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Sophie Messager

Author: Sophie Messager

  • What’s in your doula bag, and does it really matter?

    What’s in your doula bag, and does it really matter?

    When I started working as a doula nearly 6 years ago, I spent much time researching what other doulas had in their bags.

    I loved looking at blogs and getting ideas from other more experienced doulas.

    I discovered and bought much stuff, from honey straws to massage tools.

    Interestingly, many more experienced doulas told me that my bag would get smaller as I got more experienced. I didn’t question that, they had been doulaing for longer than I had, so they must have been right.

    I started with a smallish tote type bag (pictured above).

    But this soon became too small, and the tote bag is now my antenatal appointment and postnatal doula bag.

    I also had a period of having a spare sports type bag in the car with change of clothes, and heavy stuff I could only use at homebirths, like microwaveable rice bags.

    I moved on to using a rucksack.

    The problem with the rucksack is that, whilst it was roomy, getting stuff from the bottom meant emptying the whole bag. This annoyed me.

    When my friend Maddie raved about her skip hop twin duo bag, I got myself one off eBay too and tried that for size.

    But I still needed something bigger, because I couldn’t close the skip hop bag once I had put all my stuff in it.

    Also, I like things to be organised in different compartments and being easily accessible and organised.

    So last year, when I bought myself a new gym back called a Workplay bag (aptly named “the goddess” bag!), I realised it would work very well as a doula bag. Workplay bags are expensive but I got mine second hand on eBay for about Ā£20.

    It’s great, there is plenty of room and it’s very organised and easy to find stuff. The only problem is that the bag is very heavy when full, and I cannot carry it on my back and still have my hands free for my client mid contraction when we walk from the car part to the hospital. I’m now toying with the idea of buying something on wheels, I’ve been ogling a midwife friend’s new Zuca bag…

    Interestingly because my bag has so much kit, I’ve shied away from sharing it online over the last couple of years, because so many doulas say they take almost nothing with them at a birth, that I felt that I was somewhat a lesser doula for having so much kit, that there was something wrong with me.

    So I’m super grateful for doula Staci Silvan to having stated that she likes to bring a lot of kit in her bag, and to Zara de Candole, for saying that she should embrace all the kinds of doulas, the ones who just bring themselves, and the ones who bring everything but the kitchen sink.

    It’s interesting how most of us can’t help but judge and compare ourselves to others, instead of seeing the beauty in the amazing variety of uniqueness each one of us brings.

    So I’ve decided to embrace the fact that I am a “hoarder” kind of doula, and not be ashamed of my enormous doula bag.

    I’m coming out as a big doula bag doula šŸ˜‰

    The thing is, I am also a fully paid up member of the “doulaing is about being not doing ” school.

    I know that the most important thing I bring to the table is me, and how I hold the space for the woman during her labour and birth (which is also why a large chunk of the contents of my bag are actually designed to keep me going rather than for my client)

    Most of the time I don’t take much stuff out of my bag at all. But I’m the kind of person who would hate not having something available if I knew it could help.

    I really want to emphasise the fact that, (especially as I’m a doula mentor and the last thing I want is my mentees to think that they need to have everything that in my bag-it’s not about me), I am not writing this post to encourage you to do it like me, or to say that my doula bag contains the perfect kit.

    But I often see posts from new doulas asking what people have in their bags, and I know how useful it was for me when I started, so I want to pay it forward, because I think it’s really helpful to have it in a link that’s easy to find rather than trawl through stuff on facebook.

    Just remember: This is my kit. It fits me. This isn’t necessarily the kit that is right for you.

    I would like to encourage you to look at my very large amount of kit, and and thing to yourself: do I need this shit? Do I want all this stuff in my bag?

    You may want to experiment and try it for size, and when you realise that you like something, then by all means keep it, but also feel free to dump it when you realise it’s not working for you.

    Heck less than a week ago I went to a birth with only my handbag-it was for an elective cesarean and I knew it was likely to be short and that I wouldn’t need my labour comfort bits and bobs.

    Let’s embrace variety and celebrate all doulas, the ones who go to births with just their handbag, and the ones who go to birth with a ginormous bag, and everybody else in between!

    The right doula bag is the one that is right for you!

    Here is my current birth bag. I know it’s big but I love it!

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Here are some other doulas who favour big bags

     

    Staci Sylvan who is another member of the big bag club, sporting her doula bag, which a Stanley tool bag

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Zara de Candole another fan of big doula bags

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    And for balance, here are some examples of doulas who preferĀ  small bags!

     

    Eva Bay and her basket (Cards, rebozo, notebook, diary, birth beadsĀ and water)

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Mars Lord and her tote bag

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Amber Strong and her handbag style doula bag (containsĀ snacks, lip balm, essential oils and homeopathic kit, straws and honey. For me – clean underwear, deodorant, mints, charger and purse)

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    And if you’d like to know what inside my huge bag here are some pics

    My antenatal/postnatal bag (pictured at the top of this blog) contains a small pelvis and baby, a beaded birth line and client notebook (for antenatals), a small knitted boob, baby and syringe, to explain hand expressing/positioning, some slippers (I hate getting cold feet), and most importantly, some good quality, dark chocolate (I once got caught up without chocolate at a postnatal job, mum was taking a nap, baby was asleep in the sling (I usually chuck a stretchy wrap in my bag too), I’d done what I needed to do and was having a cup of tea and there was NO chocolate-never again).

     

     

    The snack section. It’s all for me, so I can keep going when I am at a long birth and can’t get away. Hospitals are a very dehydrating environment so I have a Hydaway collapsible silicone water bottle. I’ve tried plastic water bottles in the water and didn’t like the taste they gave to water. It’s much more convenient than the horrible polystyrene cups from the hospital, and also helps in not creating more waste. I usually add some squash or some sports tablets in the water too, to encourage more drinking (has to be balanced against not needing to pee every 5 min though) I also have a Pokito silicone collapsible coffee cup, for pretty much the same reasons I highlighted re water. Good coffee is important to me (hospitals usually only have the most vile cheap brown powder instant coffee) and I love the coffee “teabags” from Taylors of Harrogate. I have some cereal bars, some nuts, and sweets and other high calorie, nutrient dense stuff.

    The “therapy” section of my bag. Helios homeopathy childbirth kit, rescue remedy pastilles, essential oils in a tiny little keyring pouch (I take lavender, clary sage, peppermint, frankincense, and Katseye blend 10 and 1) , sports tablets, earplugs and eye mask, washcloths, honey straws, various smelly sprays and roller balls and crystals and amulets (mostly for me), and a homemade poo-pourri (a small, essential oil based product to spray onto the toilet because you do a poo-so if your client goes in straight after you it doesn’t stink), and some disposable gloves just in case. The little pouch on the top left had toiletries for me, toothbrush and toothpaste etc.

     

     

     

    The birth pool kit: plastic mirror, thermometer, collapsible jug to pour warm water on the mother’s back, torch, and a wet bag.

     

     

     

     

    The comfort measures section: wheat bag, birth ball pump, portable air conditioning unit, fairy lights, massage balls (got mine really cheap in Tiger), small hot water bottle, portable essential oil diffuser.

