The Glory of Postpartum Stillness
Section 1: Made For This
Chapter 1: Desire of the Ages
When Ian and I got ::engaged:: a new feeling swept over me beyond the obvious anticipation of marriage. Softly and sweetly, I wrestled with this thought: Wow. I could become a mother soon - very soon. Though happily unfamiliar with contraceptives and hormonal pharmaceuticals, even the natural fertility awareness method (F.A.M.) seemed, well, unnaturally occupied with intricate bodily fluctuations and rigorous tracking. Do I really need to chart these things? Why does this uncomfortably feel more like math than love?
For a couple weeks I wondered what would unfold for us. And then similar stories started swirling into view. There was an acquaintance who had adamantly insisted on waiting until the perfect window - only to fall pregnant right in the middle of the life project she wanted to complete first. Another couple who felt finally ready - only to experience repeated disappointment. Surgeries that didn’t work. Anecdote after anecdote of life arriving on its own accord, irrespective of much precise planning by parents to either delay or demand conception. It just felt too complicated and a bit too overwhelming a task to take on. Truly, are we entitled to our ideal timetables anyways? Are we the ones to pick and choose exactly how and when we receive a gift?
These contentions are millennia old. Pouring over ancient scripture, I read about the intimate yearnings of the biblical matriarchs. It was as if their wombs ached. As if they knew the solemnity and sacredness of their role as life-givers. Some seemed to attempt to usurp the hand of Yah. Sarah offered Hagar. Leah bartered mandrakes in the field at dusk to lie with Jacob.
Consider this pre-flood account:
For in those days the sons of men began to transgress against Elohiym, and to transgress the commandments which he had commanded to A'dam, to be fruitful and multiply in the earth. And some of the sons of men caused their women to drink a draught that would render them barren, in order that they might retain their figures and whereby their beautiful appearance might not fade. And when the sons of men caused some of their women to drink, Tsillah drank with them. And the child bearing women appeared abominable in the sight of their men as widows, while their men lived, for to the barren ones only they were attached. And in the end of days and years, when Tsillah became old, Yahuah opened her womb.
YASHAR (JASHER) 2:19-23 את CEPHER
When I first read this portion, it nearly gave me chills. Six thousand years ago, wickedness was perverting the Creator’s design. To the barren ones only were they attached. These couples were mixing drinks and devouring death to manipulate reproduction. Modern day draughts are no different. They whisper, “You can control fertility, evade aging, ignore the work to be fruitful and multiply.” Likewise, the man’s drive to co-create life is to be guarded as precious too - so much so that some were struck dead is disobedience..
And Yahudah took a woman for Er his firstborn, whose name was Tamar. And Er, Yahudah's firstborn, was wicked in the sight of Yahuah; and Yahuah slew him. And Yahudah said unto Onan, Go in unto your brother's woman, and marry her, and raise up seed to your brother. And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's woman, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother. And the thing which he did displeased Yahuah: wherefore he slew him also.
BERE'SHIYTH (GENESIS) 38:6-10 את CEPHER
Yet a longing persists as old as dust. Women still desire to be filled and fruitful. It comes not by force or careful calculation. Just sweet surrender. One error is to desperately declare, I MUST have a child at any cost. Another error is to decide, I must AVOID a child at all costs. There are inventions and products available that promise to fulfill either extreme leaning.
Looking back into ancient scripture, we find that:
- What comes from the womb is for a blessing.
- Wombs are opened and closed by the Creator.
Joesph receives these words from his father’s deathbed:
Even by the Elohiym of your father, who shall help you; and את by El Shaddai, who shall bless you with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lies under, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb..
BERE'SHIYTH (GENESIS) 49:25 את CEPHER
NOW there was a certain man of Ramathayim Tsophiym, of Mount Ephrayim, and his name was Elqanah, the son of Yerocham, the son of Eliyhu, the son of Tochu, the son of Tsuph, an Ephrathiy: And he had two women; the name of the one was Channah, and the name of the other Peninnah: and Peninnah had children, but Channah had no children. And this man went up out of his city yearly to worship and to sacrifice unto Yahuah Tseva'oth in Shiyloh. And the two sons of Eliy, Chophniy and Piynechac, the priests of Yahuah, were there. And when the time was that Elqanah offered, he gave to Peninnah his woman, and to all her sons and her daughters, portions: But unto Channah he gave a worthy portion; for he loved Channah: but Yahuah had shut up her womb. And her adversary also provoked her sore, for to make her fret, because Yahuah had shut up her womb. And as he did so year by year, when she went up to the house of Yahuah, so she provoked her; therefore she wept, and did not eat. Then said Elqanah her man to her, Channah, why do you weep? and why eat you not? and why is your heart grieved? am not I better to you than ten sons? So Channah rose up after they had eaten in Shiyloh, and after they had drunk. Now Eliy the priest sat upon a seat by a post of the Temple of Yahuah. And she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed unto Yahuah, and wept sore. And she vowed a vow, and said, O Yahuah Tseva'oth, if you will indeed look on the affliction of your handmaid, and remember me, and not forget your handmaid, but will give unto your handmaid a male child, then I will give him unto Yahuah all the days of his life, and there shall no razor come upon his head.
