I have a confession to make: I’m a scientist by background, but (shhh), I’m also quite into woo stuff.
Yes you read that right. On paper, when reading my bio, you might have picked me because of my PhD in biology. You find that reassuring, I get that. I would too. You might have chosen me over other practitioners who have a lot more alternative therapies listed on their website. You might have dismissed them as raving hippies. But you see, I am quite a bit of an undercover hippy.
Do you find this contradictory? Well for most people it is, so until recently I have shied away from showing that side of myself for fear of putting people off. So I had to control my face when you told me you wouldn’t pick someone who uses crystals. Because I do. Every day. In my house there are crystals in every room, and a crystal grid on the shelf above my computer right now as I type this. I use them for healing too, especially combined with doing Reiki healing-that’s right, I do Reiki too, that’s quite woo, I know.
The thing is, I love my woo side, I want to develop it, use more of it, and I want to use more of it with you. With the expectant mum who is scared about birth. I want to offer you more of my woo side, because you never know, it might be just what you need.
Don’t worry, I understand how confusing it feels. How come someone supposed to be an evidence based thinker believes in that shit. Because Reiki healing, crystal healing (and a lot of the other woo things I like to dab into like smudging, essential oils, flower essences, auric mists, and shamanic drumming to name a few), there are all just new age bullshit right?
I used to think that too, so I understand where you come from. Most of the alternative woo practises I love today, I used to dismiss as bullshit until very recently myself. I just didn’t get it. Then for some reason I found myself in a retreat where I experienced them and I was like, it’s rubbish. I’m sure it won’t work. And I was BLOWN AWAY!
I remember in particular one evening at the annual doula retreat, after an already quite alternative workshop involving shamanic drumming (I thought it wouldn’t work for me but I loved it so much I now own three drums-there is some actual science behind what drumming does to your brain-which is fascinating), someone brought in a large gong and said they were going to do a gong healing session. I thought: “gong healing? bullshit!”. But I was there so I gave it a go, and as we lied on yoga mats whilst this woman played the gong, I had the most amazing experience, my mind going into the deepest relaxed state ever, like being almost asleep but still completely aware of my surroundings (I have since read up on the topic and found that sound waves like these alter your brain waves patterns into an hypnotic state-more of the science behind the woo to come in another post). Afterwards I slept like a log, better than I had in many years, and woke up feeling incredibly refreshed and energised.
At the same retreat I also learnt an amazing postnatal massage of the hips called closing the bones, which has the most amazing healing effect on a new mother, as it is very nurturing but also helps her come back into herself energetically after the birth. It is a type of shamanic massage. I loved it so much that I ended up developing a closing the bones workshop and I have ended up training over 200 practitioners in this technique.
I want to reassure you that I won’t push my hippy practises on you-because the essence of doula support is that we adapt to our clients, because we want you to feel support in who you are and what you need. I will never try and steer you in directions where you don’t want to go.
But if you’d like to have a go, I would love to give you a Reiki session, make you a special energy mist for your birth, or give you a closing the bones massage after your baby has arrived.
You never know, it might blow you away 😉