     

     

     

     

    The spare clothes section: tshirt, knickers, socks, leggings, swimsuit (in case I need to go in the pool with mum)

     

     

     

     

     

    The comfort/rebozo section: 2 rebozos (you can buy some here), one blanket and one poncho (for when both me and mum or dad feels chilly in the middle of the night, I once lent both my poncho and blanket to cold midwives at a homebirth, and wrapped myself with my rebozo), one cooling towel for when mum feels too hot, a couple of inflatable neck travel pillows (handy for a labour nap for me or the partner, especially in hospital)

     

     

     

     

    A shewee. Sometimes the labouring mother loves to labour on the toilet. If you’re in a flat this might be a problem for the doula, hence this handy piece of kit (I have not had to use it yet)

     

     

     

     

    The book section-speaks for itself

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    And I also always take two more things with me at a birth: when I go on call, I bake and then freeze a groaning cake for my client, and I also freeze myself a sandwich made with something that won’t perish quickly at room temperature (like cured ham and cheese). I take these with me when I get the call (the sandwich is for me). Once the baby has been born I share the cake between the parents and the midwives.

    Update November 2018: I finally got a bag on wheels as my big gym bag was getting too heavy to carry comfortably. It’s a Santoro wheelable craft tote.

     

  • The value of a doula

    The value of a doula

    3 years ago I wrote my first blog post, in response to an article in the independent, accusing doulas of being money grabbing opportunists.

    Today I feel compelled to write another blog post, as this time a medical professional is saying that we charge “extortionate prices”.

    Dr Ahmed Rashid, an NHS doctor, wrote this piece in the British Journal of General Practise

    ” I first came across a doula as a junior doctor working in obstetrics and the idea has fascinated me since. In case you havenā€™t heard of them, they are trained or experienced lay women who provide social, emotional, and practical support during pregnancy and birth, but do not provide any clinical care. Although the practice has ancient origins, the modern doula movement began in the US in the 1970s and private doulas, hired by mothers (often for extortionate prices), have been popular in certain parts of the UK for some time. A recent Oxford study focused instead on volunteer doulas, trained by third-sector organisations. After interviewing 19 doulas and 16 mothers who had received their support, the authors concluded that they can play an important role in improving womenā€™s birth experiences by offering continuous, empowering, female-focused support that complements the role of midwives, particularly where the mothers are disadvantaged. Perhaps itā€™s not such a bad idea after all.”

    The part of this piece that triggered me, was the ” often for extortionate prices” comment.

    Nothing could be further from the truth.

    When I left a prestigious career in science to become a doula (you can read why I did that here), I also left behind a salary over 40K, regular and predictable working hours, and job security.

    I did this to follow a calling, something that pulled at my heart, the deep need to support women through birth and make a difference to their experience.

    I sure didn’t do it for the money!

    I started as a new mentored doula (Doula UK, the association of doulas inĀ  the UK, has a strict mentoring processĀ  in place, which means that new doulas called themselves mentored doulas, and usually charge lower fees to reflect this, until their mentor feels that they have acquired enough experience and Ā can become recognised doulas), charging Ā£250 for a birth.

    When I wrote my first blog post, after 2 years as a doula, I was still not earning enough to pay tax.

    Now, 5 years down the line, I only just paid my first tax bill. And this wasn’t because of my doula work, this was because of my other Ā hats, in particular the fact that I teach workshops. Most of us have “side jobs” to complement our income, because it is very difficult to make a decent living at a doula.

    5 years down the line, I am still quite far from earning what I earned as a scientist.

    Doulas charge as little as Ā£300 to as much as Ā£3000 for a birth. On average, most of the recognised doulas I know charge between Ā£600 and Ā£1000 for a birth.

    My birth fee now starts at Ā£950.

    What does this include?

    This includes several antenatal meetings (those tend to be at least a couple of hours each), and unlimited support on the phone/email, accompanying clients to medical appointments etc. Whilst I offer a system with a set number of appointments, I find that I cannot restrict my support when a woman needs it. For example, I have been supporting a woman pregnant with twins , there have been many complications to her pregnancy, and I have attended well over 10 appointments with her. I am also in contact with her several times a week. It takes a lot of headspace, and I am more than happy to do it, but, with this in mind, it is easy to understand why I feel so rattled by the accusation of money grabbing.

    At 38 weeks, I go “on-call” until the baby is born. This can be a week, 2 weeks, or up to a month or more. The majority of my clients are first time mothers, and on average they tend to birth beyond 40 weeks (last year, one of my clients birthed at 43 weeks so I was on call for 5 weeks).

    During this time, I need to be able to leave everything and go to my client at very short notice when she goes into labour, at any hour of the day or night. I (like most of the doulas I know) have young children so this means complex, multilayered backup childcare arrangements, sometimes including at night (which cost money).

    Whilst on call, my phone is always with me (I even bring my phone to the side of the pool whilst going for a morning swim so I can check half ways through that she hasn’t called). I cannot go anywhere more than an hour away from home. I do not drink alcohol, and I always tell everybody I have made plans with that I’ll come “unless I’m at a birth”.

    This also means that there is a lot of pressure on my family and social life, as births have to take precedent over almost everything. This means always knowing that I may not make important family events, like birthdays or other celebrations (yes even your kids). My husband and I rarely go out and I have had to cancel a rare evening out more than once as I was called to a birth. Being on call makes us lose “brownie points” with our friends and family – who as much as they try and understand it, still find it stressful. I remember once during a difficult on call period (my client was a repeat client and her first birth had been very traumatic, and I was very invested emotionally in making sure this didn’t happen again), my parents were visiting and my mum said “you’re not there”-meaning I was physically present, but mentally, I was with my client.

    The on call period, up to 30 days, 24h a day. This can mean a total of 720h or more.

    When on call we also tell all our other clients, including the ones who have hired us for postnatal support, that we may need to cancel at short notice. Of course, when we get called to a birth, it also means that we lose out on the money we would have earned for supporting other people that day.

    Then there is the birth. Many of my clients are first time mothers, and it’s quite normal for a first birth to take anything between 24h and 48h. One year, all the births I attended were between 30 and 40h long (that’s the length of time I was with my client). The shortest birth I have ever attended was about 3h long, but I was there for 6h because I always want to make sure the mother is settled and her baby feeding well etc before I leave. The longest was 4 days (a long induction).

    Then after the birth I make a postnatal visit (again at least a couple of hours), and I am available for 6 weeks for unlimited email and phone support. New mothers contact me for support, for example when feeding isn’t going well, and I do everything I can to help them. I put no limits on the hours I spent doing this. This means many unseen hours talking to them, sending them links, and signposting them to other professionals. For example, last year when my nephew’s daughter was born, and they had problem with breastfeeding, I couldn’t support them myself because they lived too far, I spent a couple of hours late at night, when I should have been in bed. contacting my network of doulas, until I found a breastfeeding counsellor who was able to visit them the next day. We doulas constantly pull incredible feats like this because we’re all very passionate in supporting women.

    Many of us have discussed this in the past, and found that when we break down the hours spent on average with our clients, it usually works out at less than the minimum wage per hour.

    To top this, up, I personally only take 6 to 7 birth clients a year. This is because being on call in an intense, emotionally demanding time, and I have suffered burn out in the past and learnt that I need to keep the Christmas, Easter half Term and the last 2 weeks of August free for relaxing time with my family in an absolute requirement.

