My Story
Hi! My name is Kelly Graham-Milligan, CPM. I am a Certified Professional Midwife, Educator, Speaker, Phytomedicine Practitioner , Medicinal Herbalist, Master Herbalist, Traditional Naturopath, Nutritional Counselor, Plant Based Medicine Chef, Aromatherapist, Raw Vegan and Healing Chef. I am also a RYT200 Ashtanga Yoga Teacher. I am a lifetime learner and will always be seeking more education. Right now I am finishing a double doctorate in Phytomedicine (herbal medicine doctor) and Naturopathic Medicine (traditional naturopathic doctor). I am a lifelong advocate and fighter for women and women's rights. My biggest passion within Midwifery is education. My education and experience span 30 years and it has taught me to integrate both traditional health care and western health care for the perfect balance of SAFE LOVING BASED CARE that is designed for each individual that I see. I am a lover of travel, nature, yoga, creating beautiful healing foods, and above all traveling. My husband (Scott) is my best friend and true partner in life. He is my real Midwifery partner who has traveled the globe with me serving women. When we are not attending home births we are traveling the globe making content and documentaries about women around the world while brining awareness and advocacy to the struggle of women in the childbearing years.
Catching Babies
It is only a small part of what I do.
My purpose and path in life is to guide women to find their own empowerment and trust that only comes from within and own it. Midwifery means with woman. And that is exactly who I am. I'm with woman. I will stand by your side and I will always support you to make the decisions that come from within. Because I trust you and I trust your body. I believe with all of my heart that every birthing person deserves a safe, empowering, and non traumatic birth. Because "all we want is a healthy baby and mom" is absolutely not enough in today's world. I have been with woman for a majority of my life starting from the early days when I was educating my own peer group about herbs, sexuality, childbirth, woman reproductive health, going to sister circles, speaking, teaching, and always being there for anyone in my community who needed me. Over the years I have evolved as a woman, student, practitioner, and human being and so has my practice of being with woman.
I was born to do this work
My mother is a feminist. The original kind who fought for our rights to have bank accounts, jobs, birth control, and the right for women to make decisions about her own health. She fought and marched for my and my generations rights as women. Her and the women like her blazed the path for me to do the work that I do. I was born to do this work. It was in my blood from the moment I was conceived. I come from a lineage of STRONG WOMEN. I started educating myself on reproductive and women's health around 10 when I started experiencing my own reproductive health issues that took over my life for a long time. I became "obsessed" with studying women's health and pregnancy and started educating myself in every way I could. I took my first herbal training at 15. Everything from traditional college to self paced learning to apprentice learning, I have learned through every method. I have done it all . It has been 30 years and I still continue to educate myself, take trainings and classes, learn knew skills, and read tons of research. I am always in a new class or 2. In 1994 I started my first health business and it has grown and evolved since then. I attended my first birth in 2009 and shortly after that I left the country with the goal to travel the world and learn everything I could about women, Midwifery, community health, and the way women live, eat, and birth. I did that and so much more.
My education and experience
My education and experience with women's lives and in women's health and natural healing spans 30 years.
When I knew Midwifery was my purpose I felt deep in my heart that it was imperative for me to learn from traditional communities and the western medical communities. I wanted to learn from Midwives that had been part of the fight and advocacy in the 60's and 70's. I wanted to work within a holistic model that trusted the woman's body as much as I did. But I also wanted to learn the clinical skills that saved baby and women lives in the disaster field and around the globe. This was my number one goal. I wanted to learn advanced complication skills and management. I wanted to learn to handle all the complications so that I could ensure that women could have safe, empowering, non traumatic birth in every corner of the globe. During the years I attended and graduated from Midwives College of Utah Complication management in low low resource settings was my main research interest. I have a degree in Midwifery Science from Midwives College of Utah that exceeds that ICM (international confederation of Midwives) strict standards and is endorsed by ACOG as the training and education required for a safe home birth. I am also a nationally certified Midwife and Preceptor (midwifery teacher) through our certifying body NARM.
Life experience is everything
I have spent the last 15 years in the field practicing Women's Health, Nutrition, and Midwifery. I have spent the last 13 years traveling and working in the developing world. I decided that I needed to spend time with women around the globe in order to truly understand the hardships and the happiness of women around the world and in all cultures. Learning the way the that women in traditional cultures live, give birth, eat, cook, their spiritual practices and interact with their communities and health care providers has given me a unique perception on how women really do rule the world. But I have also seen how devastatingly difficult and hard it is for women to survive. In many cultures still today women are disposable. I knew I needed to be part of the change early in life. And now I strive to be part of the global solution.
My earliest memories I wanted to be a "doctor" and work in "the field". I had dreams of running into emergency situations and giving health care and attending to pregnant women. I trusted my instinct and knew God had a plan for me. And he did. The path has been so much more than I every could have imagined. I have done exactly what I always dreamed of. I traveled the globe and started my own NGO/non-profit with my husband. He is a master carpenter, builders logistician. Together we are an unstoppable team and have helped so many thousands of humans through our organization. We have done everything from building refugee camps during the Syrian Refugee Crisis, setting up clinics in Uganda, catching babies in tents after a massive devastating typhoon in The Philippines, traveling SE Asia and India consulting, building a clinic on the beach in Cambodia and so much more. I have given care to thousands of women, children, and men over the years. We are about to embark on a new project of making documentaries about women and childbirth around the globe.
I have been a world traveler from birth and wanted to see what the world really held for women in their childbearing years. Over the years I have spent uncountable hours with Traditional Healers, Medical Doctors and Surgeons, Naturopathic Doctors, Chinese Medicine Doctors, and everyone in between. I have attended birth in the most medicalized environment and I have also stood in a corner and observed while a woman took charge of her entire birth and I never needed to touch her. I have attended breech, twins, and VBAC's in tents during the worst natural disaster to ever hit this planet. I have experience working in clinic/hospital settings, village health center settings, home and community settings, and everything in between. I have crafted my skills of expertise in Midwifery and Midwifery Complications, Low Resource Midwifery, Midwifery Education, Herbal and Plant Medicine, Nutrition, and Natural Healing. The years traveling the globe and learning the stories of women spans over my lifetime and it has made me the strong and SAFE Midwife I am today.
