Debra Pascali-Bonaro is a world-renowned inspirational speaker, filmmaker, DONA International Doula trainer, Lamaze International Childbirth Educator, author, and graduate with a degree in education from McGill University. Debra’s retreats and workshops around the world create personal transformation as well as birth forward her desire that each person has pleasure and a community of caring support during pregnancy, birth, and the transition to parenting. It began with the birth of her children as she celebrated the joys as well as faced challenges of parenting and a relationship that ended in divorce. She began listening to people around the world as she traveled to teach in forty countries discussing experiences of childbirth, sexuality, and parenting. Hearing so many challenging stories, Debra became an activist to change and heal our broken maternity care system and provide parents with Nurturing Beginnings, the title of the first book she co-authored. For the last 25 years, Debra has volunteered her time nationally and internationally to create a healthy, respectful, and equitable maternity care system. She has long served as the Director of the International MotherBaby Childbirth Organization (IMBCO), which, with FIGO, co-created the International Childbirth Initiative (ICI): 12 Steps to Safe and Respectful MotherBaby-Family Maternity Care. Debra also serves as Co-Chair of the ICI Executive Committee and believes that the ICI sets the global gold standard for optimal maternity care.
The negative media perceptions of birth, and the strong cultural perception that birth has nothing to do with sexuality, led Debra to direct her award-winning documentary Orgasmic Birth and to co-author, with Elizabeth Davis. the book of the same title, pulling the curtain back on the intimacy and sexuality of childbirth. Debra’s newest book quickly rose to Amazon #1 The Ultimate Guide to Sex After Baby: Secrets to Love and Intimacy and her signature course, Sex After Baby is life-changing and affirming for parents. Debra has helped thousands of people understand their options in birth, and as she often says, “There is power in childbirth. It’s your choice to claim it or to give it away!” Her recently launched podcast, Orgasmic Birth: The Podcast, is receiving rave reviews. Join us as we break down and heal barriers and open the door to share secrets to more love and intimacy in birth and parenting.
Debra is a Jersey girl who tells it like it is with stories and exercises that she has gathered from teaching, listening, and learning from professionals and parents around the world. She has been featured in multiple parenting journals and media in many countries.
If you are introducing Debra at an event, this short bio might help.
Debra Pascali-Bonaro is a world-renowned inspirational speaker, filmmaker, doula trainer, childbirth educator, and author. Debra’s latest book, an Amazon #1 New Release, The Ultimate Guide to Sex After Baby: Secrets to Love and Intimacy brings together her passion for pleasure in every aspect of life with her Jersey-Girl attitude of talking about what no one is talking about! Debra is a mother, grandmother and featured expert in parenting journals and media around the world.
Debra Pascali-Bonaro is also Co-Chair of the International Childbirth Initiative and Chair of the International MotherBaby Childbirth Initiative both of which promote safe, respectful childbirth maternity care. She is a Lamaze International childbirth educator, birth and postpartum doula trainer with DONA International, Director of the award-winning documentary Orgasmic Birth: The Best-Kept Secret, co-writer of “Orgasmic Birth: Your Guide to a Safe, Satisfying and Pleasurable Birth” and the Founder & President of the revolutionary online childbirth class Pain to Power, which prepares expectant mothers, fathers, and partners to be positively prepared for birth and focuses on the intimate and sacred nature of birth. Debra’s passion comes from her over 30 years of working with women, men, midwives, doulas, physicians and nurses in over 40 countries bringing comfort, love, and pleasure to birth and life!
Debra Pascali Bonaro has been featured on ABC’s 20/20, Good Morning Russia, The NBC Today Show, Discovery Health, in The New York Times, The LA Times, The UK Times as well as numerous Parenting and Health Magazines around the world.
Speaking
If you are looking to have Debra as a speaker for your next event, then you might be interested in a few of the events she has done before.
