Hawthorn (The Wise Woman's Folk Herbal Series)

My favourite Hawthorn tree.... flowers in May, just like me.

Went walking today to collect the flowers for a heart nourishing tea and remarked to my partner how I love living where I am, but so many of my friends and clients are not here, are back in Cardiff. "Not lonely, but alone" is a phrase I have used before. How being far from my mother and family has often forced me to rely on Holy Mother and friends for comfort, something that has at times been very difficult, but needed and necessary.

I came back home and opened my "Herbiary" to see what Maia Toll had to say about Hawthorn. She talks of years gone by, fairies, Hawthorn as a portal to the Otherworld, but mainly our connection to the land we live on and to consider if where we live feels like home.

It never ceases to fascinate me how plants and trees will inspire the same thoughts and feelings in us, our connection undeniable. I was talking about how at home I felt here as I walked away with a pouch full of blossom.

This eclipse season and now Mercury retrograde are already deeply affecting myself and those around me. The longings of a child's heart are coming up - whether that is for attention, belonging, connection, safety. If you can, pour some water over Hawthorn flowers, and ask your heart what your inner child needs to feel nourished right now.

Hawthorn says "take heart and have courage, you are strong and beautiful like me"

Love Jenny xxx

On Placentas

I don't know how many placentas have passed through my kitchen, but it is a lot.

Some things never change. Being one of the first ones to meet the new father, what an honour - always pale and proud, hoping he has fulfilled his mission properly when it comes to the precious, irreplaceable placenta. So grateful to hand it over to me and know his part is done.

You never know what you're going to take out of the box. You never know what the energy will be like, but if you know the mama well, you will feel her. The huge ones like dinner plates, the dainty ones.

The ones with extra lobes or cord anomalies. The pearly white cords or the prematurely clamped ones curling like retro telephone cords.

The manual extractions that arrive in pieces and that cause spontaneous prayer to spring to my lips. The birth before arrival with the string still attached on the instruction of the 999 call handler.

Working with placentas you work with families in the most intimate way at such a vulnerable time. When you're the first to hear the birth story that didn't go to plan and hold space for that grief. When the mama comes to the door herself with her face glowing because she did it, she did it herself, and her triumph radiates out from her like sunshine.

I love the different women who chose encapsulation. They are impossible to put into a box but they share one thing in common - they believe they are important.

I love it when families come back a second time, a third time, who let me know of the new life they have created before they announce it to the world.

An honour. Thank you.

https://placentaremediesnetwork.org/specialist/jenny-wren/

“Fluff” and “Woo woo" is old-time misogyny

Never forget that "unscientific" and "old wives' tale" were used as a way to eradicate women healers and their ancient knowledge, a way for upper and middle class men to gatekeep healthcare for those with a certain level of education and wealth and for men of all classes to control and dominate women.

They burned women for knowing the healing plants and herbs, for their chants and prayers over birthing women. They tried to ban wise women from tending the sick with plant medicine. Then they co-opted the word 'midwife' to mean it's modern form, a highly skilled obstetric nurse. Then they decided that national insurance would only cover one type of medicine, creating a captive audience.

We are still finding out today how much wisdom really was in those "old wives' tales".

Calling something "fluff" or "woo woo" is a form of misogyny that goes back hundreds of years when they tried to discredit women healers even as the male doctors unknowingly transferred infection from corpses to birthing women. Why are birth workers participating in this denigration of spiritual, woman-centered practice?

I look at our healthcare system today and I see the damage that is still perpetuated against women in the name of "science". Where women's bodies and minds are collateral damage while they conduct their big baby trials and inductions for stillbirth reduction. When will it end? When we refuse to participate in their reality anymore.