ReBirth

Hello Beautiful Souls 💜
Life is change, and today more than ever it requires us to flow.
Another step in the journey - if you've enjoyed my content over the years, please join me here to stay connected...
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In this new space I share my love of energy medicine, growth, healing, somatics, expansion and all things nervous system!
Love & Light to you, now and in 2024. XO.

Somatics+Energy The Emotion Code | Yoga | Reiki

Absolutely love this ❤️

Hi Dear Ones...
Lately, a few birth stories have come my way where the birth attendant or the parents felt that their intuitive responses opened the way to navigating a birth experience.
So, I'm taking a month to promote, discuss and pay respects to the value and validity of intuition.

As with every program I always pay my respects to the people upon whose shoulders I stand.
First, I honor the Grand Midwives of the South. These midwives were instrumental in keeping the tradition of midwifery and 'women caring for women' alive and flourishing in the deep South...Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida and the Carolinas...
As a apprenticing and new midwife in Georgia I sought out these Grand Midwives and was able to be received by Margaret Charles Smith of Alabama and Mrs. Endia Yelldell of South Carolina. These Elder Midwives were both retired when I sat with them in their homes. They recounted stories of a different era, when midwives were not clinical practitioners but rather practical, intuitive women who knew a lot about birth.
I was amazed and inspired by them. This is how I wanted to practice. They never touched women except to massage the baby and check the position in pregnancy. There was no listening of heart tones or vaginal exams, no coached pushing or rupturing membranes. Just knowledge, wisdom and caring.
Their statistics are better than those of any group I have ever seen.
Much respect dear women!
🌿
To be continued...

If we follow the mother and follow the birth instead of leading or guiding there will be much more opportunity for intuition to surface and be heard.

In our current unstable times, perinatal support is needed more than ever ❤️

Each of these packages is available in person (East Kootenays/East Shore) as well as ONLINE...book around your schedule! Feel free to message me with any questions 😊

Leah

Back in the Koots ❤️

Hold the mother, not the baby.⁣
⁣
Because the baby’s being taken care of—⁣
fed, snuggled, and given all the love in the world—⁣
by not only the mother,⁣
but her partner, grandparents, siblings, cousins, and friends.⁣
⁣
But the mother,⁣
may have gaps in her mind from lack of sleep,⁣
may be mechanical in her motions as she’s healing,⁣
may feel more like a mess than a mother,⁣
may be sitting in bed, crying, feeling overwhelmed in her body and life,⁣
may be full of mom guilt because in her mind, "she's not good enough,"⁣
and she’s bleeding, wincing in pain, swollen and emotional.⁣
⁣
And the mother’s that baby's whole world and needs to be seen, so she doesn't disappear into that postpartum fog.⁣
⁣
So, hold the mother, not the baby.⁣
⁣
A mother agrees that her baby matters more.⁣
But she’s hurting, while she’s the person behind the baby,⁣
in the background, making it all happen:⁣
feeding her baby at all hours,⁣
snuggling her baby close to comfort newborn cries,⁣
and being that baby’s everything.⁣
⁣
So, it’s the mother who needs your love.⁣
⁣
And a mother will remember who held her up.⁣
⁣
So instead of “I’m coming to see the baby,”⁣
try saying, “I’m coming to see you 𝘢𝘯𝘥 meet the baby, too.”⁣
⁣
Because the mother needs to be held more.⁣

This is how I endeavor to show up as a postpartum doula ~ for the newborn mother ❤

The Start of Something

I started out as a postpartum doula at only 24 years old, before I was even a mother myself. I came to postpartum work through my interest in Ayurveda, traditional Indian medicine. When I learned about Ayurvedic postpartum care, I knew this was my calling in life.

Over the next few years I studied five different postpartum doula trainings, and while they were all excellent in their own ways, none of them really got much deeper than practical information about baby care and breastfeeding.

None of them really addressed how to support Newborn Mothers through this major life transition, this rite of passage.

None of them acknowledged the deep and profound changes going on inside a Newborn Mother’s brain, let alone how we — as professionals — could support them through it.

