Darian Bleecher

WRITER, EDITOR, SUPERMOM: A few years ago, we assigned contributor Darian Bleecher an article about the childbirth options in Santa Barbara, and the experience convinced the longtime writer/editor — who’s the author of this week’s cover story on the recently opened S.B. Birth Center — to become a doula herself. “With everything that I learned through that experience, I really made up my mind that, when the time came for me to have a baby, I’d like to plan for a home birth,” said Bleecher, who’s lived in Santa Barbara for 23 years and is married to Mike Duzinski. “Happily, we had a very successful and wonderful home birth.” The product of that “empowering” experience was a precocious little boy named Felix, who turns two years old next Friday. Happy birthday!