Theresa Pettaway

Theresa Pettaway was awarded the HerStory Award at the National HerStory Award Ceremony of the Global Women's Peace Network on March 26, 2022, for her exemplary commitment to providing warmth, care, knowledge and support to mothers, mothers-to-be, and their families based on her journey of overcoming unimaginable challenges.

Theresa Pettaway is the Founder and Executive Director of Pettaway Pursuit Foundation. She is a black mother of three premature babies. She experienced the trauma of early labor, teenage pregnancy, postpartum depression, being a NICU parent, lack of educational perinatal resources, and systematic racism during her pregnancies. Through these, she had the support of her loving husband. Her experience inspired her to be a maternal and child health advocate.

She started mentoring moms and facilitating workshops throughout Philadelphia to bring awareness to the crucial issue of maternal and child health morbidity. It became her mission to provide perinatal education and support, and birth equity.

In July 2001, Theresa founded Pettaway Pursuit Foundation, Inc. (PPF). PPF is a non-profit organization operating under section 501(c)(3) serving members in Delaware, Philadelphia, Bucks, Montgomery, and Chester counties of Pennsylvania. Its mission is to impact lives, one family at a time by empowering mothers with education and support throughout their perinatal period along with enhancing healthy child development, father involvement, and increasing food security, access to baby essentials, and other resources.

Theresa pioneered and developed a collaboration between doulas and managed care agencies to provide doula services to the Medicaid population in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. To further her mission, she participated in the Doula Town Halls and Doula Surveys in Massachusetts to support the bill H. 1182 an Act Relative to Medicaid Coverage for Doula Services. Theresa also joined the Pennsylvania House Democratic Policy Committee Hearing on Meaningful Solutions to Maternal Mortality - Doula Care and Coverage held at St. Joseph's University. Furthermore, Theresa became one of the Maternal Health stakeholders in a Maternal Mortality Public Hearing in Philadelphia. She shared her testimony to support Resolution Number 190040 which authorized the Committee on Public Health and Human Services to hold hearings on the increase in maternal mortality among African American women in Philadelphia.

Moreover, Theresa became a member of the following committee or organization to support the increasing fight against maternal and child health morbidity:

• Pennsylvania Breastfeeding Coalition (PABC) Equity Workgroup

• Delaware County Breastfeeding Coalition

• Delco Area Resource Network

• Delaware County Eliminating Disparities Committee

• Conquerors Community Development Corporation.

In 2021, Theresa joined the PA Doula & Perinatal CHW Advisory Group. The initial goals of this Advisory Group are to create more equitable access to Doulas and develop a statewide infrastructure to support the work of Doulas (including Doulas, Community-Based Doulas, and Perinatal CHWs) by: gaining consensus on education and certification standards for Doulas in Pennsylvania; creating a mechanism to operationalize a certification credential for Doulas in Pennsylvania, including a registry of certified Doulas; and advancing recommendations for how to finance the critical work of certified Doulas in Pennsylvania.

Birth out of that Advisory Group was the establishment of the Pennsylvania Doula Commission (PADC). Theresa, one of the four, became the founding mother of PADC. Their mission is to promote equitable access to doula services through workforce development for the doula profession while facilitating childbirth with dignity, improving perinatal health outcomes, and eliminating barriers by reducing healthcare disparities.

In February 2022, Theresa had the opportunity to be featured on 6abc Philly proud, showcasing what she has done to help the community in need.

Theresa’s life work is passion-and-faith-driven. She grew up in a God-loving family and has been a faithful servant to God at a very young age. She answered the call on her life and started serving as a Minister in Training in October 2021 at Victory Christian Center.

While her boundless love and support for her family, for her friends, for her church family, for the maternal health community, is shown through her past and present actions, humbly she would say in her own words, “I’m just Theresa.”