SHEMU'EL RI'SHON (1 SAMUEL) 1:1-11 את CEPHER
And Re'uven went in the days of wheat harvest, and found mandrakes in the field, and brought them unto his mother El-Le'ah. Then Rachel said to El-Le'ah, Give me, I pray you, of your son's mandrakes. And she said unto her, Is it a small matter that you have taken my man? and would you take away my son's mandrakes also? And Rachel said, Therefore he shall lie with you tonight for your son's mandrakes. And Ya’aqov came out of the field in the evening, and Le'ah went out to meet him, and said, You must come in unto me; for surely I have hired you with my son's mandrakes. And he lay with her that night. And Elohiym hearkened unto El-Le'ah, and she conceived, and bore Ya’aqov the fifth son. And Le'ah said, Elohiym has given me my hire, because I have given my maiden to my man: and she called his name Yisshakar. And Le'ah conceived again, and bore Ya'aqov the sixth son.
BERE'SHIYTH (GENESIS) 30:14-19 את CEPHER
From these accounts we see the caution of falling into obsession - elevating personal desire over divine timing. The other is disobedience that blocks or damages the body from accepting life, a refusal to relinquish control to prolong what is manageable and familiar. The only narrow path down the middle is passionate trust. The beginnings of glad submission. A sober but flush excitement that the body of a woman is a sacred vessel - not to be either hurried to bear OR halted and bare! What pleases the Father is union. The fruit is almost unavoidable.
I remember letting out a thankful sigh. Maybe I am meant to walk into this next stage with an utterly open heart. A come what may approach toward the Creator, who orchestrates good far beyond our measly preferences. Immediately a burden felt lifted as we dropped focus on planning and instead simply pursuing one another. Freedom. Whatever would come from our togetherness, we would welcome with awe.
Chapter 2: Exquisite Design
I have nine or ten months to let it all sink in. ::Pregnant:: I am growing a child. Another person altogether whom I have never met but our heartbeats echo intertwined.
The first weeks knowing were surreal and tentative. Should I shout or whisper? Who should know this astonishing secret? The reality of it felt delightful and delicate. I was hushed with the seeming weight of what had begun inside me. I am now a container of something immensely precious, yet unseen.
Different thoughts came. Should someone oversee this? Do I need to be checked on? Vaguely, I remember desiring a natural route. I think what I’m looking for is a midwife, I thought. So off I went sifting through online reviews. I came across a local clinic that staffed some, made an appointment, and entered a small white room smiling shyly with my husband. The nurse listened as I explained I had been experiencing some bleeding and was unsure what to do. Their answer was a six week ultrasound in which a plastic wand is inserted to inspect the embryo. I was expected to comply immediately by moving to a reclined chair in the middle of the floor, attached to a monitor. When we began to ask some simple questions, she grew agitated and visibly annoyed. At some point I remember a threatening finger pointed straight at Ian, with a shrill voice, “You could sue us if you don’t go through with this!” On nervous reactive instinct, I glanced for an exit, a closed door. Seeing we clearly wouldn’t be going along with the procedure she was so adamant about, she visited the obstetrician on duty across the hall. Upon returning, her manner was even more curt and matter of fact. “The patients we take on trust us. They don’t ask a lot of questions. They follow our advice. This is kinda like a conveyor belt you need to get on.”
Those were her actual words to the best of my stunned recollection. Followed by a clear conclusion that we were not the type they take on at their busy practice. We paid for the visit leaving confused and immediately relieved. What was that?! How did it escalate to her shouting at us? Whatever it was, it was at the very least, rushed and rude. Unsettlingly aggressive. Soon after we decided to interview a home birth midwife in our apartment. Will this be gentler? At the end she offered to use a doppler she had brought to search for and amplify an early heartbeat. But first she needed to get new batteries out of her trunk. That began to feel weird too. Something started to seem odd about so many machines being offered to look inside my body. There were many more we would decline in the coming months with increasing pushback..
