This Father's Day, Be the Advocate She Needs

Owlet Cares is our advocacy initiative that is dedicated to making a positive impact in the lives of babies and parents. One way we do this is by partnering with nonprofits all over the world who share our mission. 

In honor of Father’s Day, we are shining a light on 4Kira4Moms - a nonprofit dedicated to fighting for improved maternal outcomes through advocacy, education, and coalition building, founded in honor of Kira Johnson who died from complications after childbirth. 

Kira’s husband, Charles, began 4Kira4Moms in her memory and in his own words, here is their family’s story. 

Kira Johnson was failed. So I built a nationwide movement to end the maternal health crisis.

Before I tell you anything, I need you to know who my wife was—Kira Johnson. 

Kira was a whole world of her own, unlike anyone I've ever met. Her "résumé," let's call it, was unmatched. Five languages. A race car driver. Licensed pilot. Marathon runner. World traveler. She was the kind of woman who walked into a room and changed the temperature. Ask anybody who knew her and they'll tell you the same thing. There was just something about Kira, and she was certainly out of my league. She had a way of making every place she went feel like it was hers and every person she loved feel like the most important person in her life. 

We were building something so intentional that it felt great. After having our firstborn, we thought, "How cool would it be to have two boys back to back?"

So fast forward a bit; we were a few weeks out from welcoming our second little boy, Langston, into the family. Kira had a textbook pregnancy. She was healthy. She was glowing. She was ready. We were ready.

We had been intentional about choosing Cedars-Sinai for her birth, and seeking what we thought would be an exceptional birthing experience. We were fully prepared to leave that hospital as a family of four. Unfortunately, that was not the way our day went.

Kira lost her life after birthing our second son. Her death was ruled preventable by the California Medical Board.

April 12, 2016. Kira and I walked into Cedars-Sinai together for a scheduled C-section., the same way thousands of families do every single day. We were supposed to bring our son home and figure out how to be a family of four.

Twelve hours later, I was a family of three - navigating fatherhood with a newborn while explaining to my 18-month old that his mom wasn’t coming home with us. 

My wife bled to death in that hospital. While I begged for hours for someone to take it seriously.

The warning signs were there early… Blood in her catheter. Fluid showing on the ultrasound. Her body shaking in a way that should have set off every alarm in the building. The CT scan they promised never happened. By the time they finally took her back to surgery, three and a half liters of blood had filled her abdomen. There was no coming back from that.

I drove home from that hospital with Langston in the backseat , Charles V waiting on us at home, and I have never felt more lost in my life.

Kira died due to a lacerated uterus during her c-section. Something that, had they prioritized her, had they delivered the CT scan they promised us but denied us, my wife would still be here. So while Kira is no longer with us, her legacy lives inside of this mission every day. Kira’s death was rule preventable and her legacy lives inside of the 4Kira4Moms mission every day. 

What Grief Looks Like

People ask me what grief looks like. Most expect me to talk about the first week. The funeral. The shock. 

After 10 years, I can tell you: grief doesn’t stay in one place. It’s watching my boys grow up without a mom. It’s every milestone she misses. It’s everywhere. But after 10 years, I can tell you: grief doesn't stay in one place. It's watching my boys grow up without their mom. It's the hours that still haunt me, the ones where I begged for help and got told my wife wasn't a priority.

But I'll tell you something about my wife. If the roles had been reversed, if I had been the one in that bed, Kira would have gone full scorched earth. She would have been the fiercest advocate in the room for me. That woman did not know how to be quiet when somebody she loved was in trouble. She would have torn that hospital down to the studs to save me. She would not have softened her voice or waited her turn. 

So when the grief became unbearable and the questions wouldn't stop, I knew what I had to do. I had to be the advocate she would have been for me.

This pain and insufferable loss grew, and I became intentional. I founded 4Kira4Moms, a nationwide nonprofit working to eradicate the maternal mortality crisis in America.

Starting with the Black mothers who are being failed at the highest rates. Everything we do is built on three core values: advocate, educate, and legislate.

• Advocate. Through our Maternal Mortality Response Team, we show up for families within 24 hours of a loss or near loss because nobody should have to navigate that alone. Through our national village of fathers, mothers, doulas, midwives, and partner organizations, we surround mothers with the support system the system itself was supposed to provide.
• Educate. Through the implicit bias training we built from Kira's own medical records, we put the lessons of her death into the hands of the next generation of healthcare workers before they ever step into a delivery room. Through public storytelling, community summits, and partnerships like this one, we keep this crisis in front of the people who have the power to change it. Education is how we change the system from the inside.
• Legislate. Through the Kira Johnson Act, which would require implicit bias training and respectful maternity care compliance programs at every hospital in this country. Through the Black Maternal Health Momnibus, the 13-bill federal package that addresses every angle of this crisis. Through the expansion of 12-month postpartum Medicaid coverage from three states to forty-three in just a few years. Policy is what makes change permanent, and we will not stop until the law reflects what every mother deserves.

Every time I testify, every bill we push, every family we wrap our arms around, I'm doing what Kira would have done for me. Losing her demanded that I build something that could move the needle and change the narrative. 

Kira would have burned that hospital to the ground for me, so losing her demanded that I build something that could fix this broken system that took her. Losing her demanded that I Build something that could fix a broken system. 

