"Trust upholds the field of birth and invites the help of our highest guidance."
Sacred Birthing Insight

Category: Blog

Video: What is Sacred Birthing?

Sacred Birthing is like… a sacred place in Nature: wonderful, still, quite, beautiful, pristine, nothing that’s hurt or violated.

Sacred Birth is not religious birth… it is unharmed, un-violated, pristine, the way it needs to be, it always was and has been; not bothered, not interferes with or interrupted; it flows in its own progression. It has everything to do with what mother needs.

Sacred Birthing is when mother can do exactly what she needs to do, when she have only people there who she lives and who love her…
…more on the video

I’ve put all the gifts that I received from the Source, during my soft birthing experiences next to mamas and babies, in my Sacred Birthing – Birthing a New Humanity book.

Wishing all the mamas and babies out there a soft, Sacred Birth! <3

Jeanine Parvati Baker, on Breastfeeding

Jeannine Parvati Baker was an amazing midwife, author and mom who first coined the terms “Lotus Birth” and “Free Birth” in the ‘80’s and 90’s. She is the author of Prenatal Yoga & Natural Birth; Conscious Conception: Elemental Journey Through The Labyrinth of Sexuality; & Hygeia, a Woman’s Herbal. She died in 2005.

Jeanine taught me about Lotus Birth. I called her in 1992 and said “tell me everything, for I have told parents about it, and they say it feels like right action for their baby”. She told me her experiences and I interviewed doctors who told me the medical truth: there was no medical reason to cut the cord. Jeanine changed my practice when I was just a brand new midwife.
Jeanine was interviewed by Michael Mendizza, who created Touch The Future and then became an amazing dad, with a sensitive blog about fathering. This website has a plethora of wonderful information on it: Expanding Human Potential by Supporting Those Who Care For Children, and so much more. Please check it out.

On Breastfeeding

Jeanine

Birth is the first sexual experience of a baby’s life. Being born in a technocratic environment with machines, the baby feels separated, removed from his or her source, from their mother. And that’s exacerbated by bottles. Anytime we put a bottle or a pacifier, which is a misnomer, it does not bring peace to the planet. I prefer to use the term “dummy”, because that’s what it does. The “dummy” literally dumbs that baby down because they’re not able to express what they are feeling. When you have a sexual relationship, love will bring out all of our feelings to be healed. When we do feel nurtured and loved, we are safe enough to be who we really are. For a lot of us, if that dummy’s in our mouth, we have been dumbed down and repressed emotionally. Those feelings come up for healing in a sexual relationship. Hence, many of us go unconscious. We do not want to approach this material inside. We’ve used and abused the gift that we have been given, our sexuality, with one another, to avoid authentic and intimate relationships.

Michael

We separate the baby from human contact, which means pleasure, and in its place we substitute things, bottles, cribs, plastic carriers and pacifiers. Removing pleasurable touch is sensory deprivation. Sensory deprivation means collapsed potential brain development. And this affects the social and sexual capacities when they unfold. Harlow’s work in the late 50’s demonstrated that monkeys separated from their mothers as babies were incapable of grooming one another, of touching one another. They had no sexual or social skills.

Jeanine:

This is one reason nursing my babies was so important. I focused on the relationship, and did not distract myself while breast feeding by doing other things. This is where a baby learns the give and take of sexuality, how the giving and receiving of pleasure is simultaneous, how pleasure co-arises. In nursing, the baby’s mouth, which is an erotic organ, is allowed to pleasure the mother. My heart melted and turned into milk. In that exchange, love and sex are one and the same. That’s what breast feeding imprints upon the baby.

Clarity from a Prenatal Consultation

Big sister meets the little one, minutes after birth.

 

Andrea connected with me for a consultation. She is a wonderful nurturing mom of four other children. She was expecting in about 3 weeks and did not feel ready. She had not made sense of one of her past births and wanted to be totally clear before stepping into this one.
She told me all about it, and we shared that deep, heart-felt space together. I witnessed and she heard herself differently as she spoke. I offered a perspective she couldn’t have had, and she incorporated that new information. I heard her sigh and breathe deeply. As she did, I could feel her as she set her internal compass, away from confusion and toward this upcoming birth.
All it took was knowing she needed to be clear, reaching out and being honest and vulnerable. All it took, was maybe 30 minutes of sharing, woman to woman. Mom shifted in that moment, and baby shifted to reflect mom’s new internal environment. Weeks later, birth happened magically, in the best way possible. Of course.