- Eat Pray Doula Workshop Bali, Indonesia, Since 2012
- Lamaze International Conferences, Since 1997
- DONA International Conferences, Since 1994
- Columbia University Midwifery Students, Since 2008
- University of Pennsylvania & PALS: Nursing midwifery, medical students along with community outreach workers, Since 2000
- Midwifery Today Conference, Since 1996
- New York University 2011, 2012, 2014
- Happy Healthy Child Screening at Golden Bridge Yoga with Director Gurmukh Kaur Khalsa, 2013, 2014, 2015
- Birth Your Way Event, Mountainside Hospital in Montclair, NJ 2013
- Midwifery Today Conference Belgium, 2013
- Malaysia, 2nd International Conference Birth Without Borders, Global Trends in Caring for Birth
- Women Deliver Conference, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 2013
- Women Deliver, Washington DC, June 2010
- White Ribbon Alliance Respectful Maternity Care Advisory Group, Since 2011
- Workshop In-Service Workshops for Midwives in Port Elizabeth, S. Africa 2011
- III Humanization Conference Brasilia, Brazil 2010
- In-Service Workshops & Grand Rounds Bokamoso Private Hospital, Gaborone, Botswana 2011
- Grand Rounds, Sofia Feldman Hospital, Brazil, 2010
- Grand Rounds, Feldbach Hospital, Austria, 2010
- World Birth Summit, Damanhur, Italy, May 2010
- International Confederation of Midwives, Vienna, 2002, Scotland 2008
- Doula workshops in 40 countries
- Project Director, First Mother-Friendly Childbirth Forum, Coalition for Improving Maternity Services, 2003
- Brazil—Grand Rounds, Rio de Janeiro, Secretary of Health and Brasilia, Minister of Health, 2003
- Grand Rounds, Wake Forest Hospital, NC, 2003
- Grand Rounds, University of North Carolina ,Chapel Hill Medical Center, NC, 2003
- Nursing In-service University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill Medical Center, 2003
- Nursing In-service, Good Samaritan Hospital, Suffern, NY, 2003
- Grand Rounds, Good Samaritan Hospital, Suffern, NY, 2003
- Best Beginnings, Healthy Families, NYC, 2003
- Early Head Start, Northeast Region, 2002, 2003
- NC Perinatal Nurses Conference, 2002
- MCA Project Director Trauma, Loss and Communal Grieving: The experiences of pregnant women and new mother’s and maternity care providers after 9/11/01, 2002
- Coalition for Improving Maternity Services, CA, 2002, 2008
- Univ. of Pennsylvania Medical School, 2002, 2003, 2004
- State University of New York at Stony Brook Medical School, 2004
- Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, PCOM 2002
- Home Obstetrical Mothercare Experience, HOME,for the European Union, Perugia, Italy, 2001
- Active Birth Centre, London, England, 2001
- State of NJ Perinatal Conference—Alternative in Childbearing, 2001
- Cayman Islands, 2000
- Upper Hudson Perinatal Services, 2000
- Hunter College, MPH program
- Lower Hudson Perinatal Services, NY, 2000
- Overlook Hospital, Somerset, NJ, 2000
- Avoiding the Pitfalls of VBAC Conference, Community Medical Center, NJ, 1999
- Community Medical Center, NJ, 1999
- Safely Reducing Cesarean Section Rates, Cambridge Health Resource, 1998
- University of Puerto Rico, 1998
- Maternity Care Coalition / University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, 1998-1999
- Lutheran Medical Center, Brooklyn, NY, 1998 Staff In-service
- American Public Health Association National Conference, 1997
- Stony Brook University Hospital and Medical Center, NY, Nursing, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001
- St. Peter’s Medical Center, NJ, 1997
- Keynote – Creating the Childbearing Village, Cincinnati, OH, 1997
- Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, MD, 1996
- NAPCS national conferences, 1989-1993
- Columbia University Graduate School of Nursing, 1996-1997
- President’s Task Force on Health Care Reform, 1993
- Child’s Health Day, Trenton, New Jersey, 1993
- ICAN of New York, 1992
- University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Nursing, 1992
- Northeast Regional Conference, Mead-Johnson, 1991
- National Association for the Prevention of Child Abuse, 1990
