Autumn Stanford, PMHNP-BC, is a board certified Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurse Practitioner.

E D U C A T I O N

My training began at Wallace State Community College, where I earned my Associate Degree in Nursing (ADN) and was deeply honored to receive the Florence Nightingale Award for clinical excellence and compassion.

I went on to graduate summa cum laude from the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa with my Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN).

I then completed my Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, becoming a board-certified Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (PMHNP).

I was selected for the highly competitive Pediatric Nurse Residency at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt—receiving the Nurse Resident Spirit Award, a recognition that I feel so honored to have received.

My years spent at the bedside as a Level 4 Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) nurse at Monroe Carell and a postpartum Mother-Baby nurse at Centennial Women’s Hospital taught me a profound truth: the health of a mother and the health of her infant are inextricably bound. I have stood alongside families in their most vulnerable, life-altering transitions, managing critical medical complexity with unwavering tenderness.

Reclaiming the Root Cause

Conventional medicine is often designed to simply suppress or put a bandaid on symptoms. Because I believe mothers deserve better, I chose to expand my clinical toolkit through the lens of functional medicine and integrative psychiatry:

• Perinatal Mental Health Certification (PMH-C): Completed advanced, specialized training with Postpartum Support International, achieving the gold standard credential for clinical excellence in postpartum mood and anxiety disorders.

• Psychiatry Redefined Functional Psychiatry Fellowship: Completed an intensive, year-long post-graduate fellowship focusing on nutritional psychiatry, metabolic health, and root-cause biological testing for complex mental illness.

• The Institute for Functional Medicine (IFM): Trained under the leading global standard for functional medicine, allowing me to evaluate the deep environmental, hormonal, and gut-brain pathways shaping your emotional wellness.

Beyond the Credentials

You deserve a practitioner who has sat on both sides of the room—someone who intimately understands the fragile, beautiful reality of the postpartum window.

Before the degrees and fellowships, I was a mother privately navigating alone, my own battle with postpartum anxiety. Despite all my medical training, I learned firsthand how isolating and scary this can feel.

Fourth & Mother was born from what I deeply needed that first year.

I bring specialized training and maternal heart straight to your home.

I am here to ensure you are seen, safe, and truly held.