    Because I make a strong commitment to my client to be available for her, I also almost never take clients with overlapping on call times. This means turning clients down, or working as a shared-care team with another doula, splitting the fee in half. Most of the doulas I know do the same. So if you imagine taking on a maximum of 12 clients a year, even at my fee of Ā£950, this only makes an annual income of Ā£11400 before tax (and doesn’t take account of all the other expenses associated with this job, like travel, hospital parking fees, etc).

    Even the rare, top of the range doulas, who charge Ā£2 to Ā£3K, assuming they took on a birth client every month, would be looking at earning between 24 and 36 000 a year. Hardly a six figure salary.

    And let’s not forget that Doula UK has an access fund, which allows women in personal or financial hardship to access the services of a doula for free. The doula, in this situation, only gets paid expenses. I have done this myself, and so have most of my colleagues.

    I love my job, I love supporting women, I love making a difference, seeing the transformation that true, unconditional support does, especially when women have had a traumatic first birth, and end up with a positive, empowering one with doula support.

    I wouldn’t go back to my previous job for anything in the world.

    The value of a doula, how transformative and life changing it can be for many women, goes well beyond how much we charge, and most of our clients, after they’ve been doulaed, feel that our support was worth a lot more than what they paid for. Ā You can read some of the testimonials my clients have written about I supported them at the bottom of this page.

    But please, do not ever imply that this is an easy, money grabbing job.

  • The mother blessing -a mother centered alternative to the baby shower

    The mother blessing -a mother centered alternative to the baby shower

     

    Recently I had the privilege to organise a mother blessings for one of our local doulas who was pregnant.

    A mother blessing is an alternative to the “baby shower” were friends of the pregnant mother gather to give her presents.

    The big difference is that in the baby shower, all the presents are for the baby.

    In the mother blessing, it is the mother who is the center of attention, and the gifts are for her, not for her baby.

    It feels very important to me to facilitate such gatherings, because our culture focuses on the mother only has a vessel for the baby, and usually once the baby has been born, nobody focuses on the mother anymore.

    Therefore with the mother blessing we can help start a cultural shift towards a more mother centered culture.

     

    I have written before about what new mothers really need, and how much of a raw deal we get, once our baby has been born, our partner has returned to work, and we’re alone at home all day, trying to make sense of this new experience, whilst trying to understand the needs of this new life helpless being we have given birth to, whose needs come before ours, always. We’re not meant to be doing this without a support network.

    Organising a mother blessing does not have to be complicated. It can be simple yet beautiful and powerful.

    This is what we did for our doula sister:

    We sat in a circle with her.

    We sang to her

    We gave her a bead each to have during her birth and the postnatal period, and we said good wishes as we gave her our bead.

    We threaded the beads into a necklace, to remind her of her circle of sisters being there with her in spirit, holding her, through the birth of her baby and the early postpartum weeks.

     

     

    We boundĀ our wrists, in a circle, with some wool, then cut the thread, tied the individual bits around our wrists, and all agreed to keep our little wool bracelet until her baby was born.

     

    We readĀ poems about motherhood.

     

     

     

     

    We massaged her hands and feet with gorgeous scented oils.

    We gave her a candle and all took away little tealights to light when we would hear the news that her baby was soon to be born.

    We gave her a goody bag of nurturing gifts.

    And of course we shared some yummy food.

     

     

    It was simple, yet magical and powerful. It was, like birth, an everyday extraordinary event.

    She knew this was meaningful, and it was touching and special for her and all those involved.

    We reminded her she could call upon us after the birth of her baby for support and companionship, and we also offered to gather around her to give her a closing the bones ceremony after the birth of her baby.

    This is what Ceci wrote about her mother blessing

     

    ” Today my doula friends gave me a “mother blessing”, which is a day to share before the baby is born, like a baby shower but more focused on Ā mum, with food toĀ share, poems, songs, made me a necklace with beads and a wish of each one.Ā  They gave me a candle and they also got one each also for when I start labour. We also sat in cicrle, each one told me a few words and we were passing a thread that we all tied up on the wrist and that we will have until my daughter is born. They gave me massages and we laughed a lot! I am super grateful to have them and to have had this day for me”

     

     

    I would like to see the tradition of mother blessings to replace that of baby showers, I sincerely hope that it will help place mothers back were they should never have left, at the centre of the circle of support, with the reverence they deserve for bringing new life into the world.

     

     

  • Reflections on what I did in 2017

    Reflections on what I did in 2017

    In my last blog, I suggested you spent some time reflecting on what you achieved in 2017.

    Inspired by my favourite doula, Maddie Mc Mahon, review of the year (you can read hers here), I decided to blog about reviewing my year too.

    As you will see, one should really do what they preach because I had a very interesting experience doing this.

    I have many hats so I’ll break it down in sections: my doula year, my teacher/facilitator year, my personal development and self care.

    My doula year.

    This year I supported 8 families through birth and 4 through the postnatal period.

    As usual in the doula world, it was a rollercoaster of variations and unexpected twist and turns. There was a woman who had had a very traumatic first birth, and who ended up with such a speedy birth this time that I only made it 30 min after the birth. The birth was a beautiful healing experience for her.

    Then another woman went beyond 42 weeks of pregnancy and decided to have an elective caesarean, instead of the homebirth she had planned, because she said that with the lack of support and “risk” pressure from the hospital she didn’t feel she could go into labour naturally. This is one of my pet hates, the arbitrary induction for “postdates” and the pressure women are under when they reach 42 weeks of pregnancy. As a mother who birthed my first baby 16 days past 40 weeks, I feel very strongly about it. I have written about it before here , and in the light of new scientific evidence about the supposed “failing” of the placenta post term, I shall be writing about this topic again in 2018.

    I provided backup support for a doula supporting a refugee mother, who didn’t speak any English. This was a new experience for me, somewhat reminiscing of my visit to a refugee camp in the North of France a few months before. Gone was the softly-softly, gentle approach I normally favour. here is no room for that, when all you’ve got is to communicate is an translating app that mostly spouts gobbledegook, and pictorial birth plans. Yet I know we made a massive difference to this mother, providing her with the information that allowed her to birth her twin babies vaginally with no interventions, and also with much needed donated baby equipment, and contacts with other local mothers who spoke her language. It felt really good to do this.

    I found myself supporting a repeat client through a miscarriage, which whilst different from a full term birth, needed the same kind, and even more gentle and loving support, than for a full time birth. I accompanied her to hospital appointments, and provided much needed emotional support in a system that only went through the motions and never acknowledged her loss. As someone who experienced recurrent miscarriages myself, this is another area that I feel very strongly passionate about supporting. After the miscarriage had happened, I went to close her bones, and it felt really good to be able to offer her something that acknowledged and honoured her loss. I wrote a blog about how closing the bones can help with loss shortly after that.

    I supported a first time mother through a long labour which ended with an instrumental birth in theatre. As in many occasions before, the couple requested my presence in theatre. In this particular case both the midwife and the obstetrician thought this was a good idea, but the anaesthetist said no. This had happened to me before, and had always felt so wrong, because when a couple ends up with a theatre birth and it wasn’t what they wished for, they are often very distraught, and for their doula to not be allowed to carry on supporting them through this difficult moment is very upsetting for them (and for the doula). I had tried to raise this with our local head of midwifery in the past, without success. This particular birth spurred me to finally try to do something about it again. A few months later I met with the head of my local delivery unit to discuss it. The meeting was very positive, and he promised to discuss it with the consultant anaesthetist. I was hopeful. Sadly, the consultant anaesthetist said no. I have been present in theatre in this very hospital with a couple myself in the past, and I know other doulas who have, so I know it can be done. I wrote to the consultant anaesthetist asking for a meeting, but didn’t get a reply. In, 2018, along with Doula UK, I will take part in a campaign to try and make this change happen.