I was pregnant. This we knew. What were we searching for exactly from these strangers? I think it was worldly reassurance. That we were progressing well toward parenthood according to their technology and training. A genuine smile and encouraging comment might have been perfect in those early states. But of course, those things are free. These practitioners had something to sell. and it wasn’t until much later, I realized exactly what and how they did it. For now, it just felt off and impersonal and unsettling. Looking back, we needed none of their devices to discern there was life forming inside of me. It was happening, day by day without official observation. Every second cells forming more and more complex. All in a hidden place. And that is exactly what scripture shows..
And Avram said to them, Do not bow down to me, but bow down to the Elohiym of the world who made you, and serve him, and go in his ways for it is he who delivered me from out of this fire, and it is he who created the souls and ruachoth of all men, and formed man in his mother's womb, and brought him forth into the world, and it is he who will deliver those who trust in him from all pain.
YASHAR (JASHER) 12:38 את CEPHER
For you have possessed my mind: you have covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise you; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are your works; and that my soul knows right well. My substance was not hid from you, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Your eyes did see my substance, yet being imperfect; and in your cepher all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them. How precious also are your thoughts unto me, O El! how great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with you.
TEHILLIYM (PSALMS) 139:13-18 את CEPHER
If I did despise the cause of my manservant or of my maidservant, when they contended with me; What then shall I do when El rises up? and when he visits, what shall I answer him? Did not he that made me in the womb make him? and did not one fashion us in the womb?
IYOV (JOB) 31:13-15 את CEPHER
Then the Word of Yahuah came unto me, saying, Before I formed you in the belly I knew you; and before you came forth out of the womb I sanctified you, and I ordained you a prophet unto the nations.
YIRMEYAHU (JEREMIAH) 1:4-5 את CEPHER
LISTEN, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; Yahuah has called me from the womb; from the belly of my mother has he made mention of my name. And he has made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand has he hid me, and made me a polished shaft; in his quiver has he hid me; And said unto me, You are my servant, O Yashar'el, in whom I will be glorified. Then I said, I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, and in vain: yet surely my judgment is with Yahuah, and my work with my Elohiym. And now, says Yahuah that formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Ya
aqov again to him, Though Yashar'el be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of Yahuah, and my Elohiym shall be my strength. And he said, It is a light thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Yaaqov, and to restore the preserved of Yashar'el: I will also give you for a light to the other nations, that you may be my yeshu`ah unto the end of the earth.YESHA'YAHU (ISAIAH) 49:1-6 את CEPHER
Scripture shows that life starts in a hidden place. The ancient Hebrew word for womb is BETAN, meaning literally, “the house that surrounds life” and RECHEM, meaning “the person in the inner chamber of water.” Both are enclosed, protected, out of plain sight. We as women must choose whether we will trust that Yahuah is forming the entity inside us and that we have everything in our being to sustain life as co-creators. Machines exist and offer information that meddles and attempts to usurp the work that is whirring within.
Eve (Hawa) fell because she wanted knowledge beyond what had already been given her, drawn by corrosive deception that she was missing out. Contentment and the willingness to wait and trust a process that the Creator of all initiated and oversees is far wiser that running to experts whose motives are - to say it mildly for now - not pure. You can question whether these modern offerings are more harmful that helpful during pregnancy:
- ultrasounds
- glucose monitoring
- rogham testing
- (+ 100’s of other to list here)
Trust.
In the first chapter, we read that Yah initiates the whirring glory of the womb. Above, we read that he oversees with perfect diligence what he began in warm darkness. It’s HIS good work. He upholds it all, orchestrating every infinitesimal mark and detail. Eyelashes and fingerprints form. The placenta protects. Blood swirls. Nutrients are allocated. The body silently building a new being as every second passes. Will we accept the miracle without interference? Will we let wonder and awe anchor instead of insisting on information? This is so out of your control - and I mean that in sweetest way possible! You are a powerful participant, a gorgeous container - but not the conductor.
The Messiah’s mother, when she was told that she had conceived replied, “May it be so.” She was not given charts, tables, timelines, explanations, blueprints, concoctions, tracking apps, or a precise play-by-play game plan. She was only given a promise. And she chose to believe it with quiet joy. I wonder if she tremored or felt faint.