Kindness abounds,
Sunni

Birthing Stones

Wahiawa Birthing Stones are a sacred area on Oahu where the Hawaiian Royalty once held their births. Royal births were not private affairs but ones that were attended by the elders, healers, wise way-showers of all neighboring clans. It was a grand gathering. And it would go on for weeks, as the families gathered ahead of time to celebrate the coming arrival.

We think Birthing Stones were used as birthing chairs, but that was never the information I received. On Kauai, birth was auspicious when it took place between two bodies of flowing water. I was shown how a particular stone of the cluster was most important to those birthing mamas because they were strongly magnetic. To move closer to the rocks, created a dramatic downward pull to assist the contractions of labor.

Since there was great importance placed on the timing of the birth, with the most auspicious time being at the moment of the rising sun, the mother could move closer to the rock, or move farther away to ease contractions some, to bring the birth as close to sunrise as possible. (Imagine trying to hold back!) Would this baby be acknowledged by the sun?

Placenta Stories & Lotus Birth Tales: Aboriginal Wisdom

In Aboriginal wisdom, the placenta is always buried – given back to the Earth, to let Her know that a baby has been born and, by its blood, who this baby is. In the early years, all the mothers and grandmothers of the tribe guide the growing child. Then, when a child is an adolescent, the first blood or first seed is also given to the Earth, buried in a handkerchief. The child steps away from the guidance of the mothers, into the guidance of the Earth Mother, who now begins to oversee the child to become what his/her soul intended by incarnating. Life circumstances are created by the Earth to help this child become who s/he means to be.

Without burying the placenta, Earth Mother would not know a child had been born; She would not know to cherish the baby in the years after birth, and from adolescence, the child would flounder without Her guidance. How could a child ever become what her soul intended and grow to fulfill the need of the village and the universe without this guidance from Earth Mother? This is the importance of the placenta to the child’s whole life.

The Aboriginals see energy.  They paint with dots to express what is emanating from the world of nature, rather than to express its form. They see and know that the stars above and the Earth below work together to guide and guard each child. We of the white world have a rudimentary respect and understanding of astronomy, but their star-wisdom is embedded in them and they remember they come from the stars. They remember their purpose in coming to Earth was to hold 7th dimensional wisdom. They remember how to live together in society, honoring each one’s gifts and individuality;  how to heal; how to travel;  how to be self-sufficient so they don’t need to play the money game. We belittle them as being barbaric, yet they have abilities we have lost and need.

At all times they are in intimate communication with each other, the animal, plant and mineral kingdoms, the weather, the stars and the planets. They know how to access the answers they need and their requests are heard and fulfilled. Their dancing may look funny to us, but is purposeful:  it communicates with the Earth and nourishes Her with each rhythm. The dances result in altered states that maintain open-heartedness, their continual communion with All That Is.

Therefore, it only makes sense to look most deeply into Aboriginal wisdom when it comes to the placenta. Blood wisdom is inherent in the placenta. A mixture of mother-father blood went into the creation of baby and placenta, and now, when its job is complete, the blood carries this wealth of information into the Earth. What is really happening with the burying of body fluids? The DNA tells the Earth on what stage this child plays. Who is this child? What consciousness does she carry? How must she be celebrated in her village to be who she is to be?

Another cultural difference in our childrearing is that parents with discordant patterns from their own childhood are not responsible for raising this child. Mama Earth who has known this being through all time sees the bigger picture and offers each next opportunity to become all she is meant to be this lifetime. Parents give way to the lessons of The Mother, releasing their overlays from the child. Without the limiting matrix of the parents’ belief systems that a child typically takes on as her own identity, she is free to become what her soul intends.  In this way, successive generations grow healthier.

Placenta Stories & Lotus Birth Tales: Kauai’s Little Miracle

I had found a special tree to plant on my big naked lawn, a 12 foot Kauai Camphor tree that smelled wonderful, with beautiful bright shiny leaves and white bark, and who would someday grow to have a huge spreading crown, almost as big as a Banyan tree. Knowing I bought this tree, a mother asked me if her daughter’s placenta, frozen for over 4 years, could be buried under this tree, as they did not feel that it belonged at their rented home. So we planned to plant them both at the Monday afternoon meditation. When 23 people showed up instead of 6 or 8, it emphasized how very important this ancient ritual is.