    Doulas often say that births come like buses, and this year I had my most unexpected experience yet, as I attended 2 births within 12h of each other. The odds of this happened were very small indeed. I am grateful to my doula buddies Ceci and Maddie, with whom we provided an awesome shared care doula team for the second birth, and I was safe in the knowledge that this client would be in good hands should I not be able to attend. As it turned out, both births were swift and straightforward, so I was able to attend both. It left me so high on oxytocin, that I only managed 4h sleep the following night before waking up for the day, and had the most amazing glow going for a few days. There is never a dull moment in doula life.

    This was a year of firsts for me, as I also started supporting a repeat client through a twin pregnancy (she hasn’t had her babies yet), this is a foray in a new territory for me, with a lot of heavy handed medical approach and many appointments. There have been quite a few scares during this pregnancy, and I am grateful for the fact that I am supporting this client together with my doula colleague Ellie. Having another doula to share support, especially when faced with a complex situation makes the work lighter and easier, and means that there is always someone at the end of the phone who “gets” it, someone to share ideas and concerns with. I’ve also been able to reach out to the wider doula community to access knowledge. It makes a world of difference. Doulas need the support of other doulas too.

    The last “first” of the year was supporting my first home VBAC. The birth itself was straightforward and the mother coped beautifully and got the birth she wanted.I hadn’t anticipated how anxious the midwifes attending her birth would be, and how keen they would be to try and transfer her to the hospital. Reflection is a very important skill for a birthworker, and it took me a few hours after the birth to understand what had felt so odd and uneasy about the atmosphere during the birth: the midwives were outside of their comfort zone, and it is amazing that the mother managed to labour so well within such a distrusting atmosphere. I feel that I was the only one there (apart from the mother and her partner) who trusted the process. Never in my 5 years as a doula have had ever had to do so much space holding and protecting, and been so utterly convinced that if I hadn’t been there, the outcome would have been completely different. Whilst on paper, the birth was straightforward, the protecting and managing the space left me completely wrung out, so much self care was needed afterwards.

    Early in the year, I became a doula UK mentor. I loved every minute of my own mentored doula journey and wanted to be able to give this back to the doula community. This year I had the honour to support 7 mentored doulas. I had expected to enjoy supporting them, but not how much more depth of knowledge of my own doulaing it would give me, and how much I would learn from my mentees. It has brought me much joy, and I have loved this new experience of reflection and self-development.

    I wrote 24 blog posts on topics ranging from birth to motherhood and I hope what I wrote helped women and birthworkers feeling empowered in making informed decisions. I also wrote blogs for other people and 2 articles for The Doula magazine.

    My teaching/workshop facilitator year.

    In 2017 I got to do a lot of something I love, facilitating workshops for birthworkers. I facilitated 34 workshops in total (Closing the bones, rebozo, babywearing peer supporter (one was with the local hospital NICU staff and one with my local nursery), and reiki workshops). I trained around 230 people. I travelled up and down the country (from Cambridge, to Peterborough, Bristol, Manchester , Sheffield, Liverpool, Brighton, Canterbury, and London (several times)). I meet some awesome people, and shared some incredible moments of connection. I also braved my ultimate nemesis which was driving through central London. I feel blessed to be able to do this.

    I also delivered a couple of conference presentations about using rebozos at a babywearing conference.

    I did several one to one babywearing consultations through the year, either as part of my doulaing or for a single one to one consult. It’s always a joy to witness the expression of joy on a new mother’s face when she realises she can meet her baby’s need for closeness effortlessly and get her hands back. I was particularly touched by a mother whose baby had a flat head, I suggested she visits my osteopath and I got a delighted thank you email later when the baby’s skull roundness had been fully restored.

    2017 also saw me develop the beta version of my online rebozo course to a group of early adopters. I thought I’d get about 10/15 people but 115 signed up, and I was totally blown away by the response I got (and to be honest, a little overwhelmed!). I will launch the live version of the course in the first quarter of 2018.

    I celebrated having trained 300 people in offering the closing the bones massage, and also launched a website dedicated to closing the bones, to spread the word further and help people find practitioners. https://www.closingthebonesmassage.com/. I hope this will help play a role in changing our culture’s attitude towards supporting women during the postpartum.

    I developed and launched the second level of the closing the bones workshop, called Deeper into closing the bones. I also started developing the massage table version of the technique, which I will launch sometimes in 2018.

    I also started an online rebozo shop at the end of 2017, something I’d sworn I would never do, as I’m more about services than products, but I had reached the stage where, having started selling rebozos at my live workshops only, there were enough people who knew I had them, and therefore I receive requests for them on a weekly basis, which was a time consuming process. My shop is a work of love, as I went to great length talking to suppliers to make sure the process is ethical. Have a look, there are some lovely stories (including videos) about the suppliers in there.

    My healer year

    Healing, with Closing the bones and/or Reiki is something I love to do, and this year there was plenty of this in my life too. I heard many harrowing stories and it felt good to be able to listen deeply and offer this powerful ritual to honour them. I got to treat a range of people, closing the bones in particular to women having experienced trauma or loss. I loved doing the massage 4 times on a new postpartum mum within 2 weeks of the birth. I taught closing the bones to a male doula (who had a fantastic healing experience from it). I usually incorporate Reiki into my closing the bones treatments, and I treated several people with alone Reiki too, and got to experiment with my new skills using the drum to channel Reiki.

    My personal development year

    Earlier in the year I set out that I’d like to attend a minimum of one day of personal self development/learning new skills per month. It’s interesting because until I wrote this post I didn’t think I had quite achieved that, but in reality I attended well over 15 days of training in 2017, which means that I beat my goal (I had no idea I had until I started writing this post!)

    I attended Sara Wickham’s post term pregnancy course, Gena Kirby’s cultured doula programme, an advanced spinning babies workshop with Gail Tully, Diane Garland’s waterbirth workshop, a Birthlight course on healing Diastasis Recti (which to my delight, included a lot of work using a rebozo), and a 2 day workshop on Closing the Bones with Rocio Alarcon. I also went to the doula UK conference, to a babywearing CPD on inclusivity, and to the annual doula retreat, were I made the most powerful and magical drum. I have using this drum for healing since, and even more so after training in the Reiki drum technique in September.

    My self care year

    I kept to my promise to myself of having a body work treatment after every birth, often within days of the birth, mostly with my osteopath and friend Teddy Brookes. I tried something new too: I had two floatation tank sessions, which I loved. I did several healing/massage skill swaps with my brilliant massage therapist friend Emma Kenny, who gave me some of the best aromatherapy massages I have ever had. I did some kind of meditation/Reiki self treatment most days too. I was lucky to be invited to a one day mini retreat called “nurturing the mama” run by two wonderful women, Jo Gray and Suzanne Morgan, who are both Reiki masters, therapists, healers and general awesome women. I had met them when they attended a closing the bones workshop. I feel very grateful for the people that my work puts on my path. And of course the 4 days doula retreat in North Wales in May, away from the hustle and bustle of the “normal” world, was the highlight of my self care year. Huge thanks to doulaĀ Selina Wallis for organising it!

