We are thrilled to announce our interim 2020 Community Advisory Board (CAB) members, Nicole Hutchings and Ruta Lauleva Lua’iufi Aiono! Nicole and Ruta will fill an important advisory role until our next round of CAB applications and acceptances later this year.
Nicole Hutchings
Nicole Hutchings is currently the Out of School Time Coordinator for the Fresno EOC Street Saints. Originally from Hanford, Ca Nicole moved to Fresno, Ca in 2003. After being a stay at home mom for a few years, Nicole decided to give back to her community by volunteering with the Street Saints. Nicole is a mother of 3 children: Tony Jr, Hailey and Adrian. Tony and Hailey were both born 3 weeks early with asthma. Adrian was born 7 weeks premature with pulmonary trunk valve stenosis/pulmonic valve stenosis. At 5 months old Adrian had a cardiac catheterization performed. Adrian is now 9 years old with asthma, but otherwise healthy and active with dreams of becoming a veterinarian. Nicole is an active community member and very passionate about the preterm birth work.
Ruta Lauleva Lua’iufi Aiono
My family comes from Fasito’o-uta and Malie on my father’s side and from San Francisco, CA on my mother’s side. I grew up in Japan, Samoa, the Bay Area and Rochester, NY. I have been supporting birthing families since 2013 with the birth of my god-child and spent 3 of those years working as an apprentice midwife with Diane Gregg in Southern Arizona serving families from Sonora, Mexico. Learning under Diane I experienced what uninterrupted, un-medicated birth looks like and I bring this sense of trust in the birthing body to my clients. Since returning to the Bay Area I have worked with Roots of Labor out of Oakland serving low-income and POC families and I am very excited and grateful for this opportunity to now serve my PI community. I have also been blessed to study under Mimi Kamp, an elder herbalist who held space for me to learn to be quiet and observe as the primary way to understand imbalance, and to sit with the plants as the primary way to understand their medicine. I am excited to support families in birthing with dignity and joy by equipping them with the tools and language to navigate the hospital system while grounding them in the traditions of our ancestors.
I believe that pregnancy and birth are periods of transformation that imprint the infant and can shape the pregnant person and their family for their whole lives. I also believe that Hospital Culture is its own culture, inherently based in colonization, white supremacy and capitalism and that This is why we see more negative birth outcomes for our people. My work as a birth companion centers around supporting BIPOC families to have autonomy within the medical system- the confidence to make informed decisions about their bodies and experiences, the support to impart these rites of passage with cultural values and protocol if they so desire. As a Samoan person I was raised to serve my elders and my community: ‘O le ala i le pule o le tautua’ – The path to leadership is through service. In doing this work I hope to both honor my family and uplift my culture.