The placenta belonged to a four year old, a fiery redhead who often threw angry tantrums and would cry for unknown reasons. Naps were nonexistent and sleep was constantly disturbed. She would strike out and nobody could figure out what she needed. Both parents were at their wits end, knowing how tormented she was and not knowing how to help.

The family had prepared baskets of different colored flower petals for their placenta celebration, pink, red and white from roses, and yellow and orange from marigolds. The hole was dug, the placenta laid down, the tree placed on top and the soil packed around it. One parent spoke about her birth and one about how happy they were to finally place the placenta in the Earth. The little redhead sprinkled petals decorating the base of the tree, and everyone else added more handfuls of color. As we backed away from the tree, a mighty energy let us know we had done something important. Something had been accomplished but we didn’t know what.

The next meditations brought reports that this little girl had started sleeping through the night:  before this, she had slept through the night only one time in over four years. Planting her placenta had somehow anchored her  enough to let her rest. And, in the next 9 months, what had created such anger, also eased and she seemed much more at peace.

I felt it was so appropriate for this little one’s placenta to be beneath a Camphor Tree:  Camphor is the substance used to burn away negativity in Pujas. This tree seemed to be her homeopathic similar – Like cures Like. And it worked.

Mother & Baby Soul Communions Through Hypnotherapy

Mother/Baby Soul Communions initially referred to working with mothers whose infants had physical, emotional or behavioral challenges but were too young to be worked with directly. Using the hypnotherapeutic model, I would help a mother go into a deep state of relaxation and expanded consciousness and through her, call in a connection with her infant’s spirit and inner wisdom.

Through the study of the life and work of a South African wise woman by the name of Sobonfu Some’, I received the first role model I had ever come across reflecting the work I was doing. She took me a step further by telling how in her village, a similar process to what I was doing was used consistently with every pregnant woman for accessing the spirit of her unborn baby. The purpose for this was to ask questions like, “who are you? why are you coming to us now? what is your life purpose? how can we support you in fulfilling that purpose?” and so on. Reading Some’s beautiful books, I realized the scope of this work was much bigger than I had realized.

The stories below reflect the wonder yet naturalness of this capacity we have to access the spirit of our children; whether born, in utero, or before conception; whether aborted or in other ways deceased and so on. I learned early on, that each experience in this work was individual and unique to every situation and that the essential key was to ask and receive permission from the spirit of the child we are endeavoring to make contact with.

My First Experience of Mother/Baby Communication

9 Month Old with Skin Rash

Early on in my years of teaching at the Oakland Center for Hypnotherapy Certification, I was teaching a class entitled, “Accessing the Inner Healer”. I lived in Berkeley at the time and had a next-door neighbor who had her one and only child at age 40. At nine months old, her son developed a rash all over his body. She came over one day and we discussed ideas about what might be causing the rash and how it might be alleviated. Her diet was very healthy so it seemed unlikely that the cause was her breast feeding. At a point in our conversation, I wondered if it would be possible to access the inner healer of a child by going through his mother. This was a new concept for me but I offered it to my friend. She is a subtle energy intuitive healer herself so she was open to checking it out.

We got together soon after this and began our session. I invited her to do her familiar foundational practices for doing deep inner work. She let me know she was having trouble grounding. I made mental note of that but continued to guide her into deeper levels of expanded consciousness. We called forth the spirit of her son. In her mind’s eye, she saw her son approaching looking very serious. He told her that we had to ask permission to do this work. I remember the profound feeling of humility and awe that came over me in that moment. We asked permission and after a serious pause, were told that we both needed to learn from this so permission was granted. In that instant, my friend went very deep within; making is quite clear what had inhibited her ability to ground earlier. When asked about the rash, her son told her it had nothing to do with diet or anything physically wrong but had to do with his grieving having left the spirit realm. He directed his mother to take him up in the Desolation Wilderness and lay him on a rock. Then she was to take him to the beach where the ocean meets the shore. Something in the context of these two energetic vortexes would help him to integrate into his body more efficiently.

My friend was not one to question what she had experienced or received from this communion with her son’s spirit. She followed the directives and when they were complete, the rash cleared up.

So began my own exploration into the potentials of Mother and Baby Soul Communions.

Overdue Mother with Previous Abortion Issues

A doula friend of mine called me in to work with a client of hers who was two weeks past due in birthing her baby. The woman was showing anxiety symptoms and my friend thought I might be able to help her.