    Another very important part of my looking after my soul, is that in 2017 I re-joined a community choir. I had spent 10 years in a Cambridge community choir before, but I hadn’t taken part regularly since my daughter had been born in 2009, so this was a big deal. Coming back to singing made me take stock and measure how much I’ve changed since my scientific career days, how much more in tune with my body am I. I also found the singing is such an important medicine for the soul, in a job as emotionally and spiritually demanding as doulaing.

    Sports wise, I kept to my normal regime of 3 swims a week. In April I joined an online fitness club called Rebelfit and started learning lots of new fitness techniques I had never done before, including playing around with kettlebells. I can now squat and do proper situps and press-ups, something I couldn’t do before. I also started experimenting with eating a paleo type of diet and mostly eliminated grains and dairy. I’m make exceptions to this regularly, but I notice I have much more energy when avoiding these foods.

     

    Writing all this, which I would probably not have done in so many details for myself if I hadn’t been writing this blog post, I’m oscillating between feeling very proud and feeling a little worried it comes up as boasty. I’m quite surprised that I have done so much because it really didn’t feel like it until I looked back. I’m getting a taste of my own medicine when I tell people to focus on their achievements. I’m quick to dismiss my own because I mostly focus on what I’m not yet doing, not yet achieving, against my own impossible standards. And yet, looking at it all written like this, this is rather a lot.

    Because I wrote this blog, I spent a lot more time than I normally do reflecting on how I work. It has allowed me to see pattern and things I want to do differently, and plan differently. It’s been a real eye opener. Who knew?

    I just took part in a live seminar on goal setting with my friend Charlie Ashley Roberts, from “your time to grow”. During the seminar, Charlie explained that only 3% of people write goals, 13% think about goals but don’t write them, and 84% of people don’t do any goals at all, yet research shows that people who set goals are much more likely to achieve them than people who don’t. I oscillate between the 13 and the 3%. My struggle is to find a good balance as I have such high standards, that I often use the goal tool to berate myself, to feel that I’m notĀ  good enough.

    I just received an email newsletter from Lissa Rankin, a brilliant American doctor/healer, and her it said this:

    “ Studies show that approximately 40% of people make New Years Resolutions, but only between 8ā€“19% of people actually follow through on fulfilling those promises two years later which means that 81ā€“92% of people who make New Years Resolutions wind up feeling like undisciplined losersā€¦”

    This year I’m planning to work more creatively around the goal setting thing, rather than making it a chore/or a stick to beat myself up with (I’m not finding bullet points type lists very exciting). I’m going to apply the principle that it’s best to do little and often, rather than setting unrealistic goals (for instance, committing to meditating 10 min a day is much easier than 30 min which I know I’m unlikely to do). I’m going to be playing around with a law of attraction diary and also meeting up regularly with a couple of friends to set goals together, starting with making a vision board.

    Mostly, I’m making the promise to myself to spend more time having fun with my work, than trying to stick to a rigid working schedule.

    I’d love to hear how you balance celebrating your achievements and finding the right balance in goal setting and work planning.

     

     

  • Are you focusing too much on what you’re not doing?

    Are you focusing too much on what you’re not doing?

    I’m writing this as a reflection on myself, but really hope it helps others too.

    I have noticed this dichotomy between how I perceive myself professionally and how others perceive me. I tend to focus more on what I’m not yet doing, rather than what I’m doing. This means I beat myself up very often with feelings of procrastination and not doing everything I “ought” to be doing.

    So it surprised me recently when I ran a workshop in London and the host asked me how I managed to “do it all”. It was interesting to hear how she perceived my work, versus how I perceive it, because I didn’t think I did that much at all.

    This isn’t the first time I explore this topic, in fact, I wrote this blog about this topic a while ago, called “are you full of should?”.

    I would like to invite you as the end of the year draws near, to sit down for a while and reflect on what you have achieved this year.

    I did a bit of it recently as I did my accounts, and looking through receipts reminded me of lovely things I’d done through the year and forgotten about.

    I like to sit down with my diary and a good cup of coffee, and write down everything I did in the last year.

    Lists, bullet point style, don’t really work for me, so writing as it comes, mindmap style, is a better choice for me, especially with lots of different colours.

    I’m thinking of doing some kind of collage of special moments pictures too. So I when the “not doing enough” gremlins attack I can look at it and remind myself of what I’ve achieved.

    I also keep a file where I copy and paste all the lovely feedback I receive from clients. It’s a very uplifting read on a low day.

    I’d love to hear what you do, and how you get on!

    In the meantime I am myself permission that it’s ok that I’ve “only” booked my 2018 workshops for January so far.

    I have plans for many more for 2018, and I will book them in the new year.

    I’ve kind of learnt that although I don’t necessarily book things in advance as much as my inner critic would like me to, I always get things done when the deadline looms, and it’s what matter.

    This week IĀ only had a 2 day week as school finished on Tuesday, and I had much to do before starting the holidays.

    I gave myself permission toĀ tick less stuff offĀ my to-do list, becauseĀ they were short of volunteers at the local breastfeeding clinic on Monday, and I wanted to go an deliver cakes to the midwives at my local hospital on Tuesday afternoon, which a Cambridgeshire doulas tradition.

    I had to remind myself that doing stuff which feels good, which fills the soul, like giving to others, was going to have more impact on my well-being than ticking stuff off my list.

    I guess in this time-pressured time of the year, taking time to do this amounted as self care.

     

    I’m looking forward to a time of rest and enjoying the quiet time with my family.

    Have a lovely holiday season.

  • Closing bones, the completion of one cycle and growth of a new cycle

    Closing bones, the completion of one cycle and growth of a new cycle

    Sophie Fletcher attended the closing the bones training in 2017. This is her account what the ritual did for her.

    https://www.closingthebonesmassage.com/closing-bones-freedom-movement/

  • Motherhood is f**king hard and you’re not meant to be doing this on your own

    Motherhood is f**king hard and you’re not meant to be doing this on your own

    Those of you who follow my blog know by now that most of my posts are inspired by something that happens to me in my work as a doula.

    Today is one of those days.

    I’ve just had a conversation with a new mother of two, who has a baby and a preschooler, and who wonders why she’s so exhausted, and why everybody else seems to be coping fine.

    She also feels guilty at the idea of asking for support.

    I’m so seriously pissed off at our society right now!

    I’ve written several times before about what new mothers really need, and I’d love to see a shift in our culture about how we support new mothers, with a mother centered, and mother supportive approach, rather than one that only gives gifts to the baby and encourages the new mother to “go back to normal” (as if there was such a thing!) as soon as possible after the birth of her baby-as if nothing of significance has happened.

    This post is about the lack of community support, how we’re not meant doing this on our own, and how much harm is caused to new mothers by a culture which encourages women to put up a brave face, and keep their challenging moments secret.

    This secret part means that women feel inadequate thinking they are alone in their struggle.

    I remember being a new mother and struggling massively with finding my new identity (another topic that isn’t discussed), but also being really tired, bored and lonely (all my social network was at work from 9 to 5) at home with my new baby, and feeling really GUILTY about it.

    I had this stupid romantic notion in my head that somehow, motherhood alone ought to make me feel fulfilled.

    Ah bloody ah!