I didn't wake up one morning and decide to become an advocate; I was placed in this role at the expense of my wife's life. There was no plan. There was no playbook. There was a hospital room, two boys who needed their dad, and a question I could not stop asking myself: if I don't say her name out loud moving forward, who will? 

The first steps were small and ugly. Phone calls to reporters. Questions nobody at that hospital wanted to answer. Telling Kira's story again and again, even when it cost me each time. And the more I told her story, the more I realized this: Kira's death was not a tragic outlier. It was a pattern. Black women in this country die from preventable pregnancy-related causes at three times the rate of white women, and most of those deaths could have been stopped. This crisis is solvable. That is the whole point.

The United States has the highest maternal mortality rate among high-income nations but it shouldn’t have to be this way.*

According to the CDC, more than 80% of maternal deaths are preventable, and Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related cause than White women.** This is a systemic issue at hand. That gap has existed for decades, and it remains the largest disparity in any conventional perinatal health measure.***

These numbers are why 4Kira4Moms refuses to slow down.

Every program we run is built around one goal: prevent another family from living through what we lived through. None of it brings Kira back. All of it makes sure she did not die for nothing.

For too long, maternal health has been treated like a "women's issue" tucked away in a corner of the internet that men don't have to look at. For too long, maternal health has been treated like a women’s issue. That is part of what led us here. 

Every person on this planet either is a mother or has one. There is no such thing as a man who doesn't have skin in this game.

So, to the dads reading this, I need to talk to you directly for a minute. I am a father myself, and I believe in the importance of paternal involvement in the perinatal space. Be in the room. Read your wife's birth plan with her. Learn her vitals. Know her doctor's name and her nurse's name, and don't be afraid to use them. If something feels wrong, trust her, and trust yourself.

It's important to understand that advocacy doesn't always look like a podium. Advocacy doesn’t always look like a podium. 

Sometimes it looks like a husband who refuses to leave the bedside until somebody comes back with an answer. Sometimes it looks like a man who learns what a postpartum hemorrhage is so he can recognize one in time. Maternal health is not a "women's issue" we get to tap out of. It is fatherhood. It is a partnership. It is our work too.

That is exactly why I extended the efforts of 4Kira4Moms and built 4Kira4Dads.

4Kira4Dads is the first-of-its-kind maternal health curriculum designed specifically for fathers because we believe that when dads are informed and engaged, mothers are safer. 

We have watched men walk into our Love4Dads Summits not even knowing what a hemorrhage is and walk out as the strongest advocates their families have ever had. That is what hope looks like. That is the village expanding.

We firmly believe that The village is how we will end the maternal mortality crisis we are facing.

4Kira4Moms exists to end preventable maternal deaths in America. Every bill we push, every father we train, and every family we walk through the worst week of their lives with is one step closer to that goal.

But this work is not done alone. It is built on a village of fathers, mothers, doulas, midwives, and people just like you who refuse to accept that this is just the way things are. We are inviting you in.

If you ask me what 4Kira4Moms gives me back, the answer is hope. It is the place where my grief becomes useful. It is my wife's name, still alive and moving through this world. It is two boys who will grow up knowing their mom mattered—that her death meant something for someone else's family. If you ask me what 4Kira4Moms gives me back, the answer is hope. It is the place where my grief becomes useful. It is two boys who will grow up knowing their mom mattered. 

If this story moved you, do something with it. Follow @4Kira4Moms on Instagram. Find us at 4Kira4Dads.com. Share Kira's name. Support the work. We are not going to end this fight with one bill, one organization, or one father. We will end it together, the way Kira would have wanted, with everybody at the table doing their part.

Kira's name is still doing work in this world. As long as I'm breathing, it always will.

Author Bio: 

Charles Johnson founded 4Kira4Moms after the preventable death of his wife, Kira Dixon Johnson, following the birth of their second child. What began as grief became a sustained fight for accountability, patient advocacy, and maternal health reform.

Charles speaks from lived experience. His advocacy is grounded in the reality that a family can do everything right and still lose a mother when systems fail to listen, respond, or escalate care in time.

Under Charles's leadership, 4Kira4Moms has pushed maternal health into rooms that do not always hear directly from affected families: hospitals, boardrooms, legislatures, community coalitions, and national media.

His leadership combines storytelling, policy pressure, coalition building, and a refusal to let maternal loss be written off as normal. That standard shapes the organization's work across education, advocacy, and legislation.

The quotes, stories, and experiences shared in this post are those of the individuals featured and do not necessarily reflect the views of Owlet. This content is intended for informational and educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of a qualified healthcare provider with any questions about pregnancy, postpartum health, or any medical condition. 

*Hoyert, D. L. (2026, March). Maternal mortality rates in the United States, 2024 (NCHS Health E-Stats, No. 113). National Center for Health Statistics. https://dx.doi.org/10.15620/cdc/174651

**Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2025, November 20). Working together to reduce Black maternal mortality. U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. https://www.cdc.gov/womens-health/features/maternal-mortality.html

***Howell, E. A. (2018). Reducing disparities in severe maternal morbidity and mortality. Clinical Obstetrics and Gynecology, 61(2), 387–399. https://doi.org/10.1097/GRF.0000000000000349