Mama: Jodie Yearwood Holistic Counsellor @doortoyou.wellbeing
PART 1 - I sat in labor for 3 weeks…
It wasn’t what I expected it to be, it’s a place at points I didn’t allow myself to be with this idea of ‘labor can’t be this long’, a place that I found judgement, frustration, control and a place I found my biggest healing and lesson. A place that I knew I had to share, because I know how easily the magic of this time can be missed by all the above. I’m sharing this in parts and lessons.
3 weeks I had regular contractions daily, however they would stop after a few hours. 3 weeks my body was cleansing out every couple of days. 3 weeks I was losing my mucus plug. 3 weeks I had my body screaming to stay close to home. The first day it all began I was so excited, so ready to meet my little soul. Little did I know that I wasn’t yet quite ready and this, this was the work I had to do before he arrived… A couple days later when I was still sitting in pre/early/prodromal labor (whatever you want to call it) and not progressed further I became extremely frustrated. My body cues were telling me labor, yet I am still days later sitting here, same cues, no progress, my baby not in my arms. This is where I started to gravitate to all the natural inducing ways- raspberry leaf, dates, acupuncture, anything oxytocin stimulating, curb walking, squats. Anything to help speed up the process. I journalled and sat in nature many times a day. It was here I realised my first lesson. Lesson- I need to release the grip and truly trust that my body knows exactly what it’s doing, why it’s doing it and with this I need to trust my baby too. I used this lesson to check in on myself, was what I doing, my actions, aligning with this lesson, this belief? I was far from alignment here. I leant into natural labor inducing techniques in order to control, in order to get my baby here, to speed up the whole process so it was happening when I was ready for it, and that, that is what I thought was now.
I pulled away from everything I was doing with the intention to control, and stepped deeper into the trust of my body and my baby, the belief I wanted to deeper cultivate. It was in the pulling away from control I was able to lean into trust. And in this trust I realised my role in pregnancy, in labor and birth. I connected deeper to my baby and handed him back the power, a power that was never mine to take. He chose to be here, he chose to enter the world with me in this lifetime, he chose to land here now to fulfill his purpose and he sure wasn’t going to come a moment before the stars perfectly aligned for him to live out that purpose. Here did not only sit a lesson for birth but the greatest lesson of motherhood. One I always knew, but this time felt so deeply. I am not here to control any part of my baby, I am here to trust him, nurture him, support him and
let him become exactly who he is meant to be in the world.
PART 2- (unraveling of a 3 week labor) A week and a half later I was still sitting in this phase of labor, regular contractions that would stop and start, cleansing the body out, loss of mucus plug. I knew I had to keep leaning into the trust of my body and baby, I had this beautiful lesson shown to me and I had stepped back from any need to control and draped myself with surrender. It was this time another layer of myself was shown. I felt embarrassed, which led me back down the rabbit whole of self doubt. I felt embarrassed that I had told people my body was showing me cues and I thought I wasn’t far from birth, yet a week and a half later I didn’t have my baby in my arms or progressed any further. I doubted myself and my connection to my body, could I be wrong? Are these cues something else? Labor is meant to be at most a few days, that’s all I have ever heard. My mind became latched to this belief in me that screamed I was wrong and should be embarrassed.
I knew it had shown up to be unravelled. I realised in the unravelling that the whole process of labor and birth is not just the intensity right when my baby is entering the world, it is all of this. It is the preparation within soul and body, it is the birthing from maiden to mother not just baby, it has layers. This moment I let myself just be. This phase of labor, whatever phase it is called, I might be here for hours, days or even weeks later. I didn’t know, it could change at any point, but what I did know is that I am in a phase of labor, this is part of my preparation, of my birthing, of my story, and it was okay to last longer then what society has told me.