Although I started my doula business, providing massage and meals for Newborn Mothers, I knew there was something more. When I had my own first baby, the need to find answers became even more urgent.

I started exploring postpartum from different perspectives including through my own background in social justice and community development. I dove into newer areas of study to me, from anthropology to evolution, traditional medicine to brain science, and eventually pulled together a radically new paradigm for postpartum transformation.

Now, over a decade later, my work has evolved. I’ve written books and created online courses, available worldwide, for Newborn Mothers and the professionals who work with them.

Learn more about my books here >>> www.newbornmothers.com/books

This needs to be talked about ❤

Approximately 1/3 of women describe their birth as traumatic. These are only those who report their experience. One of the most invalidating phrases in maternity care is "well at least you had a healthy baby." Obviously they are happy their baby is healthy. But let's not pretend that's all that matters. To use that phrase as a scapegoat to normalize obstetric violence and to further invalidate the very real feelings that come with birth trauma is absolutely unacceptable. We need to do better.

Swedish photographer Lennart Nilsson spent 12 years of his life taking pictures of the fetus Developing in the womb.

These incredible photographs were taken with conventional cameras with macro lenses, an endoscope and scanning electron microscope.

Nilsson used a magnification of hundreds of thousands and “worked” right in the womb. His first photo of the human fetus was taken in 1965.

Post brought to you by https://ourcultures.org/

Part 1 vi*****rs, p u s s y and womb health

I get asked about vi****or use weekly and I am 100% not a supporter of them.

Our society is addicted to hard, fast, convenient.

Female physiology is all about a slow burn, gentle swell, full engorgement.

Vi*****rs are the quick convenient choice to having a contracted, sneeze like o.rgasm without any of the deep physiological benefits.

Typically when women are using vi*****rs within 5-10 minutes they go from 0-climax. That trajectory is not serving your body in any deep nourishing way.

Vi****or or.gasms are the equivalent of fast food. It may be satisfying your superficial needs but it cannot be compared to a slow cooked roast that you’ve been tending to and cooking for hours ie: the slow tending of your hands, taking your time touching yourself, allowing yourself to come to full engorgement, not rushing to climax.

The female body needs time to become aroused and engorged. 25-45 minutes depending on the day, where you are in your cycle, your connection to your body, how well you slept the night before, your nutrition etc.

Honestly ask yourself how often in your life have you experienced your v.ulva and v.agina in her fully engorged state? How often do you take the time to not rush your body? Do you allow your tissue to soften, open, swell with blood? Do you allow your nerve endings to wake up, and come alive?

Or do you expect your body to go from 0-100 in 5-10 minutes flat because that’s easy, convenient, what you saw in the movies and p**n, and what your body “should do”?

With stereotypical quick vi****or induced or.gasms sensitive nerve endings get fried, decreasing sensation, increasing numbness and tension through out the nerve, fascial, and muscle tissue of the whole pelvic bowl. And the plateau stage (the liminal space, the swell, the holding, the quiet space) of the full arousal cycle is completely bypassed.

In NECTAR I teach you your full pelvic anatomy, about prioritizing your physiology, working with your p u s s y. You will experience a whole new way of touching yourself and being IN your pelvis.

NECTAR v u l v a and v a g i n a mapping March 25th 5pm PST link below to join 💦🩸

🌼 OXYTOCIN 🌼

This amazing hormone is what will get your labour started and progressing smoothly.
Your body will release this hormone throughout labour with higher bursts released at different stages.
As you prepare for birth it is important to understand what helps to release oxytocin and what may inhibit its release.

Oxytocin boosts
▪︎ Feeling safe & loved
▪︎ Privacy
▪︎ Dim lighting
▪︎ Familiar people or items surrounding you
▪︎ Touching, kisses, cuddles with your partner
▪︎ Warm, inviting environment

What inhibits the release of oxytocin during birth?
▪︎ Feeling frightened
▪︎ Feeling observed
▪︎ Bright lights
▪︎ Strangers
▪︎ Questions
▪︎ Uncomfortable environment
▪︎ Thinking

Oxytocin is your feel good and love hormone, we want as much of this as possible to birth your baby.

