About Us
Who We Are

Sage Femme Midwifery Service, Inc. is a multi-discipline practice with Certified Nurse Midwives (CNMs), Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs), Llicensed Midwives (LMs), Registered Nurses (RNs), childbirth educators, midwifery students and volunteers from a variety of backgrounds.

Judi Tinkelenberg
CNM, RN, CCE, Clinical Director & Midwife

Judi began her journey as a labor/delivery/post partum and neonatal care nurse in 1975 as an RN. After giving birth to three children and training as a childbirth educator, she entered the world of midwifery, becoming a CNM (Certified Nurse Midwife) in 1985. Judi spent 4 years working in a hospital-based nurse midwifery program providing care in a clinic/hospital setting, serving a largely low income, immigrant and refugee population. She also was a childbirth educator and designed the education program for perinatal nursing and medical staff.

After also completing two years in nursing management, Judi realized that the hospital environment was no longer where she belonged (after being in that world since she was 16 years old). In 1990, due to requests of former clients, Judi opened a private midwifery practice - Sage Femme Midwifery - and began a home birth practice. In May of 1999, she founded a freestanding alternative birth center.

Over a period exceeding 30 years, Judi has delivered (more accurately received) close to 1500 babies and has attended more than 2800 other births. She has served as a childbirth educator since 1979. Judi absolutely loves what she does, and loves doing this work in the birth center setting.

Naomi Stotland
OB/GYN, MD, Medical Director

Naomi Stotland began as the Medical Director of Sage Femme Midwifery in November of 2003. She is an attending OB/GYN at San Francisco General hospital, and a faculty member at UCSF School of Medicine. She is a mother of three very active children, Beatrix and Isaac who were born naturally and Noah who was adopted from Korea. Naomi has been a supporter of out of hospital birth and midwifery care for quite a while. She assumes the role of medical director at the Birth Center in an administrative and advisory capacity only.

Shannon Staloch
Certified Professional Midwife, Licensed Midwife

Graduate of the National Midwifery Institute: Shannon apprenticed with Sage Femme for a year, attended births in El Paso, Texas and Senegal, West Africa, then upon returning attended various homebirths in the bay area. She came back to the birth center in 2007. She has a son born four years ago at home and is currently on maternity leave.

Serena Saeed-Winn
CNM, Women's Health Nurse Practicioner

Recent graduate of the UCSF midwifery program, Serena is joining us to experience some out-of-hospital birth work. In addition to being a Certified Nurse Midwife she is also a Women's Health Nurse Practitioner and has over 10 years experience as a certified doula.

Tenaya Jackman
Certified Professional Midwife, Licensed Midwife

Tenaya became interested in midwifery when she volunteered in rural health centers in Ghana, West Africa. She recieved her midwifery training at a birth center based, MEAC accredited, midwifery training program in El Paso, Texas. After completing the program she became a Certified Professional Midwife and California Licensed Midwife. She supports and encourages women and their families to trust the birth process, themselves, their body and their babies.

Jessica Christen
Apprentice Midwife

Currently a student at the National Midwifery Institute, Jessica began apprenticing at a homebirth practice in Southern California in March of 2008. Since October of 2008, Jessica has been apprenticing at Sage Femme and is working toward becoming a Certified Professional Midwife and a California Licensed Midwife. She lives in Berkeley with her husband and has hopes to start her own family in a few years. Jessica is very passionate about encouraging and supporting families through the journey of becoming parents. Her hopes is that, while it may sometimes be a challenging process, it can also be rewarding and empowering.

Evaly Long
Apprentice Midwife

Evaly began her midwifery path by taking Heart and Hands midwifery classes in the summer of 2007. She was a volunteer doula at Kaiser SF for a year and saw some beautiful births that further inspired her to be an advocate for natural birth and informed decisions. In July 2008 she gave birth to twin girls and has loved being a mom. She enrolled in the National Midwifery Institute in 2009 and began an apprenticeship at Sage Femme in December.

Alison Hall
RN, Birth Assistant

Alison is a graduate of Columbia University School of Nursing, and volunteers her time at Sage Femme in addition to working as a Registered Nurse in women’s health. Since joining Sage Femme in June 2009, she has been awestruck at the power of women birthing normally, which confirmed her decision to pursue a degree in nurse-midwifery.

Rebecca Levin
RN, Birth Assistant

Rebecca became interested in medicine when she worked as an EMT/Fire-Fighter in 2003. Post fire season, she decided nursing was her path and went back to school. She precepted in Labor and Delivery in her last semester of the RN program and couldn't get enough! Since graduating in May of '08, she has worked with UCSF's Safe Motherhood Program on the Lifewrap Initiative. Lifewrap was developed with the goal of eradicating death caused by post-partum hemorrhage in developing countries. She joined Sage Femme Midwifery Service in June of 2009 to gain out of hospital birth experience. In October, she went with an NGO group of Registered Nurses and Midwives to Senegal to deliver babies and teach updated Western medical techniques.

Melissa Eckard
CPM, Childbirth Educator, Birthworks Certified

Melissa is Judi's daughter and had been attending births since she was 15 years old. She has two amazing children of her own, one of whom was born at the birth center. She's been certified and teaching childbirth preparation classes at Sage Femme since 2002. In 2007 she graduated from the National College of Midwifery, however she is not currently practicing full-time while she focuses on getting her Bachelors in Dietetics.

Tabitha Ames
Childbirth Educator, CAPPA Trained

Originally obtaining Bachelor’s degrees in Biology and Psychology, Tabitha worked as a Research Associate in a molecular biology lab. She first came to Sage Femme as a client looking to birth her first child with midwives at a "home away from home". Leading up to the birth of her daughter in July 2008, she knew that after the birth she wouldn’t be able to leave the birthing community. Thus, she began her certification process through CAPPA to become a childbirth educator. Tabitha has been teaching classes at Sage Femme since April 2009 and is excited to be able to continually support and educate expectant families about the birth process, comfort techniques, and how to make the right decisions for them that will enhance their birthing experience.