A lot of childbirth preparation talks about the mechanics of childbirth and fails to touch on the hugely transformative effect birth has on women. You don't have to be religious to have a spiritual experience - it is one that touches us emotionally and psychologically and stays with us for our lives.
We are moving from the daughter figure to the mother figure and this is bound to bring up some intense feelings, from our own perception of what a mother should be to how we were mothered ourselves. If we have had no good experience of being mothered we may be anxious and if may affect our feelings about being pregnant and giving birth. Added to how mothers are treated in society, especially by the medical model, who make it all about the baby's health and survival and tell the woman she should be grateful for whatever happens to get that baby out.
Many women feel a strong desire for a sacred and healing experience when giving birth whether they are aware of it or not. If they have no mother or a mother who cant meet their needs they may be looking for that "wise woman" figure to make them feel safe and support them through this enormous transition. The sacredness of birth is something that is rarely acknowledged by the medical profession and this need in women goes unmet, causing emotional wounds, women who feel a lack of something without even knowing what it is they have missed. This is because western medicine focuses on the body, not the mind and soul. In the medical model there is often no room for gentleness, awareness, ceremony, profundity. It is treating the physical body for a perceived illness. I remember being told by a midwife to "Not worry because they would give me a designer vagina" while suturing and feeling like it was incredible crude and jarring.
“To be initiated into a mystery psychologically is to have a mystical experience that changes you. You no longer are what you were before. You have undergone something that sets you apart from those who have not had the experience. Often an initiation involves an element of isolation, of facing fear or undergoing an ordeal. But perhaps just as often, the initiatory experience comes as a gift of grace, where mystery and profound beauty come together in a numinous moment of which we are a part….
…For me, pregnancy was an iniatory experience that changed my body, shifted my consciousness, taught me surrender, and was the beginning of the dawning awareness of the physical, psychological, and spiritual demands and gifts that would come through being a mother."
- Jean Shinoda Bolen
If you are able to do the journal and discussion prompts I would really encourage it as a way to connect to feelings you may be holding in your body around your experiences and whether they are useful or not useful, are they something you want to take with you into your new phase of life?
In birth you face the physical limits of your body and challenge and push yourself to limits you never dreamed of. You hold within you the ancient knowledge to be able to this from all the women who have gone before you. Mentally you are challenged to face your deepest insecurities and repressed feelings and overcome all this to bring your baby into the world. Birth is like wildfire rushing through your life and making it new. Birth is a great healer. As your baby is born you are reborn. Again and again.
When I say birth is an initiation I mean...
The woman must let her old self die in order to bring forth the new version of herself in the form of Mother. Even if she has done it before.
So much pain and trauma around childbirth comes from these initiations that were never properly supported, and I believe that in these cases some part of the self is still stuck in the "Death" part of Life/Death/Life, where nobody was there to hold sacred space. This is why subsequent births can be so healing, as we complete the cycle as it was intended.
Part of this surrender of birth means realising that she is at once in the body and yet not of the body, she is part of the universal life force, she is at once herself and every mother there ever was, she faces her own mortality, she lets go of any preconceived ideas about who or what she is and becomes simply her true essence.
In any spiritual experience you would be supported by a guide, somebody who had walked this path before you, and this is what my work is about.
Surround yourself with loving and experienced support. Plan for this initiation gently and with love. Take time to dream, to breathe and be, take time to be in nature, seek pleasure. Find the balance of preparation and surrender. And find your guide
"The physical phenomenon of pregnancy is almost miraculous in its essence, for woman multiplies herself into another being and becomes the channel for bringing another soul to life. For nine months she creates matter, shapes a body and brings substance within herself like an alchemist transforming essence into living matter." - Manuela Dunn Mascetti
“Activity: Discussion questions/journal prompts for women and couples:
- what was your relationship with other girls like growing up?
- did you feel connected to your mother? Were you able to talk to her about important things?
- what worries you about becoming a mother?
- what do you think are your strengths that will help you to be a mother?”
