Nurturing the Journey
Nurturing the Journey
A Nature-Based Pregnancy Retreat Using a Three-Day Experiential, Nature-Based Retreat with Pregnant Individuals to Improve Maternal Mental Health Outcomes
Pregnancy is a profound rite of passage — a threshold moment that deserves space, reverence, and community. This retreat invites you to step into the mountains, slow down, and reconnect with yourself while receiving the care and support you deserve.
Why Join?
Restore body and spirit through nature immersion.
Build community with others navigating pregnancy.
Explore somatic practices that ease stress and support wellbeing.
Contribute to important maternal mental health research
Who This Training is For
Nourishing the Journey is for:
Pregnant, about 15–28 weeks gestation
Experiencing a medically non-complicated pregnancy
Energetically and physically able to participate in light
experiential activities
Why Research?
By joining this retreat, you’re part of something bigger. Together, we’re helping shape the future of perinatal mental health support by exploring how nature-based practices during pregnancy can protect and support parents for generations to come.
Research around perinatal mental health is thankfully gaining momentum, with growing evidence supporting the need to thoughtfully address maternal mental health challenges, as well as increased understanding around effective treatments to do so such as medication and psychotherapy. However, there is still so much work to be done in exploring interventions that go beyond symptom management and instead reach towards deeply felt wellness.
This study is unique because it looks upstream— exploring how nature-based interventions during pregnancy may help insulate and prevent maternal mental health complications before they begin. By joining this retreat, you are not only nurturing yourself but also contributing to a body of knowledge that can expand maternal mental health support for countless others.
“Birth is not only about making babies. Birth is about making mothers—strong, competent, capable mothers who trust themselves and know their inner strength.”
— Barbara Katz Rothman
Offering Details
Dates: Sunday, May 31st at 1 PM — Wednesday, June 3rd at 10 AM
Location: Dao House, Estes Park, CO
Cozy private or shared rooms with bathrooms + mountain views
Farm-to-table meals (organic, nourishing, community-oriented)
Fireside gathering spaces + oxygen lounge for high-altitude support
Price: $800 (some partial scholarships available)
To apply: click the button below
About Your Facilitators
Alyssa Coleman is an Experiential Counseling student, doula, perinatal mental health researcher, and wilderness guide tending journeys through the inner and outer worlds alike. She is a graduate student at Prescott College pursuing an MS in Clinical Mental Health Counseling with a concentration in Adventure-Based Counseling as well as an EdS in Experiential Counseling. Alyssa is also a birth and postpartum doula, maternal mental health advocate, and wilderness guide. She is a deep believer in the incredible transformational, healing potential of pregnancy and childbirth, especially
when held with reverence, intentionality, and community support. Alyssa is so very excited to be able to offer this event for folks and gather insights that can help improve maternal mental health offerings more broadly and can't wait to meet you!
Anne-Marie Chmielewski is a nature-based chaplain, mom, auntie, and devoted rites of passage companion supporting journeys through the shifting seasons of life and land. She is grounded in feminist spirituality and earth-honoring pastoral care. Anne-Marie holds a master’s degree in Women’s Spirituality and a second in Consciousness, Healing, and Ecology. With a practice rooted in deep listening and relationship with the more-than-human world, she supports folks in connecting with nature as a source of insight, belonging and transformation. Raised in rural Montana and now based in Colorado, she carries a lifelong reverence for the textures and teachings of the land—threads that continue to shape how she listens, holds space, and accompanies others through thresholds and transformation. Read more.
Ways to support
Sponsor a Participant: $800 fully covers one participant. Contributions
of any size help make this retreat possible.
Donate: Your support helps make groundbreaking research possible. By funding this retreat, you’re contributing to a study exploring how engaging with nature-based practices during pregnancy can help improve maternal mental health outcomes— creating ripple effects for families and communities for years to come.
Interested but have some questions? Email Alyssa at alyssa.coleman@student.prescott.edu