I went to this woman’s house and we began to talk. She told me about the time a few years earlier when she was pregnant and living in, what she referred to as, a dangerous relationship. She knew she needed to run from the man she was with but she also knew that if she ran with his child, he would follow. So she decided to abort the baby. Now she was living within a healthy relationship and she very much wanted this baby. Yet, as her birthing time neared, her guilt came forward making her afraid that this baby would die at birth in punishment for what she had done in the past.

When I helped her to go deep within herself, we invited a connection with the baby soul she was currently carrying. When that connection was established, we learned from the baby that it was the very same soul that had been conceived before. The baby soul told the mother that S/he knew that the decision to abort in the past had been made in love and that now everything was perfect for the soul to come forth into form. The baby soul told the mother that it was excited to be with her and that all was well.

Tears of joy and relief were pouring down the mother’s face as this exchange was taking place. The force of her guilt and anxiety was the constriction in her body not allowing the labor to start. After the session, this mother’s labor came on within the next 24 hours; her baby born vital and beautiful.

Doula and Mother with  Stillborn Baby

A doula Friend of mine called one day to tell me a very emotionally charged story. One of her dearest friends, who this doula was supporting in a home birth, gave birth to a stillborn baby. My Friend told me about the labor. She said that everything went really well: the baby’s vitals up to the labor were strong and clear and remained that way into and through labor. Even the birth was normal except for the fact that the baby was still and never revived after birth.

My doula friend was distraught with anguished questions about what had happened. Did someone do something wrong? What could have prevented this? How could this have happened with everything up to the end showing such vital life? She felt deep grief with the mother being her dear friend and such guilt having been in the birth support position.

I didn’t know whether it would work to connect with the unborn baby soul through the doula rather than the mother but offered to support her in the attempt. Once my friend was taken within to a relaxed and expanded level of consciousness, we invited a connection with the still born baby soul. A connection was made and though little was said, what was needed came through. My friend was told that no one had done anything wrong and that this happenstance was purposefully designed and was between the mother and the baby soul. Apparently this incident, as it played out, was to affect some opening within the mother. The baby soul also said that it would be coming again to this mother.

This communion brought my doula friend much healing and relief.

Pregnant Mother Seeking Insights into Behavior of Older Son

This was such a fascinating study with many layers and connections. A woman came to me in the latter stages of her 2nd pregnancy in hopes of finding some keys to the discord she felt with her 3 year old son. She worried about having another child come into the tension that was in the home.

When I took her into deep consciousness, she made easy contact with the spirit of her 3 year old and was told that he needed art supplies around him. He needed paints and an easel and other supplies. This medium would help him express and develop himself for easily and harmoniously.

This mother decided to check in with her unborn child whom she knew to be another boy. She was told that this child would need a lot of nature around him and that this would be key for him to connect with and develop his life purpose.

Then a most unexpected thing occurred. This woman’s deceased mother-in-law walked into her consciousness. The mother-in-law came to tell this woman to inform her husband that it was time that his mother’s ashes be let go of. He was to take them out on his surf board and dispose of them out in the ocean. His mother also said that she would be carrying away something for her older grandson that he did not need to carry any longer. She finished by saying that her daughter-in-law and the two grandsons should be on the shore watching as her son paddled her ashes out to sea.

Turning a Breech Positioned Baby

A woman who had taken my HypnoBirthing Classes came to me in the latter stages of her pregnancy to see about the possibility of turning her baby who was in the breech position. As we conversed, I learned that she had never wanted to have children and that it was her husband’s desire that had moved her into this pregnancy. I also learned she had experienced some sexual trauma when she was younger. Hearing all this, I had a pretty good idea what was detouring baby from proper positioning.

I helped her relax into a deep, expanded state of consciousness and we invited the spirit of her baby to commune with us. When that connection was granted, I watched as this young mother’s eyes filled with tears. She learned that this baby was coming in to teach her about love and that he was very excited to be with her. When the heart opens, the tears of healing and love tend to flow and clear the way. This mother fully opened to the wonder and blessing of this soul coming to her.

We described to the baby about the proper position for an easier birth for baby and mother. I doubt whether that was a necessary step in the process but regardless, Baby turned into the proper vertex position within the following 36 hours.

Recommended Reading

  • Sobonfu Some’s   ~ The Spirit of Intimacy
  • Welcoming Spirit Home
  • Walter Makichen ~ Spirit Babies