Labor- it will always look different to others, and society had made me believe how it ‘should’ be. I had gotten lost in the external world, in google searches, seeking validation, when really how could I validate myself more then listening IN, listening to my body, my truth. The lesson- Do not seek externally for what only lives internally. We are all so beautifully different, we don’t need someone outside of ourselves to confirm if there is normality in our individual experiences. We all walk uniquely by each others side, layered in many things which create unique feelings, so how can something only we know ourselves be validated by someone else? So here I was sitting in this unknown phase of labor, the warm up, the preparation, the beautiful internal well of insights where I get to listen in and be. I didn’t know how long I would be here, and that’s okay, because what I did know is that I am here, in my experience not someone else’s or being told how it is. How do I know I am here? My body has told me, through all her wise cues, and I choose to listen. This beautiful lesson wasn’t once again about that moment, it was a deeper initiation from maiden to mother. Here stood another lesson for me to take into motherhood- that I don’t need to be externally told what is right and wrong for my baby, my intuition, my inner knowing will always know best, so listen in, don’t listen out.
PART 3- The final unraveling before birth
I was approaching my 41 week in pregnancy a place where I knew conversations were starting to change, where induction was about to be offered and fear was going to be placed on me. I knew this was the time to really lean into my own education, a time to advocate for what is best for me and my baby, a place of listening in rather than out, a place to trust my intuition, my body and my baby. While I was standing in my power; in all I had unravelled so far, in all I had learnt so far and what I came to believe so deeply, the outside noise started getting louder, not just from the systems but from people to. “Is the baby here? Are you still pregnant? He is going to be overcooked soon!” Side note- Please while your intentions are from a good place and you are excited to, do not ask anyone these questions. Pregnant women are going through enough internally at this point and all those questions do is add layers of frustration and doubt in our baby’s ability to arrive at their divine timing and our bodies ability to know. So here I was again, writing out my experience, trying to keep myself grounded and open to receive whatever I needed to at this time. With these questions from the external of baby’s arrival I landed back in myself of trusting my baby fully, yet I found myself asking why do we, as a society, doubt and question this so much? Pregnancy and birth, however it looks, is extremely sacred and spiritual. It is a journey of deep transformation physically and mentally, and the greatest surrender.
A power that my beautiful midwife reminded me of when she was going to be away in my final weeks of pregnancy, she told me. “Jodie, your baby knows exactly who he needs around him at birth, it will look how he needs it to, trust he will come at the time he needs, which is okay if it’s not when I am here and it’s okay if I am back and we are still here at 44 weeks.” We are asked to hand over everything to our babies and trust them. They have chosen to be here, they have chosen to arrive at a particular time, for a particular purpose, there are things we can do to support our bodies and babies, however ultimately, we are being asked to surrender, to lay ourselves down and hand our trust completely to our babies. Unfortunately though, such a sacred and spiritual time has been robbed by our human need to control, even when it’s not needed, but what is on the other side of that? …. Immediate distrust for our babies and distrust for our bodies. We, as a society, have been taught to trust others over ourselves and in doing that, we ignore our intuition, we ignore our innate wisdom. When you really look at it, however pregnancy and birth looks, it is extremely scared and spiritual. But to get there we must do a lot of unravelling. We must unravel to allow the process of sacredness to be, to come back into our own power. I find myself now in a time that started with deep frustration and need to control to now a time I am truly grateful for, a time to lean into this space, because I knew these last lessons and last unravelling had to happen for me before birth. Before my body opened in a way that it has never opened before. With our bodies holding our deepest beliefs, traumas, memories, stories, pains, this time was being asked to connect within, to meet my soul, to land in a space that allowed me to fully, completely trust my baby and his purpose for being here. However birth was going to look, I knew it was going to be how he needed to enter the world, my need to control and listening to societies expectations/pressures had to step out of the way to allow this.
