Closing the bones, sacred touch for the body and soul

The air is thick with Oxycontin and the scent of warm massage oil. I feel the steady comforting pulse deep within the body of an open and trusting goddess as a her newborn sleeps serenely on her chest. I sink further into this sacred practice finding our perfect rhythm. I feel connected and guided by ancient hands. The room feels like our sanctuary, the blanket she lays on protected by an invisible force. I feel warm healing energy pouring from my whole being as I wrap and hold this amazing body, I silently bless the hips that have carried new life into this world as I sweep my hands around them in a practised loving movement. As I massage her stomach and hips she sighs, 'it feels like forever since I've been touched.'  As I tightly wrap her with the rebozo she lets out a deeper sigh and a solitary tear rolls down her face catching the candle light as it falls, I see the body completely surrender to the embrace.

I dim the lights further and tiptoe away to prepare a sacred bath of milk and honey, scatter rose petals into the water and in a beautiful path back to our sacred space. I kneel at her side and whisper that we are ready. This bath is a very healing moment, the perfect end to this closing ceremony as she did not get the water birth she had wished for. She climbs into the bath and I gently glide the baby towards her, rose petals clinging to the perfect pink body. Tears of joy are shed, a warm light radiates from her, I bathe in this most perfect moment with all of me and can't help but shed a few tears myself as the goddess whispers 'thank you, I feel like a queen, I'm a Mum.' She smiles and adds 'I'm really a mum'. Her baby who has been perfect and serene throughout starts to feed. Total perfection.

I leave the goddess and her baby to breastfeed and bathe together in their bliss. 

I drive home aching,blissful and feeling ever so slightly surreal! The feeling I am left with on arriving home is complete gratitude. My gratitude was of discovering another beautiful tradition and reclaiming it for our sisters. My gratitude is also for the blessing of amazing and profound experiences like this. I reflect on my training in the red lined yurt in Southese and remember knowing that I was meant for this, I look forward to sharing this sacred touch for as long as my hands will allow!
Thank you to Maddie and Sophie for the gift.

Nurturing the mother and myself

I have been talking a lot about self care recently. I had suffered for a while with hip pain and lower back problems ever since the birth of my now 12 and 9 year old boys, it’s especially painful if I have supported a long birth or not been keeping up with my daily yoga promise from last year, which is often if I am completely honest! I have historically ignored my own discomfort or pain and generally tend to just suffer through until whatever ails me goes away. Why do I do this and how many of us are guilty of this?! I had a moment of clarity when I was speaking to my own mother on the phone a while ago. At some point in the conversation she spoke of how she really would have liked some postnatal support. I was shocked as I had modeled my own postnatal experience on how I remember my Mum being growing up! I felt that my mother ‘just got on’ with it and coped so well and that I should too. I remember flat out refusing help from my mother in law who was desperate to look after me.  Wow! I thought, how far back does this go? I then at our next family gathering spoke to my Nan about birth and the postnatal period. My cousin was pregnant with twins and my Nan was passionately talking about how hard it is to have a baby and how ‘you really need support, you really need to be looked after’ This is a woman again who I saw as being a ‘just get on with it’ type of lady, I was surprised to hear this coming out of her mouth!

I tell new mothers to take care of themselves and allow others to take care of them. I treat women with Reiki, loving massages and nurturing postnatal food packages
(find out more at http://thebirthgem.com/doula-services-sussex) but when it comes to myself I ‘don’t want to make a fuss’ despite telling all women around me that ‘you can’t pour from an empty cup’. This year based on the conversation with my mother and many other inspiring conversations from women around me I decided enough is enough, time to practice what I preach and accept the loving I should have accepted 12 years ago. Better late than never I guess! I have made use of the wonderful community of women around me and have begun to feel comfortable with being touched and nurtured. I accepted the offer of acupuncture, I jumped at the chance for a local midwife to practice her reflexology on me, I have started a red tent to nurture my soul and connect with women around me on a deeper level and asked for closing the bones sacred massage swaps. The result of this letting go is that I feel better than I have done in years, I truly believe having a self-care plan will make me a better doula. I can rave about the benefits of self care and mothering the mother with a new understanding of what it really feels like to surrender in this way. I also, and this is a big one for me have now first hand seen the joy that nurturing someone and making them feel good brings to the caregiver. I love loving, I love mothering women and I now witness that love from both angles! So many years on and I can honestly from the depths of my heart say not just to others but to myself  a healthy baby is not all that matters. Mothers matter, we matter.