📷




Repost:

Great post from Ocean Hypnobirthing

This is something that comes up with all of my clients.

It's another fear that has been driven into us from the media and shared stories.

👉 Nuchal cords are a variation of normal and rarely cause a problem.

🤔 What if i told you that nuchal cords are as common as 1/3 of all pregnancies.

👉 It looks pretty scary to see something wrapped around a babies neck but we have to remember they don't breathe through their lungs, they get oxygen and blood through the cord.

👉 Ok, but what about the cord being compressed and stopping that?

👊 Well, natures got you covered.
The cord is covered in a jelly substance called Wharton's Jelly.

👉 This is there to protect the veins and arteries in the cord. To stop them from being compressed and it does a fantastic job and means that the cord can squish into all sorts of amazing things including knots without causing a problem.

👉 In fact, the cord being around the babies neck is a good thing. If it were around the babies head it would get squashed coming out from under the p***c bone as this is a tight squeeze.
So it being tucked under the chin around the neck is actually a great way of stopping this from happening.

👉 Once born you (or your midwife) can easily slip the cord over your babies head, sometimes doing a somersault flip on the way out.

✨I keep saying it, natures unbelievably clever and thinks of everything.

📸: Townsville Birth Photographer - Lauren + Douglas Birth .birth

Confessions of a Radical Doula Why is the delivery room the one place where a woman doesn’t have control over what happens to her body?

This is my absolute favorite moment to witness. It is the most amazing and rewarding moment to be a part of ❤

From

There are no words for this moment.

It happens in a fraction of a second. So much work, then suddenly he’s on your chest. This is the in between moment, the introduction. A moment so quickly passed by it’s almost mentally registered as combined with another event- pushing or cradling. This split second moment is packed with incredible accomplishment and bonding and connection and relief and exhaustion and joy and love, and it would have been forgotten had it not been on camera.

This precious introductory moment is perhaps the most important moment of the event- the exact climax, the culmination of everything you worked for.

This is birth.

So true

This is something I've been sharing with mothers for years, something I intuitively felt when I had my first child 25 years ago.... and I can now say, from experience, that it is true ❤

I don't like to write about babies. The reason is very simple. There is a ton of information out there on what we moms need to, have to, should do, for our babies. Of course, we all love our babies so much that we try to do them all. In the frantic rush to be the “best” mom, we can forget the single most important factor in a child’s quality of life- ourselves. Neglecting our own bodies and souls leaves us cranky and impatient, far from the moms we want to be for our kids.

As mothers we will do whatever it takes for our kids. Are you willing to do what it takes to give your child a happy mom? Your pleasure is important to the entire family.

Childbirth is just one scene in the grand landscape of motherhood, but it is a pivotal one. When you birth your child, you are also re-birthing yourself as a mom. Unfortunately, most births happen with little consideration to the birthing mama.

How you experience your child’s birth can have major effects on how you feel- body and soul- after the birth. Think about your desires and your needs when making your birthing plans and do everything you can to stay in integrity with them. Set your intentions. Gather support. You are not the only one who will benefit. Your baby will.

Childbirth is your initiation into the sacred realm of motherhood. How would you like to experience that? How would you like to emerge on the other side to meet your baby? Please share your thoughts below.

Ready to take this on? Dm me for more info on 1:1 Ecstatic Birth Coaching.

📷 By tayneetinsley on Instagram

Being the birth ju**ie that I am, one of my great loves is seeing how life and birth mirror each other so fully.

Women are always asking me- how is it possible to have pleasure in childbirth? What do they have to “do” to have an ecstatic birth?

Well, truth is that there is so much that one can do to prepare…, but a whole lot of that involves learning how to be, and how to receive.

The Yin and Yang of our world is off balance. Yin, the feminine energy, the receptive energy of “being” is generally overwhelmed by Yang, the active masculine energy of “doing.”

It is the balance of the two that allows for harmony and that opens the door for pleasure.

A birthing body that is left to “be” will most often lead the expectant mama to “do” all the “doing” that is required.