    So I didn’t reach out and talked to anybody about it.

    Luckily I read a lot of books, and I remember feeling so vindicated when reading, in the book “The continuum concept” that it’s not normal for our species to be alone with a baby.

    We’re meant to be with other adults once we have babies, and babies are meant to be around many of people too.

    We’re meant to have experienced mothers around us, other women in our close community, who can help guide us and make us feel more normal and confidence as we navigate the treacherous waters of new motherhood.

    I love this article called ” In the Absence of the Village, Mothers Struggle Most”

    I was also amazed to read an article about the fact that women who live in traditional tribal societies have the same issues with breastfeeding as Western women but the difference is that they have the support of experienced women around them.

    We’re meant to have other people who can hold the baby for a while whilst we sleep, who can take care of chores and provide us with nutritious food whilst we rest and recover from growing and birthing a baby, and get to know our new baby too.

    So in our nuclear family culture, for the lack of a village around most of us, we shouldn’t feel guilty about asking for support, we should demand and expect support, because that’s what’s normal for our species.

    What’ not normal in the unusual situation Western culture puts us in.

    We also live in a strange, “fake” culture, one that is all about glossy Instagram pictures. Motherhood isn’t glossy. Motherhood is raw and messy. There are many moments in the day of a mother, that can be wonderful (the smiles and gurgles of a baby), and also many moments full of tedious drudgery, and many moments which are downright terrible. I love this article about it.

    Coming back to my early days of being a mother, my feelings of inadequacy were exacerbated by the fact that I didn’t talk to anybody about it. One of my biggest regrets to this day is not to have hired my birth doula, Maddie Mc Mahon, as a postnatal doula to help me through make sense of things through these first few weeks and months. Knowing the magic of doula support, I know it would have made a world of difference, to have someone witnessing my mothering and reflecting it back to me in a positive light ,and reframing it like I am trying to do with this blog.

    But hey I believed that I couldn’t justify spending money on myself, what with my reduced maternity leave pay and all that. It felt selfish and indulgent to spend money on myself.Ā  Yet I bought so much useless crap for my baby. Somehow, I don’t think I even realised at the time that I was a victim of the low value our culture places on mothers and motherhood.

    Eventually I started going to baby classes, and met other mothers who became friends, and the informal discussions we had whilst feeding and playing with our babies were peppered with priceless nuggets of information-and made me realise that I was normal and not alone.

    As a doula I have had more occasions that I can remember when I’ve witness new mums going through the same feelings of inadequacy.

    “I’m not doing anything” they say. I usually reflect back to them that they are solely managing to keep a very helpless and very demanding tiny human alive-and that’s no mean feat!

    The problem is that our culture place such a low value on motherhood, and considers it to the a “non activity”, so people assume that mothers just get to relax all day. But nothing could be further from the truth.

    I remember when I went back to work when my son was a baby. I went back part time-working 4 days a week. On my day off , I hung out with my new mum friends, some of which had decided not to go back to work. One of them said “I don’t know how you do it”- referring to the fact that she thought that balancing work and being a mother was really difficult. I replied “no, I don’t know how YOU do it”, then proceeded to explain to her that the hard days weren’t the ones at work, but the ones at home. Ā I told her that on my work days I got uninterrupted coffee and lunch breaks-complete with adult conversation, and that I even got to go to the toilet on my own (anybody with a small child knows that as soon as you sit on the loo they need your attention for something).

    There is no breaks in the day of a new mum, no pauses, no quiet, uninterrupted time, no appraisals, no pats on the back, and no bonuses.

    The days can be 14-16 hour long or more.

    You cannot see the results of your mothering at the end of each day, the results of all the effort, all the patience, all the time and all the love you have poured into your child.

    I love this dad’s response to a friend asking what his stay at home wife does all day.

    The “I’m a crap mum” worry is another common one. We focus on where we’re failing, on the moment when we’re exhausted and loose our shit with our kids, not on all the love with pour into them all day. I did that a lot in the early days, I saw other mums do stuff I wasn’t doing with my kid, and I felt like I was lacking. I never did focus on the stuff I was doing well.

    I have said many times before that there should be some kind of “bad mothers club” (a bit like AA but for mums), where mothers could safely talk about the less pleasant sides of motherhood without being judged.

    I was inspired today by reading this story of a mum who hunted around her toddler’s bedroom for the source of the bad smell, only to find her toddler had done a poo behind the curtain, on the windowsill at that. (warning-graphic picture of a poo if you open the link).

    This mum was judged and shamed on social media for posting this.

    And yet this can be the reality of motherhood for many of us.

    I once had my baby in a sling and he had an explosive poo which leaked all the way down his legs and onto the sling. And yes I was out in a park when this happened.

    I for one, wish more mothers had the guts to post stories and pictures like the mum who wrote the toddler poo story.

    We need a “real motherhood” Instagram account!

    Let’s leave the glossy culture behind, the one that keeps on portraying motherhood as filled only with joy, let’s stop only sharing the perfect pictures, and let’s stop pretending that everything in our life is perfect.

    Because if more mothers shared the less glamorous stories as well as the joyful moments, more of us would realise that we’re not alone and that motherhood comes with enormous highs, but also with terrible lows. And all within the same day, sometimes within minutes even.

    More of us would feel connected, normal, and would have a good laugh in the process too!

    Only in sharing the joys and the lows can we truly connect with each other.

    If you resonate with this, please comment, and also please share stories of raw moments of motherhood.

     

  • A tale of two VBACS

    A tale of two VBACS

    I wrote this blog with Sarala’s permission, and it is now featured on the Cambridge vbac friends blog

     

    Saralaā€™s two VBACs in the Rosie Delivery Unit and the Rosie Birth Centre as told by her doula

  • How closing the bones can help after baby loss

    How closing the bones can help after baby loss

    When I started writing this post during baby loss awareness week, I thought I was going to write a post specifically about miscarriage. But when I started writing it, I felt that it needed to be about baby loss in general. Because you cannot measure grief by what it looks on paper.

    Your grief can be as real if your baby died when you just found out you were pregnant, or if your baby dies when he was several months old. Grief cannot be defined by numbers, and we cannot measure how sad, how hurt we are, or by comparing ourselves to others. By judging that some losses are more “worthy” of grief than others. It doesn’t work like that.

    Yet, god knows I’ve been guilty of doing this myself when it comes to my own grief. So I want to share my stories, and those of others, and I hope it helps. I have two different histories of baby loss. The first was when I was eight and my little brother, Julien, was stillborn.

    This was in the late 70s, and in those days people thought that brushing things under the carpet was the right thing to do, that to pretend it just hadn’t happened meant that, somehow, it would disappear from your brain. None of us where allowed to grieve or process our feelings properly. There was no funeral, and my brother’s little body was disposed of in clinical waste. There was no memory box, no pictures, no footprints. I never got to see my brother (neither did my mum). My mum hid in the toilets to cry. We didn’t share our sadness. I was left with all those unprocessed feelings, so unprocessed in fact that my mind’s choose to forget them to protect me. I have this big blank in my memory which I cannot retrieve. I can’t remember my mum being pregnant, or anything after the birth. Which is odd because, of course, I have plenty of memories of times before that. There is a part of my childhood I simply cannot reclaim because we weren’t allowed to grieve at the time.