So it’s begun. There is no backwards. There is no undoing. Relinquish. Rest. Praise. Ponder. Be open to accepting the unknown. Meditate on the miracle, but don’t dissect it. Life is swelling inside you. Yah is working in hidden places. Feel the sensations and physical changes as a part of the broader purpose of life coming through you. You are bearing fruit. And it is beautiful and right and true and oh so uncomfortable and exhaustinhgly exhilarating. Often a rush of questioning appears early, “What must I DO?! What must I prepare, plan, gather?” For now, know that these days are less about doing and more about dwelling. There will come a time to buy allll the onesies. Let the more subtle spiritual shift wash over you gently. Let the news sink softly into your soul and savor it. Return to the reality that you have been called to be a mother perhaps a thousand giddy times in one day. That you already are a mother. And your Maker is at work in you.
All the tests to peer into the womb and calculate and quantify are worthless.
Facts we know. 9-10 months. Phenomenally orchestrated shifts.
Some of the facts just to appreciate the gorgeous exquisite design of it all.
Run away from →
Run towards →
Definitions.. Informed consent
Chapter 3: Arrows
For you are a holy people unto Yahuah Elohayka: Yahuah Elohayka has chosen you to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth. Yahuah did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people: But because Yahuah loved you, and because he would guard the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, has Yahuah brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Phar'oh king of Mitsrayim. Know therefore that Yahuah Elohayka, he is Elohiym, the faithful El, which guards his covenant and mercy with them that love him and guard his commandments to a thousand generations; And repays them that hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him that hates him, he will repay him to his face. You shall therefore guard the commandments, and the statutes, and the judgments, which I command you this day, to do them. Wherefore it shall come to pass, if ye hearken את to these judgments, and guard, and do them, that Yahuah Elohayka shall guard unto you the covenant and the mercy which he swore unto your fathers: And he will love you, and bless you, and multiply you: he will also bless the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your land, your grain, and your wine, and your oil, the increase of your kine, and the flocks of your sheep, in the land which he swore unto your fathers to give you. You shall be blessed above all people: there shall not be male or female barren among you, or among your cattle. And Yahuah will take away from you all sickness, and will put none of the evil diseases of Mitsrayim, which you know, upon you; but will lay them upon all them that hate you. And you shall consume all the people which Yahuah Elohayka shall deliver you; your eye shall have no pity upon them: neither shall you serve their elohiym; for that will be a snare unto you.
DEVARIYM (DEUTERONOMY) 7:6-16 את CEPHER
AND in the forty second jubilee, in the first year of the seventh week, Avraham called Yishma'el, and his twelve sons, and Yitschaq and his two sons, and the six sons of Qeturah, and their sons. And he commanded them that they should observe the Way of Yahuah; that they should work righteousness, and love each his neighbor, and act on this manner amongst all men; that they should each so walk with regard to them as to do judgment and righteousness on the earth. That they should circumcise their sons, according to the covenant which he had made with them, and not deviate to the right hand or the left of all the paths which Yahuah had commanded us; and that we should guard ourselves from all fornication and uncleanness, and renounce from amongst us all fornication and uncleanness. And if any woman or maid commit fornication amongst you, burn her with fire and let them not commit fornication with her after their eyes and their heart; and let them not take to themselves women from the daughters of Kena
an; for the seed of Kenaan will be rooted out of the land. And he told them of the judgment of the Naphaliym, and the judgment of the sodomiym, how they had been judged on account of their wickedness, and had died on account of their fornication, and uncleanness, and mutual corruption through fornication. 'And guard yourselves from all fornication and uncleanness, and from all pollution of sin, lest ye make our name a curse, and your whole life a hissing, and all your sons to be destroyed by the sword, and ye become accursed like Cedom, and all your remnant as the sons of Amorah. I implore you, my sons, love the Elohiym of heaven and cleave ye to all his commandments. And walk not after their idols, and after their uncleannesses, and make not for yourselves molten or graven elohiym; For they are vanity, and there is no ruach in them; For they are work of men's hands, and all who trust in them, trust in nothing. Serve them not, nor worship them, but serve ye El Elyon, and worship him continually: And hope for his countenance always, and work uprightness and righteousness before him, that he may have pleasure in you and grant you his mercy, and send rain upon you morning and evening, and bless all your works which ye have wrought upon the earth, and bless your bread and your water, and bless the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your land, and the herds of your cattle, and the flocks of your sheep. And ye will be for a blessing on the earth, and all nations of the earth will desire you, and bless your sons in my name, that they may be blessed as I am.YOVHELIYM (JUBILEES) 20:1-10 את CEPHER
And their seed shall be known among the other nations, and their offspring among the people: all that see them shall acknowledge them, that they are the seed which Yahuah has blessed.
