Living out her dream

Erika Wilkins has wanted to become a labor and delivery nurse since childhood

For most young adults, the answer to the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?” is constantly changing, even while they are in college.

However, Erika Wilkins, a Liberty University senior nursing student, knew from an early age she wanted to become a labor and delivery nurse.

student midwife — Senior Erika Wilkins has delivered six babies and witnessed 83 births so far. Photo credit: Michela Diddle

Student midwife — Senior Erika Wilkins has delivered six babies and witnessed 83 births so far. Photo credit: Michela Diddle

“In third grade, my favorite TV show was ‘A Baby’s Story,’ and I’d watch it everyday,” Wilkins said. “I remember writing down the words I didn’t know and looking them up to see what they meant.”

Wilkins’ love for pregnancy also extended to animals.

“I was the neighborhood animal midwife for a while,” Wilkins said. “If anybody had a dog or cat that was pregnant, I was the one they’d call … and I’d be there when the puppies or kittens
were born.”

During her senior year in high school, Wilkins had the opportunity to shadow a labor and delivery nurse and observed her first birth.

“I got a really good perspective that day and I just knew this is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life,” Wilkins said.

Wilkins furthered her pre-college experience by becoming a doula. According to Wilkins, a doula is a nonmedical professional who is an expert in normal physiological childbirth. They understand the entire birthing process from beginning to end as well as the normalcies and abnormalities. In addition, they are educators and advocates for families in times of need.

“I talked to a lot of people in the field (of labor and delivery) and they told me the best way to gain experience and to learn how to take care of a woman in that place emotionally was to become a birth doula,” Wilkins said.

She became certified through DONA International, the leading certification organization for doulas. After her certification, she shadowed a home birth midwife for one-and-a-half years while attending community college near her home in California.

Through her experiences, Wilkins found a calling to help less fortunate women in their pregnancies.

“I really feel called to be a certified nurse midwife to help women in unplanned, unwanted and untimely pregnancies,” Wilkins said. “Some people in their lives won’t be respected or valued. If in that moment where a woman’s giving birth I can provide that for her, that might help her know she has a voice. In the future as a mother, she can do what’s right for her children.”

Wilkins also believes she helps women have a sense of empowerment.

“I give them the space to figure out what they want in a certain situation,” Wilkins said. “Maybe no one’s asked them that before.”

Wilkins views her calling as a personal mission field.

“The whole reason I want to be a midwife is so I can tell people about Jesus,” Wilkins said. “Parents reach this place where they are in such need because they’re dealing with something that’s much bigger than they are. As a parent, they are responsible for a whole new life. It’s been said that aside from the college years, a woman is most likely to accept Jesus when she’s giving birth to her first child. It’s amazing because you see women in their most vulnerable state that they’ll ever be in when they’re giving birth, but also the most triumphant and joyous they’ll ever be.”

Wilkins also had the opportunity in 2013 to serve as a midwife in the Philippines, realizing how she could use her passion abroad.

“If you can bring a skill to the mission field, it can become so much more powerful,” Wilkins said. “You’re meeting people where they’re at in a need they have and also being able to present them with the fulfillment of their true need in life.”

Wilkins’ long-term goal is to open her own freestanding birth center in an urban community that is connected to a pregnancy resource center.

“This is a very secular field, (but) comprehensive maternity care has to include all of the options in a pregnancy,” Wilkins said. “If we can produce leaders in the field who value life and who can help women see they can remain pregnant in a situation that isn’t the best, that would be life-changing.”

Maurer is a feature reporter.

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