Traci Palagi, LM, CPM
Empowered by the strength given to me on the day I birthed my first child, my future as a midwife was defined. I was overwhelmed by my desire to “pay back” the support and encouragement bestowed upon me by my midwife and eager to explore the academic side of the innate and fascinating progression of pregnancy and birth.
I enrolled in the Seattle Midwifery School in 1999 following several years of prerequisite courses. As a student, I was fortunate to acquire extensive clinical experience in several locations including Seattle Home Maternity Service, Puget Sound Birth Center, and a rotation at a public health hospital in Manila, Philippines.
Upon graduation I began employment with Puget Sound Birth Center in Kirkland, Washington, providing care at the birthing center in addition to attending home births. During this time I Co-chaired the Quality Management Program for the Midwifes Association of Washington State and for two years, taught a course at the Seattle Midwifery School. After five years of practicing in Washington State, we moved to Montana. I opened a midwifery practice, primarily attending home births. The practice grew quickly and I enjoyed my clients, my clinic, and the adventure of living in Central Montana. It was a positive experience in all, but after several years we moved back to Seattle to be closer to family.
I now live in Seattle with my husband of nineteen years and our two teenage children. It is my sincere passion to practice midwifery and continue supporting families as they grow.
Tina Tsiakalis, LM, CPM
I grew up in Boston, a first-generation Greek American, listening to my parents’ stories around the dinner table. My mother’s birth stories fascinated me the most – her births, and those of other women in their remote mountain village. I was a teenager the first time I witnessed a birth – my nephew’s. Everything from the biology involved, the shape of pregnancy, the process of birth, how women incorporated becoming the parent of a new human being, it all fascinated me. While my life path took a circuitous route before reaching midwifery, today I am happy and feel privileged to be a midwife with SHMS.
I spent the 1990’s working at Microsoft and Seattle “dot-com” start-ups with my techie college sweetheart, Nat Brown. My latent interest in childbirth and parenting was rekindled when I had my first child. I met childbirth educator Penny Simkin, who introduced me to an active approach to pregnancy and childbirth that I hadn’t yet fully understood, I learned about modern midwifery care, trained as a labor-support person (doula), and volunteered on the Board of Directors for Great Starts, a long-standing Seattle non-profit committed to evidence-based pregnancy and childbirth education.
I chose midwifery care and home-birth when I became pregnant with my second child. I was impressed with the personal, attentive care I received and felt respected, supported and safe throughout the pregnancy and birth. After my daughter was born, I delighted in the fact that my midwives shared in my joy. I knew then that attending midwifery school and becoming that kind of midwife in our community would complete the journey I had begun as that teenager at my sister’s side, fascinated by pregnancy and birth.
I have a Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard University and I am a graduate of the Seattle Midwifery School. Over the course of the three-year midwifery education program I attended home-, birth-center, and hospital-births as a student midwife, benefiting from the experience of 8 experienced midwife mentors, and volunteered at the maternity ward of a busy hospital in Port Vila, Vanuatu.
I look forward to being your midwife.