Meet Natalie Peña | Full Spectrum Doula and Couples Counselor

We had the good fortune of connecting with Natalie Peña and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Natalie, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
Healing Internationale was dreamed while I was completing my masters in Spain. Being a birth worker, full spectrum doula and counselor I went to Barcelona to study Clinical Sexology and Couples Therapy. I was in an interdisciplinary program with doctors and nurses from all around the world and while I wasn’t able to legally work I could support parents in postpartum support. I was a poor graduate student once again and I realized that I needed to use the skills I had to survive.

As I was working with families, I saw that the real difference in care and healing for families that were on their own was not with the families themselves, but with the healthcare system. Having worked and lived the US, inside and outside the healthcare system, I saw first hand how many families are not only looking for healing from trauma of birth in the US but also basic wellness education. How we could look at other healthcare systems of developed countries and blatantly not see how bad our American healthcare system was failing was insane to me. The American system spends the most money and has one of the worst maternal mortality rates of the developed world, when COVID hit the disparities were obvious. We needed to do better and thus Healing Internationale was born.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
Healing Internationale set out to change the way we think of healthcare and healing. At Healing Internationale our mission is to leverage technology to advance the lives of people who socially, or culturally, cannot access sexual and reproductive health education and healing. What sets us apart from other organizations is our focus in mental health and healing with the intention to interrupt intergenerational trauma before it passed down to the next generation. We believe that by learning from different cultures, different countries way of caring for women and families we can heal the maternal health crisis and create a platform for the future of reproductive medicine.

Being an entrepreneur has been hard, missing major events, birthdays, holidays and anniversaries as a Latina who is so close to her family has been difficult. I overcame by being held by a community of women, tia’s, tio’s who remind me to believe in my dreams and that the world needs our gifts. The women in my family are educators, social workers, doctors and caretakers. They raise families AND change the world. They inspired me to do the same.

Healing Internationale is made of children of immigrants who parents moved for a better life. Our community is made of the many families who choose us to support them when the world says you should go at it alone. The truth is many families no longer have a village, they don’t talk to their neighbors and they are often vulnerable to postpartum mental health disorders, chronic stress and all of this effects they way they get to parent. We are a team of doulas, therapists, healers and coaches who hold the dream of the internationalist, that we all deserve healthcare, healing, homes and the right to education no matter where we come from. We hold you in your most difficult moments so you can get back to the powerful work of healing AND changing the world, one family at time.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
When my friends come to visit NYC I take them to have drinks at the Shrine in Harlem. We would walk through the Washington heights, go dancing bachata at Mamajuanas and eat cachapas on the way home
I would take them to chinatown for dimsum and a speakeasy for cocktails and finish the night with Karaoke in Koreatown.
We would go shopping at the thrift stores in Brooklyn, visit Sacred Vibes apothecary for some healing herbs and go see DJ Bembonas set where every she is playing.
I would check out a Hot situations party at Ideal glass and party in the art mansion to German dj’s
Lastly would go to the MET and dance salsa in Central Park

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
Dr. Griselda Rodriguez at the City College of New York was a huge influence on my ability to act locally and think globally. She was the first Afro-Domincan academic and the first Latina who looked like me was a PHD I had ever met. She was one of the first professors of color I had as undergrad student, while previously all my teachers had been white men and women. Seeing someone who comes from my background achieve, inspire and create changed me. Her class Transnational Feminisms allowed me to think critically about systems, governments and healthcare for women of color around the world but particularly for women in the global south. Griselda encouraged me to follow my dreams of making a space for an academic study that encompassed global economic analysis and reproductive freedom.

Chanel Portia- Albert founder of AncientsSong Doula services. Chanel came to support our student organizing campaign against gender violence with her baby and I was enamored of the way her babies were always part of her work. While in most places children are considered a nuisance Chanel inspired me to create a job and a life for myself that encompassed all parts of womanhood, motherhood and community action. She helped to get my doula certification when I couldn’t afford to train as a doula. I worked alongside her for years to create community spaces for education and support. Her love for our community and her stance on community care, trained me to be the birth worker I am today.

Website: https://www.healinginternationale.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healinginternationale/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalie-peña-68247a49/