YESHA'YAHU (ISAIAH) 61:9 את CEPHER
For, behold, I create renewed heavens and a renewed earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind. But be ye glad and rejoice forever in that which I create: for, behold, I create Yerushalayim a rejoicing, and her people a joy. And I will rejoice in Yerushalayim, and joy in my people: and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her, nor the voice of crying. There shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an old man that has not filled his days: for the child shall die a hundred years old; but the sinner being a hundred years old shall be accursed. And they shall build houses, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them. They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and my elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain, nor bring forth for trouble; for they are the seed of the blessed of Yahuah, and their offspring with them. And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent's meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, says Yahuah.
YESHA'YAHU (ISAIAH) 65:17-25 את CEPHER
BUT the souls of the righteous are in the hand of Elohiym, and there shall no torment touch them. In the sight of the unwise they seemed to die: and their departure is taken for misery, And their going from us to be utter destruction: but they are in peace. For though they be punished in the sight of men, yet is their hope full of immortality. And having been a little chastised, they shall be greatly rewarded: for Elohiym proved them, and found them worthy for himself. As gold in the furnace has he tried them, and received them as an ascending smoke offering. And in the time of their visitation they shall shine, and run to and fro like sparks among the stubble. They shall judge the nations, and have dominion over the people, and their Yahuah shall reign forever. They that put their trust in him shall understand the Truth: and such as be faithful in love shall abide with him: for grace and mercy is to his qodeshiym, and he has care for his elect. But the wicked shall be punished according to their own imaginations, which have neglected the righteous, and forsaken Yahuah. For whoso despises wisdom and nurture, he is miserable, and their hope is vain, their labors unfruitful, and their works unprofitable: Their women are foolish, and their children wicked: Their offspring is cursed. Wherefore blessed is the barren that is undefiled, which has not known the sinful bed: she shall have fruit in the visitation of souls. And blessed is the eunuch, which with his hands has wrought no iniquity, nor imagined wicked things against Elohiym: for unto him shall be given the special gift of faith, and an inheritance in the Temple of Yahuah more acceptable to his mind. For glorious is the fruit of good labors: and the root of wisdom shall never fall away. As for the children of those who break wedlock, they shall not come to their perfection, and the seed of an unrighteous bed shall be rooted out. For though they live long, yet shall they be nothing regarded: and their last age shall be without honor. Or, if they die quickly, they have no hope, neither comfort in the day of trial. For horrible is the end of the unrighteous generation. CHOKMAH SHALOMAH (WISDOM OF SOLOMON) 3
CHOKMAH SHALOMAH (WISDOM OF SOLOMON) 3:13-18 את CEPHER
CHOKMAH SHALOMAH (WISDOM OF SOLOMON) 3:7-12 את CEPHER
CHOKMAH SHALOMAH (WISDOM OF SOLO
Yahuah is concerned with lineage. Seed lines. Generations.
Section 2: Birthing in Babylon
Chapter 4: The Womb as Warfare
Chapter 5: Enemy Interference
Chapter 6: As Freewomen
Section 3: The Way of Wisdom
Chapter 7: What to do with Fear
Chapter 8: The Intimacies of Birth
Chapter 9: Be Qodesh
Section 4: What to Gather
Chapter 10: Simple Supplies
Chapter 11: Creative Re-Villaging
Chapter 12: Healing Foods
goji
jujubes - build blood calm balance ph
longan - restorative sleep, fiber, loaded w vitamin a and c
Section 5: The Furnace
Chapter 13: A mended Vessel
Chapter 14: Rhythms and Wells
Chapter 15: Radiant Mothering
A 5+ yr. old interview - a possible introduction?
What was your pregnancy with River like? What were you thinking about?
I remember thinking about millennia of women who’ve given birth, in awe of how common it all seemed. If they’ve done it, I thought, I’ll survive too! But where am I in this supposed glorious lineage? I had never witnessed a birth. I knew didn’t want to be led by cultural hearsay or the fear-mongering cackles of strangers.
Most of my thought energies were just swirling around how the baby would come out. I loved the idea that I was only eating and resting, while invisible, impeccable mechanisms were knitting a being inside my belly without conscious effort on my part. This was another reassurance: if my body was designing a baby without any needed interference, then birth, however mysterious it seemed, would not be a sudden catastrophe, right? It’s not like a baby is beautifully formed and then the situation suddenly deteriorates or malfunctions into a crisis the moment the baby is ready to come out. Right? Anybody?
I remember you collecting stacks and stacks of books, learning and dreaming about the process of childbirth. What did you read? How did it shape your preparation for River’s arrival?
