offers retreats, yoga teacher training programs, anatomy and physiology intensives, and specialty workshops worldwide.

Stefanie Antunes

Stefanie Antunes has been a Lamaze® Educator and doula since 2002, after the birth of her second son showed her just how valuable it is to be prepared for birth and to have good support around you. Stefanie is a visionary in the childbirth field. She leads the Discover Birth organization providing a variety of services to expectant parents and training for those wishing to pursue work in the childbirth field.

Stefanie is the president of the Ontario Association of Doulas, former Public Relations Director for DONA International. and sits on many local boards and coalitions to improve our communities. She is a DONA-approved Birth Doula Trainer, and runs the Canadian Institute of Childbirth Educators, a Lamaze-Accredited Childbirth Educator Program.Stefanie is the founder of The Birth Doula Program at the Scarborough Hospital.

Stefanie is a contributing author in the best selling Power of Women United and the book Bearing Witness: Childbirth Stories Told by Doulas. She is a regular contributing writer and blogger, and has done many interviews online and for TV/radio.She believes that the world can be a better place if parents can have more positive childbirth experiences, allowing them to bond properly with their babies. She works tirelessly to change the world in this aspect…one family at a time.