PART 4- Today is the day 🥹
The day had come. I woke up about 4am with cramps, the same ones I had been having but something within me felt different, I knew that this was his day of birth. Surges once again were about 5 minutes apart and I felt the need to go to the toilet, this is when I saw my bloody show. I crawled back into bed and whispered to my partner “today is the day, it’s happening”, I gave him a kiss and went and had a shower. At this time I texted my doula letting her know that my bloody show had arrived and I truly felt in my soul that this was the day and I would let her know when we needed her here. I went and made myself something little to eat to nourish my body and prepare for everything to come. I went back to bed and cuddled up to my partner. The surges started to get a little stronger and we put the TENS machine on. I moved into the lounge room to put on a movie and rest. I have a beautifully bright lounge room filled with natural sunlight, something my body was not craving and needed at that moment as about 9:30am the surges stopped again, it had been an hour since the last one. I was devastated, again!? Stopped again!? I moved back to my dark bedroom, laid back in my bed and felt complete safety, I went completely inwards with the dark lighting. Immediately the surges came back, more intense and closer together, I could no longer talk through them and used the support of my breath.
My doula came over around lunch time and put me in a position to get him deeper into my cervix. I was kneeling on the rug leaning on to the bed. Everything progressed very quickly, I became more vocal, I felt more pressure and surges were closer together. After about 40 minutes I moved to the shower, leaning over the fit ball and once again everything got more intense, more pressure and much louder. This is when I started to feel pressure in my bum, and we knew I wasn’t far.
I was ready to go to the birthing centre and be in a place where I was giving birth so my body could surrender even more.
Part 5- This was the moment I said I couldn’t do it, the moment that I said I can’t. Once I arrived at the birthing centre, with a surge greeting me out the front I went into my birth room. It was so beautiful, I felt so warm and safe immediately. It was dark, only salt lamps and fairy lights giving the light. I fell onto a bean bag where I stayed for about an hour, my surges were very close together and much more intense yet between the surges I felt extremely calm and peaceful, I was in awe at my body and the moments of rest it gave me in between filled with deeper slower breaths too gentle swaying. I then hopped into the pool, the warm water on my body was the most beautiful feeling and I quickly found myself leaning forward onto the pool side being held by my partner. I found comfort for a moment, the intensity slowed down a little but I was quickly reminded by my doula to try a new position to get the baby deeper. I shifted around intuitively for a few surges until I found one that brought the intensity back, this is the position I knew was supporting me best for my little man to enter the world. Then the moment came that I cried into my partner's arms and said I can’t do this. I knew the moment I said this that I had landed in my crisis of confidence, that I was in transition and that by saying this it meant my baby was not far away at all. My doula so beautifully reminded me that what I was saying was perfect for where I am at and her and my partner reminded me that I absolutely can do this. A few more surges went by and I felt in my body that it was about to start pushing, I turned to my doula and said he is nearly here. She ran out and got the midwives to let them know the baby was coming.
Part 6- He is here!!!
My partner went behind me as I leant forward with my left knee up in the pool ready to catch him as he enters the world. My body started pushing, a truly amazing feeling. I didn’t have to do anything but breathe down to my baby and follow my bodies lead. I didn’t push, she was doing it all for me, I just had to surrender to her and trust her lead. After two surges his biggest part of his head was out and my midwife let me know that the hardest part was over, the next surge my partner would catch him. But in that moment, I heard the hardest part was over my whole body went soft, my breath fully released, and my baby came out. Except, when he arrived into the earth he had his own plans, and during labor or the week before, he turned himself and decided to come out facing me. So instinctively I scooped him up from the water and placed him on my chest. A feeling I will never forget is holding my baby for the first time and how proud I was that I did it, I worked so fucking hard for this birth, and despite many people saying don’t get your hopes up for the birth you want, I FUCKING DID IT. Reefs birth was beyond beautiful, so undisturbed, so instinctual, so intuitive, I was completely left to follow my body and my babies lead. I worked hard for this birth, so fucking hard. Not just on the day but the lead up. I educated myself so deeply, I let go of beliefs that did not serve me, I spent so much time mentally and emotionally preparing myself. It wasn’t easy, there was a lot of society beliefs to unlearn but my gosh it was worth it. We so often normalise that we can’t have the birth we want, lets normalise that we can!! Let’s change the conversation and hand the power back, that actually sometimes, most times, we can have that beautiful birth we have dreamt of. So, on his great grandmas birthday, on the final full moon of the year, the stars were perfectly aligned for Reef to enter the world and he wasn’t going to come a moment before.
🤍🤍🤍
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