Many people warned me to stay away from advice or philosophies. But God made me a seeker and a sifter of theories. I didn’t gather lots of information around me wholly out of fear, more so out of fascination. I liked Joyous Childbirth Changes the World, Spiritual Midwifery, Birth without Fear, and the research of Michel Odent and James McKenna.
There was a lot of voracious delight and discovery. I heard that you don’t “do” birth but rather it does you, as something you submit to and partner in, with pain or not. I wondered, how exactly does one prepare to be out of control?! How do I think about the coming time when I’ll have to cast aside thinking in order to get through it?
I hoped birth would be transformative yet bearable. I imagined staggering elation at the end. Looking back, I listened to varied voices, which helped loosen my grip on expectations. I was excited about the unknown, tinged with some trepidation, and anchored in the love that brought all of it about in the first place. I had my husband’s hand, my other one resting nonchalantly over a womb whirring with life.
(In our prenatal group they had us take twelve scraps of paper and write down a “birth intention” on each one. Then one by one we were instructed to set the least desired ones aside until each of us were left with just three top priorities. After the exercise we discussed how we would cope and find a way to thrive if this is what actually happened.)
You and Ian were so joyful during your pregnancy. You also sustained that joy through difficulty.
O thank you. Yes, something else worth mentioning -- the very morning we found out we were pregnant, we had already planned a little get together at home with a dozen or so of our closest friends that same night. We decided to tell them, reasoning that these people we wanted to share this joy with would be the same ones who would walk through any loss if it was to be. Weeks passed and I started bleeding.
We Yelped a place so I could be checked and the only thing they could offer so early on was an internal ultrasound. I was uneasy. Just the day before, I had browsed through a book at a bookstore the that spoke to the unconfirmed safety of this technology. The “med-wife” nurse on staff sensed our hesitation and at one point thrust her finger aggressively at Ian and said “If she doesn’t do this procedure right now, you could sue us!” I immediately looked for the door, incredulous at the pressure and fear she was filling the tiny room with. She stepped out to talk to the OB of the practice, giving us “time to decide.“
Before we had a chance to politely decline, she came back and told us that we wouldn’t be a good fit for them, explaining that their patients “trust“ the doctor by not asking a lot of questions and doing what they’re told, when they’re told. She likened the process to a conveyer belt that we were about to get on. We said no thank you and were outta there right away.
How did you two deal with that kind of fear and morbidity, which are so common in conversations about pregnancy?
As we walked back out through the waiting room, I was still shaking in disbelief at the assumption that we would show instant obedience. In the sanctuary of our bedroom soon after, we quietly declared that we would not be run by fear in the coming months, but faith. That we wouldn’t consent to anything our spirits, intuition, or even hearts did not feel peaceful about as man and wife entrusted with this new gift. I still bled for weeks afterward, unsure if my body would sustain the pregnancy. We ended up opting out of a lot of procedures! Many eyebrows were raised. We said no to routine genetic testing (tests just so we would have the choice to abort? We just don’t need that information). We said no to antibiotics for back to back symptomless UTIs, using d-mannose instead. No to rhogam in utero or amniocentesis after finding out we had the rhesus factor. No to even the syrup to check for gestational diabetes. I took home a glucometer for a couple days and monitored myself. We were learning and trying to navigate the prenatal labyrinth according to how God was calling us to parent, fact-based but still intuitive. The baby grew. I whispered to Ian one day, “even if he or she is born perfectly we might still suffer a fatal crash right after.” I’m not exactly a morbid person, but I needed to choose grounded-ness in the Gospel rather than dwelling on threat of death or developmental disability, all very real possibilities. I was both fragile and ferocious. There’s no way to bypass suffering or emerge unmarked. It’s guaranteed in life. But Jesus has the final say. He can give and he can take away and he is always good. Claiming that peace was the sweetest preparation we did.
“There’s no way to bypass suffering or emerge unmarked. It’s guaranteed in life. But Jesus has the final say. He can give and he can take away and he is always good.”
What happened when you finally gave birth to River?
How do I share something so messy and glorious without tidying it up and sanitizing it with sentimental haze? Our baby girl was born in the summer heat at dawn. We had been calling her River for months already. My dad would grin over the phone and ask, “How’s little stream today?” I took long lazy walks around the lake often, getting out kinks in my back and marveling over the fact that my future granddaughter's (yes, please!) eggs were already formed in my daughter’s ovaries as she swam and swelled.
