heart-centered mamas

There’s work in surrendering.  It doesn’t mean “to do nothing” or even “to be passive”.  It is rarely easy.  Instead, surrender means to lay down your weapons, to be vulnerable in yielding to something else, letting down the defense, the plan, the control.

And anyone who has ever done that knows it is hard, hard work.

I’m thinking of surrender in terms of birth, (which I usually do), which leads me to drawing parallels between birth and parenting and then all of life, (as it usually does)...

In order to give birth we must get our head out of the way, set our knowledge & desire for control aside.  For most, this is a concerted effort.  We work to build up our knowledge, devouring books on natural birth or newborn care.  This knowledge is incredible power for helping us make informed choices, oh yes.  This is big and important.  But somewhere along the line,...

The first trimester is one of the strangest emotional times of a woman's life.  We may be excited, shocked, terrified, thrilled or all of the above, but most often we are not supposed to talk about it.  Many women keep the news of pregnancy within their partnership in the first trimester.  Our culture in general is unaccepting of pregnancy and birth, and un-equipped to discuss the pain of working to conceive, of pregnancy loss, of body changes, or hormonally induced emotions.  Women are isolated in the worry and joy of motherhood from the very beginning.  And then, the puking.

You guys, I hate the term "morning sickness".  Some moms do find this prenatal nausea to plague them only in the morning, or another limited time of the day.  But I am one of the lucky mamas blessed with all day, all night, over all unrelenting nausea and c...