Meet Jacoba

I am Jacoba (Elle), from the mountains of native lands of Borikén (Puerto Rico), and I am the Founder-Director of Montuna and your main Sexual and Reproductive Health Feminist Specialist with over 20 years of experience. I currently live in Skokie, IL, serving the North Chicago and North West Suburbs of Illinois. I am a trained traditional Midwife (DEM), Certified Doula, Childbirth Educator, Death Doula, Lactation Consultant, 3rd generation Santigüadora, Women's Health Herbal Medicine Certified, Reiki and Somatics practitioner, Gender and Sexuality specialist (WGGS), Community Health Educator currently finishing my Thanatology certification.

I currently specialize in trauma-informed care creating and honoring spaces for communities that have experienced sexual trauma and reproductive (fertility loss) and pregnancy loss (miscarriages and stillbirths). I am also passionate about community health education, and I aim to do so by respecting and preserving our communities' innate cultural healing practices and bringing a decolonizing role in multiplying knowledge on health prevention and wellness practices back into our people's hands.

At Motuna we offer consultations to organizations, expansive education and care services, as well as resting spaces for other experiences, or outcomes of pregnancy within an evidence-based approach balancing the Midwife Care Model and the Ancestral Comadronas-Santigüadoras practice. I am driven to uplift the voices and experiences of our Global Majority/BIPOC/Immigrant-Refuggee-Assylum Seekers communities. I am a native Spanish speaker and have extensively worked with French and Moroccan Arabic-speaking community referrals, specializing in FGM post-trauma and care. You can reach me at www.montuna.org.