On the evening of her "due date" Ian accompanied me on that walk. Right past the weeds and sunflowers flirting along the canal, I felt that first contraction. River was born 34 hours later in Berkeley. Exhausted, elated, and trembling in my legs, we fought so hard. 10 hours active labor, 7lbs. 20 inches. Persistent posterior. Why have I not been able to write this story for years? Because I'm still healing from her arrival. The truth is I was hurt. Not just at the event of her arrival at that birthing center but for the months that ensued.
I remember visiting you and River a few weeks after your family settled in. When you shared your birth story, it was the first time you cried in front of me out of sadness, not joy.
I can’t talk about her arriving and sever off the trauma that swirled for months after. There are numbers and words that hint: Second degree labial tear and third degree perineal tear. Transferred to the hospital. I hated being held down by the man in the mask and scrubs in the freezing operating room as they inserted the needle into my spine. Like I had the energy to fight back. Before they started the sutures I told them I couldn’t feel anything but pressure waist down. Perfect, they said. I was gone for hours.
Ian wrapped River, only a handful of hours old, in his jacket. My sister contemplated offering to nurse her as her hunger for me grew in the waiting room. Slowly, sensation in my legs came back. Slowly we realized we didn’t want to spend our first night as a family in the hospital. We signed papers stating we were leaving against doctor’s orders. We collapsed into bed just before sunset.
At the time, the phrase you used to describe those days was “this is my Garden of Gethsemane.”
Did I really say that to you? The days after were a mess of blood milk and tears. Drops of all three splattered on the bathroom tiles. Begging Ian to not make me laugh. Laughter sent searing pain. Fear of sneezing and the toilet. Feeling alone, confused. My own mama, though she brought sumptuous flowers and sweet cheer, also poured vinegar on my wounds when she declared that the way I chose to give birth (naturally) was the exact reason I was injured so badly. She insisted on this narrative despite my hope for gentleness rather than fearful judgement in the guise of care. I know it was not her intent to compound my sadness. I remember in those fresh weeks an almost raw desperation of craving not validation per se, but encouraging mothering, pure emotional support, a celebrating of what I had endured and the new woman I was becoming. I wish she had been able to stay longer. At the time they were living in Northern Japan and after a week my dad and her flew back for his job on an American air base. It felt like we only spent a handful of hours together. To this day I miss her. Our few and far between visits always seem too brief and intense. I gave up my offense of that particular memory but the yearning for closeness, the casual daily mundane type of closeness that would allow for cooking and laughing and mending or thrifting together without agenda or ticking clock, remains.
I should have stayed in bed. I belonged in bed. A midwife at the birthing center suggested we “get my stitches checked out” and it resulted in me trembling in the ER waiting room clutching our newborn for half a day with no productive conclusion at all. They thought River might have had tongue tie and be in need of oral surgery just because at two weeks she wasn’t gaining an ounce PER day despite the fact that she had reached her birth weight overall.
If there was anyone near me bedside in those early days who knew even two cents about breastfeeding she would’ve quelled all doubts in second. Instead, out of isolation and ignorance there were more completely unnecessary hospital visits, car rides, and inspection by strangers. My baby and I were learning, struggling but progressing beautifully (according to an independent lactation consultant we eventually hired to come to our home). Those early charts, protocols, the utterly inane meddling in an otherwise normal process of postpartum was crushing. At perhaps my most vulnerable and pain filled time in life I was fielding despicable remarks from a sexist OB I had never met right after he very un-tenderly inspected me. Other practitioners gave us conflicting, contradictory advice. I think I was bombarded with cortisol when all I needed was to be souped up on oxytocin. The latter requires peace, trust, space, intimacy, warmth, love undisturbed.
The only reason I was still breastfeeding was because I was wildly defiant. I didn’t want the plastic contraptions near me, the monitoring, the man-made measuring. Even though the learning curve, excruciating at times, lessened week after week, month after month. I knew my body was designed to sustain life but the metamorphosis hushed me. I was forced to trust and wait.
How did you begin to heal?
There was beauty for sure. Steaming red date tea and fragrant ginger laced Chinese home cooked dishes prepared by my mother in law. My beautiful sister and brother-in-law who sacrificially drove through the night from Mammoth Lakes with her two babies to be there for the first two days. On River’s sixth day of life the summer swelled with so much swirling heat that Ian decided to move to our new place a month early. With last-minute help of some of his friends, he stealth moved our bed and a few essentials. I’ll never forget the feeling of stepping out of the car with her swaddled to no street-lamps, engulfed in darkness, piercing stars above, and the chirping of crickets. New house, new baby. Slowly the days started to be more punctuated with pleasure than pain. For some perfect reason sex, when we were ready, never hurt, but it wasn’t until seven months after giving birth that I could walk in the hills without searing pain. I could only nurse River laying down in those early months and that’s what we did. She grew, milk drunk asleep in our bed day after day. I grew too. I started to ask God big questions.Why was I broken for a reason so beautiful? What did I do wrong? How could I have prevented this? Is this the curse in Genesis, our lot as women to bear and wither? I chose to REFUSE that thought because although I felt confused and in the dark, God never stopped being good. The suffering always felt just a micron under what I thought was bearable.
