NBKC founding midwife, Debbie Perry, believes in the sustainability of midwifery care, which is why she has formed a team of midwives and students to provide quality care to NBKC clients while preventing midwife burnout.
Debbie Perry, CPM
Debbie began her midwifery career in the late 80s after having her own home births and working as an ICU and labor and delivery nurse for 7 years. She became a practicing home birth midwife in 1989 and has helped start three birth centers over the years. After doing births in hospital, birth center, and home, Debbie chooses to do home births exclusively because she has found they have less transfers and happier outcomes. Therefore she started her Natural Birth KC practice in 2010 in Kansas City. She has trained over 10 midwives, several of whom continue to practice and build midwifery in the Kansas City area. She has been married for almost 50 years to her husband Ted and has 3 grown sons and 12 grands kids so far.
Gloria Hines, CPM
Gloria Hines grew up in the home birth culture, with 6 of her 11 sisters born at home. She has been married since 2014 to her best friend, and biggest encourager, Chris. Gloria knew she wanted to be a midwife when someone explained to her all that their midwife did for them, and how much it changed their life. She believes true midwifery should be nurturing body, soul, and spirit. She trained initially as a doula in March 2017, then headed off to GoMidwife in Kona, Hawaii in October 2018. She graduated from GoMidwife in March 2019 and started her apprenticeship program. She completed it in a record 2 years with a total of 200 births out of the required 55. She trained with and got experience with multiple midwives: Amber Walla, Katie Connor, Sara Waldo, Debbie Perry, Sarah Papabathini, Jana Johnson, Amy Kirbow and many more. Gloria passed her board exam in March 2021 and became a fully certified midwife in April 2021. Yes, she made all of her sisters pinky swear to have Gloria as their midwife; she has been the midwife for 3 of her sisters so far! She considers every birth an honor to be a part of and every moment of it sacred to partake in.