Cynthia Mason, CNM, APN, MSN

As a midwife who’s attended more than five hundred births—more than one thousand if you count my time working as a Registered Nurse at a county hospital in Cleveland—I’ve seen firsthand how sacred and life-altering having a baby can be.

When I started my career, I wanted to become a pediatrician—I loved children and I wanted to help people, so pediatrics seemed like a natural fit. Several internships and opportunities to shadow physicians later, how- ever, I realized that I wasn’t philosophically aligned with the standard model of medical care that exists in the United States. Most of the talented physicians I trailed were focused entirely on what was going wrong with the body, rather than figuring out how to make things go right. And there was zero emphasis on preventive medicine or holistic living.

It wasn’t until my junior year in college that I understood how different things could be. I was working as a receptionist and patient educator at a family planning clinic, and I saw firsthand how certified nurse-midwives cared for their patients while encouraging a healthier, more holistic lifestyle. It was like a lightbulb went off; I knew this was what I was supposed to do. In the world of midwifery, we call this our calling.

A year later, I graduated with a degree in biology and went on to receive my master’s-level training at the Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing at Case Western Reserve University. And these days, I’m living my dreams: I’m married to an amazing husband, we have a pair of loving fur babies, and every morning (sometimes in the middle of the night, too!) I rush out of bed, full of adrenaline, ready to welcome a new life to the world.