I remember sobbing on the couch with Ian after the first month, an eerie catch-22 loop in my head, knowing that one day all the sharpness that took place would dull into maternal amnesia and I’d want another baby - but at the moment I couldn’t stand the thought of reliving the entanglement of mental and physical anguish I was in.
“One day all the sharpness that took place would dull into maternal amnesia and I’d want another baby - but at the moment I couldn’t stand the thought of reliving the entanglement of mental and physical anguish I was in.”
Where did you find solace?
Spiritually, a turning point happened when Ian prayed over me one evening. Something about my body being a temple of the Holy Spirit. I was reminded by him that I had not been abandoned. My husband was so good to me. We both believed I wasn’t supposed to feel broken. Even though I had more reasons than ever to be critical of my body, I had never felt so beautiful and fulfilled by it, all it was doing to sustain life. It was brimming with purpose.
Eventually time did soothe. I started to see clearly what was culture and what was Kingdom. What, in our society, made mothering maddening and needlessly tumultuous, compared to how God designed to have us healed and whole and learning in community. How beautifully oxytocin works and how it needs delicate settings to be maintained. Rest is derided here. So is recovery and interdependence. I learned that the strongest, wisest thing I could do is lay low. I learned that as with pushing a baby out, pushing anything forward before its time causes harm.
I looked at my maternal lineage, pieced together cellular memories, dissected dreams, and prayed for generational healing. I got soaring visions for my own children. I was bathed in the euphoric stillness, breastfeeding and tending to my girlie. I ceased striving. I waited for renewal. Just as the baby was cocooned and grown with care, so, I think, should the newborn mother be enveloped. Surrender became my strength.
You’ve become a source of compassion and wisdom to me, and to other mothers, since then.
I am convinced we are not meant to do this alone! There needs to be more stories. Not disparaging horror stories laughed about among strangers in the grocery aisle. At every stage, childbearing women crave raw, intricate, nuanced accounts of journeys shared in honoring solemnity. I’m curious about bringing back new initiation rites for mamas like me who were so tossed and disoriented. There’s a place for sound advice. But what’s sorely lacking is space and celebration and just mothers seeking fresh manna together. We need our mamas close. Our aunties. The acquaintance down the street. No help is perfect. No family relationships are intact and unstrained. But kind whispered words, wise perspective, empathy, shared tears, touch, a bit of beauty gifted, windows flung open to the sun - all that heals. We need more than meal trains. We should witness one another weak. Or harried, laughing/crying about how hard it is sometimes. In the Kingdom, all suffering has purpose.
How we can be sweet, sisterly containers for the trauma, bliss, fresh, incoherent wonder that is adding mother to our ultimate identity as daughters of the living God? I sense it might be a way I would like to minister one day. I could serve as a postpartum doula. Or lead a support circle. Teach or design content around village building or wise preparation for postpartum bliss. Maybe make nature-sourced products that restore and soothe the body. I’m excited about anything really that can bring us closer to the blessing God originally envisioned for birthing mamas and babies. Echo his intent and find his heart in it all.
Here are the questions I am still asking: what are the true, divinely placed, physiological needs a woman has in the postpartum period, and how can we use those needs as a blueprint to gather around her? How can families be more potent in the Kingdom as they are seen and celebrated and abundantly, lavishly supported? Bonding with baby, nutritional healing, and maternal mental wellness ripples out to affect so much in our communities. A nourished mother will scatter joy for generations.
What cultures have known for millennia past is that the tending to in this sacred window is critical for our capacity to thrive long-term. There’s a saying, “The first forty days for the next forty years.” Although we are in a fractured world and there is strife and struggle and complications and mourning, my hope is to see much more sweetness and clarity around how children are brought into the world and how families are formed -- not necessarily because I want to prevent the hardship that accompanies birth, as it was all woven for my refining, but because I believe the way families are made in the furnace and haze of newborn life matters more than we can imagine.
I have a fire in my heart for this work and I wonder where I’ll be led. I was undone and remade in giving birth to my wildly precious daughter River. Unflinching I can declare, I am more whole today than I was before.