    When I studied how children grieve as part of my antenatal education diploma, this led me to revisiting this in depth and I had some lovely healing conversations with my mother about it. In fact in 2017 I closed the circle by giving my mum a closing the bones session-she was very scared about what it would bring, in case it brought all the bad feelings flooding back I think, but it was gentle and beautiful and, honouring, nurturing and healing for both of us. A couple of years later, I would give her the massage again to help with back pain, only for my mother to tell me the day was the anniversary of the birth of my baby brother,

    My second loss, was when I miscarried my own baby (I went on to have 3 further miscarriages and 2 live children but I am only relating the story of my first loss in this blog).

    Ā I started to try and conceive when I was about 33. After over a year of trying and no pregnancy, we were fast tracked for fertility tests, due to my age and irregular cycles. Everything was normal but my cycles were very long and they wanted to give me drugs to induce ovulation. I wasn’t keen, so I investigated other options instead, and after 3 months of acupuncture, I fell pregnant for the first time. I can still feel the raw, amazing joy I felt when the test turned pregnant. I can still picture myself, alone in the bathroom. I looked at myself in the mirror, and I burst into tears of joy. I kept my little secret all day and then surprised my husband with the wrapped positive test in the evening. For 3 months I walked around in a constant state of bliss. Yes I was tired and nauseous at times, but mostly, I was so high on pregnancy hormones, and I felt that nothing could touch me.

    At 12 weeks we went for our first scan. We were very excited. Then the sonographer told us there was no heartbeat. She tried scanning me again. I was in denial, still hopeful that somehow, there had been a mistake, and that my baby would still be alive. But my baby had died. What ensued was disbelief, numbness and shock, followed by the deepest grief I had ever experienced. I cried like I had never cried before in my life. Big heavy howling sobs. My arms literally ached for my baby.

    It wasn’t helped by the lack of understanding of my own feelings, by the lack of acknowledgement our culture provides to women who miscarry, by the lack of support, or by the inappropriate, well meaning comments given by friends and relatives who didn’t know how to support a mother’s grief.

    • “It wasn’t a real baby” (to me it was)
    • “There was probably something wrong with it” (maybe, but this was implying I was wrong to grieve)
    • “You can have another one” (I wanted this one)
    • “At least you can get pregnant” (more grief dismissal)

    All these comments contributed to feeling that my grief wasn’t valid.

    Thankfully someone put me in touch with the miscarriage association. I rang lovely local volunteer lady Janet Sackman. She was the first person to put soothing, acknowledging words on my grief. I ended up attending miscarriage association meetings for a while. I helped me a lot with processing my feelings. But nothing was done to help heal my body, my spirit, my soul, in a holistic way.

    I carried this grief and this fear with me-nobody helped me with that. I never experienced that feeling of bliss in any of my subsequent pregnancies, because I was so scared that I was going to lose my baby again, that I didn’t dare let myself be happy again.

    In 2013 I was trained into doing a postnatal massage called Closing the bones. Ā I have been offering and teaching it since 2014 (read about that here). Having offered the massage to hundred of women, we started noticing some common threads in what this ritual does, and one of these thread is how helpful it is for loss. Amongst the women who received this massage, many, including the ones who had live births as well as loss, told me that the ritual felt especially significant for loss. To this day, women keep telling me this.

    This is what some of those women said:

    ” I came along to the Closing the Bones Training about a year after my baby had died. Towards the end of the ceremony, as I was being rocked deep shudders started going through my body and as the rebozo was pulled tight around my pelvis I felt a huge emotion that even now I am not sure what to call it. It felt as though the protective bubble I had formed around myself moved away and with that my baby ā€“ as if I was releasing him. Sobs racked my body all the grief, the anger, the exhaustionĀ  all the disbelief of what had happened came pouring out. I hadnā€™t realised how much I was holding on to. I felt the women form a circle around me and felt what it was like to have a safe space held for me, allowing me to just be there in my wild tumult of emotion. I heard someone singing the most beautiful song and someone stroking my hair, hands touching me sending love and support“. Rosie (you can read more about Rosie story and the beautiful poem she wrote here ).

    “I have had 3 different losses. Ā All the years up to having children when I felt sad I realised I had empty arm syndrome. It was a deep sadness that as I was so young was not felt I had the luxury of acknowledging. (Wwhen I felt pregnant) I never fully bonded – just in case. I always felt doomed. After two more children in quick succession I learnt closing the bones and was lucky enough to be the subject for the full closing ceremony at the end. I could see golden light all around and I felt deeply relaxed and to have so many women touch me was a unique honour.Ā  When I got home I felt a far deeper connection to my children than I had before.Ā  A lingering barrier I was unaware of had been lifted.Ā  Since then I have felt a far deeper acknowledgement of my loss. And far less pretending all was ok. It feels far more authentic. ” Allison

    “Having the closing the bones massage helped me to accept my babies loss and start to move forward and also forgive my body and let go of all the negative feelings.” Claire

    This is also what some of the women who had losses, have either experienced or heard about closing the bones, but didn’t experience closing the bones at the time/or since their loss told us:

    “I think it could have helped me as it took a long time to fall pregnant again and I felt like I had to be pregnant again in order to process losing our second daughter. Maybe a closing the bones ceremony would have helped with saying goodbye to that pregnancy and feeling less stressed falling pregnant again. If that makes sense?” Ā Hannah

    “Instinctively I feel this is a worthwhile ritual/ ceremony to honour the mother and acknowledge her pregnancy and loss”. Molly

    “I had a miscarriage at 9 weeks. I think closing the bones would have helped me in so many ways, but mostly emotionally, being able to share it with another woman who understands or at least who can empathise and perhaps sympathise. Who could normalise it (I knew it was common, but it would still have been nice to be told again, several times!). A healing time with another woman. That’s what I would have liked”. Saveria

    ” I didn’t know about closing the bones until recently and had not really considered it with regards to my loss, but your post made me reflect and actually had (has!) me in tears thinking about how, at the time, a “ceremony” would have helped me so very much. I would have found a closing the bones ceremony beautiful in that situation, a celebration of my child, me as her mother, and a way of celebrating her life, however short it was.Ā  I would have found it healing and it would have allowed me the focus I so desperately needed to just be alone with her, and my thoughts, and my pain! ” Jo

    “I think it would have helped me after numerous miscarriages as a way of creating ‘closure’ but still keeping that love within me, honoured as a part of my body. I think of it whenever I wrap someone else, and today when I wrapped myself…” Katrina

    If I could go back in time and have women close my bones after my miscarriages, I know what it would mean to me. It would mean that I would be held by a group of loving, supportive women, and that they would witness and acknowledge my grief as valid, without judgment. THat I could let all my emotions out, within a safe space, whilst being held. This would have felt very significant for me at the time, the physical aspect of it, and I expect would have helped me heal faster, and better, than I did at the time. It would have been complimentary to the more “mental” side of the miscarriage association meetings. This is also why I feel so strongly passionate about supporting women through loss.

    In her recent book, Braving the Wilderness, Brene Brown states :

    ” The collective pain (and sometimes joy) we experience when gathering in any way to celebrate the end of a life is perhaps one of the most powerful experiences of inextricable connection. Death, loss, and grief are the great equalizers.”

    This feels like what this ritual is all about when honouring the loss of a baby.

  • Energy hygiene for birth and perinatal professionals

    Energy hygiene for birth and perinatal professionals

    What is energy hygiene and why do you need it as a birthworker?

