Formerly known as Mama2Mama

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About Us

Transforming the fourth trimester

OUR STORY

At 4th Trimester, we believe the weeks and months after birth should be a time of deep care. We’re a nonprofit organization changing how new mothers and birthing people experience the postpartum period. We’ve been through the trenches ourselves and know how isolating it can feel without enough support. We serve those most often left behind by traditional systems, including low-income, immigrant, asylum-seeking, and disaster-impacted families. We provide practical support, emotional care, and advocacy that puts parents’ needs first.

We started simply with a few mothers supporting others after birth, providing recovery supplies, diapers, and a listening ear.

As our community grew, we learned more about what families truly need. Over the past two years, we’ve expanded our focus to include mental health support, economic assistance, and advocacy. The name ‘4th Trimester’ reflects our bold belief that this tender stage of life matters, enough to refer to it as a separate ‘trimester’ with its own set of important needs.

We’re on a mission to transform the postpartum experience for new parents by giving them real resources, community support, and advocating for their needs.

How we win trust with parents

While many organizations focus on the baby, our focus is on the parent. Postpartum can be such a vulnerable time, and we constantly ask ourselves how we can enter this unique period in people’s lives with care. Our four core values guide us.

Radical Empathy

We listen, we see, we show up. True support means meeting postpartum people where they are without judgment.

Collective Strength

No one should navigate the postpartum period alone. We build communities of care that uplift and take action.

Sustained Care

Support isn’t a luxury; it’s a necessity. From immediate postpartum essentials to long-term mental health resources, we make care continuous.

Confidence

Every birthing person deserves to make informed and confident decisions about their body, their baby, and their recovery.

"I hate asking for help. There have been many important lessons that I've learned through this. One is that it takes a village, and my village has been you."

‒ Bell, Altadena

Who We Are

We are community health workers, birth advocates, nonprofit leaders, and parents ourselves. Our team brings both lived experience and professional expertise to the work.

Marisa Callahan

Board Chair

Rachel Scandling

Executive Director 

Cayla Willingham

Community & Volunteers

Tiffany Liu

Programs & Operations

Karen Jaimes

Brand & Marketing

Isabel Hernandez

Programs

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Marisa Callahan

Board Chair

Jerilyn Castillo McAniff

Member, Oaktree Capital

Brooke Cutler

Member, United Nations Foundation

Vanessa Dew

Member, Entrepreneur

Abiel Garcia

Member, Kesslman
Brantly Stockinger, LLP

Bhuvan Martin

Member, OBGYN/High Risk Maternal
Fetal Medicine

Rachel Scandling

Executive Director,
4th Trimester

Cayla Willingham

Treasurer & Secretary

Rooted in Southern California and the US-Mexico border

We’ve spent years working in neighborhoods from Los Angeles to San Diego and along the U.S.–Mexico border. These communities, rich in culture, resilience, and diversity, also face some of the most significant gaps in postpartum care.

Because we live and work here, we understand the landscape: the systems that fall short, the networks that step in, and the families caught in between. Whether it’s navigating birth while seeking asylum, recovering after wildfire displacement, or caring for a newborn far from extended family, we’ve built our model to meet parents where they are.

Marisa co-founded 4th Trimester to help fill the gaps in postpartum care, which she saw firsthand. Her path from tech executive to maternal health advocate began at Meta, where she led the Account Management team and scaled big ideas. But it was her experience of becoming a mother and feeling overwhelmed in her early days postpartum that shifted Marisa’s focus and lit the spark that became Mama2Mama, now 4th Trimester.

Outside of 4th Trimester, Marisa serves on the board of Planned Parenthood’s San Gabriel Valley affiliate and volunteers with several nonprofits in her community. She’s in the thick of parenting four young children, and her lived experience continues to shape and fuel her advocacy work.

Rachel brings nearly 20 years of leadership experience across LA’s public, academic, and nonprofit sectors. A hands-on leader and systems thinker, her career has spanned fundraising, programming, and management for organizations of all sizes, with a consistent focus on supporting women.

Before joining 4th Trimester, Rachel led the graduate producing program at CalArts and served as Producing Director of its Center for New Performance. She’s a member of Loud Community, a woman-led network advancing community care, and did her graduate studies in intersectional feminist practices in the arts at Wesleyan University. Rachel is a mom of two and loves visiting her childhood home of Juneau, Alaska, each summer with her family.

Cayla has spent her career showing up for mothers in moments of crisis and transition. She began her nonprofit work in Iraq, supporting families after life-saving surgeries. After returning to the U.S., she launched a business that doubled as a platform for supporting migrant and refugee mothers in Tijuana, co-creating a ‘makerspace’ that helped hundreds of women build skills and community.

Motivated by the challenges faced by parents navigating displacement and new motherhood, Cayla co-founded 4th Trimester to ensure no one goes through the postpartum period alone. She lives in sunny San Diego with her husband and three kids, and when she isn’t exploring the world with her family, she can be found cooking, crafting, or doing yoga.

Tiffany brings nearly a decade of experience designing and managing community-based programs across LA and the Inland Empire. Her background in public health equips her to work at the intersection of education, healthcare, and social justice, driving systems change through both advocacy and direct service.

Whether designing a program, planning an event, writing a grant, or managing a partnership, Tiffany listens carefully to uncover and address unmet needs. She holds a Master’s in Public Health from Claremont Graduate University and a BA in Biochemistry from Pitzer College.

Karen brings stories to life visually and strategically. With over 15 years of experience leading creative teams, she has helped shape bold narratives for social impact organizations, non-profits, and Fortune 500 companies.

An immigrant from Colombia and mother of three, Karen understands the power of representation and telling stories authentically. She leads our creative direction with intention, using design as a tool for connection.

Isabel (Isa) is the force behind our Mamas at the Border program. Originally from Chiapas, she moved to Tijuana in 2002, and as a single mother of two, turned her own challenges into a deep commitment to serve others. She began by volunteering in her community, distributing food and building trust with local families.

Isa went on to support women and girls escaping human trafficking, becoming a mentor and trainer and master jewelry maker. She then helped lead a livelihood development project for migrants but her passion is for mothers and postpartum care. Isa shows up every day for families with humility and heart.