About Me

Who Am I…
I am Wilma Smits. I was born in Katwijk aan Zee on New Year’s Day as the second child in a family of four children. My cradle was almost on the beach, and pretty much my entire childhood was spent there. Whenever we wanted to do something fun as a family, we first checked if it was ‘beach weather’. If so… we always went to the beach. The beach is still a place of peace and insight for me. A place of coming home. After high school, I first became an operating room assistant. At that time, I mainly wanted to be independent quickly, and that included having my own income. I really enjoyed the work and had the time of my life, but I soon felt that this wouldn’t be my final destination. A fellow student who had been a midwife in Poland thought that profession really suited me and encouraged me to attend the open day.

Midwife
And so it happened that in 2006, pregnant with my first child, I received the coveted diploma in Amsterdam. I felt like a top-notch midwife. After a year of working in various places, I joined a partnership in Leidschendam in 2008. In that same year, I also completed my training as a sonographer and was pregnant with my second child. In 2011, I became a mother for the third time. Until 2023, I worked with great pleasure in the partnership in Leidschendam. However, at some point, the family, the partnership, the shifts, and the ultrasounds felt like too much. I had to make a choice. With a heavy heart, I left the partnership. I preferred to spend my time on things close to my heart. And my heart lies on the work floor. Since then, I have been working with great pleasure in various places in and around The Hague. Many other doors have opened for me, and I have met countless inspiring people.

Pure Pain Training
In 2022, I started giving Pure Pain and partner training. I saw more and more women who did not look back positively on their delivery in the postpartum period or even described feelings of trauma. This coincided somewhat with the time when women were getting more options, such as choices for various types of pain management, and the birth plan was also becoming more prevalent. I didn’t quite understand it. When I talked further with these women, it often turned out that they didn’t fully understand how the birth process works and had focused too much on the plan and what the caregivers should or shouldn’t do for it. In doing so, they had actually given up some of their control. I think it’s very important that women and their partners receive honest, clear information and work on positively influencing their process so that they can look back on the delivery with a good feeling. Prevention is better than cure, after all! A good birth experience brings about a whole cascade of positivity that you can reap the benefits of for the rest of your life.