    Please don’t let the “woo” undertone of this title put you off and read on because I am going to try and explain it in a way that is hopefully both meaningful and helpful for those of you who aren’t used to dealing with energy work.

    Let me start by making an analogy. As a doula (and I’m sure you do the same whether you are a doula, a midwife, an antenatal or postpartum educator or a therapist who work with expectant, birthing and postnatal families), I naturally use a certain level of physical hygiene. Before interacting with a family, I make sure I’m clean. For example, I wash my hands before touching a newborn or before entering a ward in the hospital. So this is the part of the hygiene where I make sure that I protect the families I look after against any germs I may be carrying.

    During the actual process, during birth for example, most of the time I do not feel the need to apply extra hygiene measures, however I may choose to wear gloves whilst cleaning bodily fluids, or give my hands an extra thorough wash after dipping them in birthing pool water. ByĀ doing this, I protect myself again germs that may be carried by the people I look after.

    Finally, when I get home from a birth, or from visiting the hospital or a new family,Ā  I also clean myself appropriately. After a long hospital birth, for example I always put all my clothes straight in the wash and usually have a shower or bath. This is about my own comfort and well being, as well as protecting myself and my family (i.e. trying to limit bringing hospital germs back into my home for example).

    Of course, all of these practises are something I do without even thinking about it, and they are also adapted to the levels of risk and vulnerability of the clients I am supporting, both in the way I protect them (disclosing to clients that one of my children or another client’s child has come down with an illness for example), and the way I protect myself (choosing to wear gloves to clean up).

    I bet you do it too, especially if you are a health professional or therapist. These basic hygiene measures will have been drilled into you. And you don’t even think about it anymore.

    For a long time I thought of energy hygiene as a long and complex task that I just couldn’t do (a bit like I used that I couldn’t do meditation because I thought this required to think of nothing (if you still believe this watch this fantastic animation about it)

    But various experiences made me dabble more and more into techniques of energy hygiene. It boils down to 3 aspects: Grounding, Cleansing and Protection. Good energy hygiene didn’t have to be complicated, because intention is key and the principles are the same as with physical hygiene.

    But before I go into this, let me explain about bit about what I mean about energy, and energy work.

    The human body (and all living things) emits an electromagnetic energy field. This can be measured scientifically with electrodes for example. But the field produces energy that also goes beyond the physical body. Traditional medicines like the Chinese and Indian medicine have a deep understanding of these energetic systems and how they affect health and wellbeing. The organ that produces the biggest, most measurable electromagnetic field is our heart, and its electromagnetic field can be used to communicate between people. The institute of HeartMath has some cool science on this.

    The tricky bit for us Westerners is our current medical view of the human body doesn’t acknowledge the existence of such an energy field, so it can be difficult to understand, or to believe in. Yet, everything in our world is made of particles and energy. A friend once told me “if you believe in quantum physics, you believe in Reiki”.

    Interestingly, even the most sceptical among us have felt energy. We have all felt stuff like the gaze of someone behind us, feeling really good or really uneasy somewhere for no apparent reason, or that when someone walked into a room, the room instantly felt uplifted, or the opposite, the room felt suddenly heavy and uncomfortable.

    Energy work can simply be summarised by saying that every time we interact with someone, we exchange energy. Whether we are mindful of it or not. So coming back to the physical hygiene analogy, we bring our own energy to the table, and so do everybody we interact with. Therefore the same rules of cleansing and protection apply on both sides.

    As birthworkers and healers, we need to make sure we’re as clean as possible, that we protect our clients and ourselves, and clean ourselves again when the work is done. When we get that close to people, especially in the birth space, where massive energetic shiftsĀ  are taking place, then energy hygiene is essential, for the same reasons as physical hygiene is essential.

    So whether you teach a class, do massage or healings, attend births or support families after birth, anything that involves getting close to other people who are in a state of flux energetically and/or in a vulnerable state, then you need to apply the same principles.

    First, keep your own energy clean. Don’t bring your own shit to the table. As a doula, if I have some personal challenge going on, I do to mention it to my clients. Similarly, I try to leave my own energetic crap at the door. Grounding yourself will help with this (more about that later). So be mindful about protecting the people you work with, and make sure you’re as clean as possible.

    Second, protect yourself. Everybody you interact with will bring their own energetic state to the space, and like for physical hygiene, some people are clean and full of positive energy and some people aren’t. You don’t want to catch the energy issues of others.

    Third, when the work is done, be sure to cleanse yourself again.

    So how can you do this?

    It’s quite easy, because it is all about the power of visualisation and intention.

    Grounding is the earthing of our own energy to the energy field of the Earth. Again some cool science behind earthing-we know that earthing helps people heal a lot faster, having measurable effects on inflammation, the immune response, wound healing, and prevention and treatment of chronic inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. One of my two favourite ways to ground myself are the tree meditation, and walking barefoot on the grass. Super simple an quick, and they work!

    The tree meditation goes like this: stand up, close your eyes, give your body and mind a quick scan (how do you feel etc). Then imagine that you are a tree. Visualise the tree in as many details as you can. Then, with each out breath, imagine that you are growing your roots deep into the earth. That’s it! do this for a couple of minutes, then scan yourself again. Be prepared to be amazed at the difference!

    Protecting yourself is a simple as visualising some kind of protection system around you. Find something that work for you, because in my experience if the visualisation isn’t your bag it’s harder to visualise. Some people picture a bubble (including one with a reflective surface), some see some kind of suit or cloak, or shield, etc . As you visualise your protection recite in your head what you want it to do (for example, to stop any negative energy from coming in but letting positive energy circulate both in and out). If the idea of the bubble appeals to you, you could try listening to this guided meditation.

    Again it’s interesting to experiment how you might feel before and after a protection visualisation!

    Cleansing can be done by grounding yourself again, whilst visualising all unwanted energies flowing into the earth works well. Walking barefoot on the grass/the earth is a quick and powerful way to ground and cleanse. You can also try and visualise whatever works for you as a way to sever the energetic links you will have made with all the people encountered that day and that you no longer need. It could be just visualising something like a shower or waterfall cleaning you, seeing the energies flow down into the earth, visualising scissors or other cutting implements actively cutting the ties you no longer need. Again intention is key, and so is finding a visual tool that speaks to you.

    Another nice way to cleanse your energy is to smudge yourself with sacred herbs (sage is a classic, and there are many other. I personally love Palo Santo) or an essential oil spray made with cleansing intention (or you can buy a ready made one).

    There are many many other ways to practise these energy hygiene techniques,Ā  and like the physical hygiene techniques, you may feel drawn to activate some of them depending on your circumstances and what you feel the need to do in a particular situation. For example, I often feel the need to add a layer of protection to Ā myself on crowded public transport like the subway in London. Similarly I may feel the need to ground myself more than usual after teaching a bit group, after providing a healing session, or to cleanse my house after doing a healing in my space.

    If you’re a Reiki practitioner, then there are all sorts of ways you can use the Reiki energy for grounding, protection and cleansing, depending on your intention (and specifically, if you’re trained at level 2 you can use the Chokurei Symbol for both empowerment, protection and clearing negative energies).

    So in a nutshell, energy hygiene is healthy and necessary, and actually simple and easy to do! Give it a try and see what difference it makes to your life.