About
Ihotu (meaning “love” in the Idoma language) is an integrative medicine practitioner and researcher, doctor in training, and cultural womb healer.
As the granddaughter of a traditional Nigerian chief in the Idoma tribe, Polish-Irish farmers, and a graduate of Columbia University, Ihotu conducted maternal health research with the United Nations before becoming a doula in 2011.
Fascinated by the connections between western and traditional medicine, she studied Afro-indigenous and global cultural practices for childbirth, ancestral and womb healing, alongside formal medical training in chiropractic care, neurological benefits of touch, and the neuroscience of spirituality and meditation.
Ihotu is a Founding Member of the Minnesota Healing Justice Network, and was featured in Rolling Stone Magazine for her focus on rest for Black bodies as protest, after the murder of George Floyd.
In response to burnout among healers, Ihotu partnered with technology company We Sparkle Co. to form the Oshun Center for Intercultural Healing - a small business incubator and interracial collective offering intensive support to community healers, as well as public courses and consulting on decolonizing and democratizing medicine and business.
As a national speaker and consultant, Ihotu teaches on cultural healing, appropriation, racism in health care, allyship, and economic justice tools including the sliding scale fee.
Teachers
Ihotu’s teachers include Columbia University’s School of Public Health, the Finger Lakes School of Massage, Panquetzani Ticitl of Indigemama, the Arvigo Institute, Dr. Carol Phillips, Spinning Babies Founder Gail Tully and Instructor Adrienne Caldwell, the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, Cathy Calderon, Maria Gaviña, Mama Okpoga, the Yoruba Association in Havana, Cuba, the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute, Sacred Window Studies for Ayurveda Postpartum Caregivers, Third Root Community Health Center, Hope Flanagan of Dream of Wild Health, Divine Bailey-Nicholas and Ethnobotany of the Southern Black Midwife, the Black Women’s Wealth Alliance, Midwives Jennie Joseph, Rebecca Polston, Martine Jean-Baptiste, Iya FaDundunbi Leslie and many more.