So our challenge in preparing for childbirth is learning how:

• to fully “be” in our bodies.
• to surrender to the massive birthing energy flowing through us,
• to allow the primal wisdom that lives in all our bodies to flow forth freely and
to birth from that powerful place!

For more information and resource on how to support childbirth with PLEASURE, visit the link in my bio!

📷 By pride_nyasha on Instagram

A W E

Always be in awe of yourself, no matter what your birth looked like. It always has the power to be transformational.

📷:

Let food be thy medicine.

Art by

Animal mamas are such an inspiration!

Trauma isn't necessarily what you think it is...

I've been following Irene Lyon for years, she is such a valuable resource!

Change your Life on every single level by healing Trauma. ♻️ Why our drive to survive makes it super hard to heal. Learn the Science & Signs of Untreated Trauma and how to heal at the deepest level possible.

Love. Food. Hydration. Space. Bodywork. Sleep. Love.
Love.
Love.

Image by:

THIS ❤

Childbirth can be deeply empowering, pleasurable, ecstatic and even or****ic.

Yet most women experience the opposite.

There is a HUGE gap between the possibility and the reality.

The gap is not whether or not Ecstatic Births actually exist.

The gap is in how we are raised, our relationships to our bodies, the structures of training and support that exist (or not) for women, the healthcare system, the legal system and so much more.

I see so so many women judging themselves harshly or feeling down in the dumps for not "achieving" this ideal.

That is the heart of the matter right there--

Ecstatic Birth is an IDEAL and ideals are not a measure by which to judge ourselves, but a source of inspiration, elevation.

The last thing I want is the idea of an Ecstatic Birth to become another thing for women to feel compelled to achieve.

That negativity is our culture of perfectionism speaking through a woman's body and it has got to stop.

To be bluntly honest, it is also is completely counter to everything I teach.

Pleasure thrives on approval.

Celebration of every drop magnifies and expands the sensation of pleasure.

While bringing the image of the picture perfect birth you have in your mind into reality is incredibly difficult, (when does life ever conform perfectly to our ideals?) elevating your experience of birth is astoundingly simple.

Watch the Ecstatic Birth Masterclass: Opening for Pleasure in Birth, 3 Essential Keys to learn how (it's free).

https://ecstaticbirth.pro/essential-keys-to-ecstatic-birth/

📷 By sierrarosebirth on Instagram

PLEASE FOLLOW Down To Birth]]

Can you safely say no to early elective induction?

🏷Save this post in case induction is recommended for you...

Let’s talk about Induction of Labor and the ARRIVE study.

🏷The ARRIVE study was a large, randominzed trial (high quality research) used to determine if elective induction at 39 weeks prevented stillbirth and other serious complications.

🏷What the study DID find: elective induction (at 39 weeks) resulted in a lower cesarean rate of 19% versus 22% for those who waited for spontaneous labor (more on this below).

🏷What the study DID NOT find: Early elective induction did NOT improve outcomes for babies such as death or other serious complications. ‼️Very important point‼️

💭So what does this mean for you?

◼️While a slightly lower cesarean rate (which may be attributed to provider willingness to maintain a higher threshold for moving to C/S because the patient is already under controlled induction) may be an enticing finding, remember that the average rate of cesarean in low-risk induction is more like 30% to 60%. This study had an unusually low C/S rate of 19%.

◾️Of Note 📝: In the U.S., the Cesarean rate is about 5% at planned home births and 6% at midwifery-led birth centers. Hospitals with a higher percentage of midwife-attended births also achieve lower rates of cesarean birth closer to 15%.

🔘Additionally, the primary outcome for elective induction in this study (and often the reason given for scheduling an induction, ie. “Your baby will die” or “your placenta might fail”) is to prevent complications for the baby such as stillbirth.

🔑This study did not find a reduction in complications for the baby.

🔑Key Point: Early elective induction for low risk pregnancies is not mandatory, and it is not right for everyone.

The choice is yours to make.

You can safely say no ⛔️

**********
Hear Everyone. Listen to Yourself. Follow Down To Birth]] and Down To Birth podcast on all podcast platforms 🎤🎙🗣🎧

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