Kristin Brennan, LM, CPM

Licensed Midwife, Certified Professional Midwife

Every community needs a midwife! To prepare for my own homebirths, I traveled to Amherst from Springfield for my prenatal appointments. I longed to have a midwife down the street to connect with. I believed that anyone and everyone should have an option to give birth at home and became passionate about making home birth accessible to the Lower Valley towns. I started a comprehensive educational path to provide skilled care and now, as a midwife, I have been joyfully accompanying families in their journey for the past seven years.

My midwifery practice is based on the traditional model of a midwife serving the community she is part of. When we live close to the people we serve, we are invested and accountable. We are better attuned to the culture and values of the place and people. We build connection that can last past the birthing time. We are not only birthing babies, we are birthing a community.

Midwifery Training and Credentials:

  • Attending births in a professional setting since 2015, assisted and managed over 300 births

  • Licensed Midwife with the State of RI Department of Health

  • Certified Professional Midwife (CPM) since 2017

  • Served for 4 years as a partner midwife with River Valley Midwives (Northampton) before starting Greater Springfield Midwifery in 2022

  • Certified in Adult and Infant CPR, Advanced Training

  • Certified in Neonatal Resuscitation

  • 2 years of full-time apprenticeship with highly experienced home-birth midwives

  • 15 months of clinical training in high-volume birth center, El Paso, TX

  • Graduate of Maternidad La Luz, MEAC accredited school for out of hospital birth midwifery, El Paso, TX

Midwifery requires constant learning, skills practice, and integrating evolving best practices. I continually take advanced classes in a variety of birth topics.

Laconia Fennell, 3rd Year Midwifery Apprentice

Laconia has worked in the health care field in different capacities for the last 10 years. As she has developed her skills, she has become increasingly knowledgeable and drawn toward natural, herbal, balanced methods of health. A graduate of Elms College Nursing Program, she has been a doula for 5 years (Springfield Family Doulas). She practices Reiki, teaches prenatal and postpartum yoga, and has studied herbalism. She recently completed the Massachusetts Midwives Alliance Homebirth Midwifery Course. She is a mother of three beautiful children and can be seen around town with her supportive husband, Justin. She brings calm, openness, professionalism, and an amazing listening ear to every encounter she has.

Elissa Carney, 1st Year Midwifery Apprentice

Although she is in her first year of homebirth apprenticing, Elissa is not new to birth! She has been a doula since 2020 and is the current co-founder/director of the Doula Program at Seven Sisters Birth Center. She owns her own doula business, “Your Birth Coven,” hosts a podcast with the same name, and is in the final stages of completing the Massachusetts Midwives Alliance Homebirth Midwifery Course. A mom of two (her second was born at home with midwives), she proudly exclaims that she is “birth-obsessed.” She deeply believes in and advocates for the right of all women to birth how they want, surrounded by those able to hold sacred space, provide loving support, and/or skilled assistance. She has been accepted into the Greater Springfield Midwifery practice with such joy because she is a natural: conscientious, calm, detail-oriented, and an incredible communicator. .