Calling all LDS women who have given birth. We have received many great stories that have made us feel even more in awe of women. We are still looking for a few more on specific topics.
Meditation - How did you meditate during your pregnancy? How did meditation prepare you for birth/motherhood? Share any growth, insights, or anything about meditation.
Preparation - What ceremonies/rituals did you participate in to prepare you for birth/motherhood/letting go of maidenhood? How did you spiritually prepare for the birth? Physically? Mentally and Emotionally? What would you write on a spiritual birth plan? We are also looking for stories about preparation and agency/consequences as they relate to pregnancy, birth, and beyond.
Healing from Sexual Abuse - How giving birth helped you heal from sexual abuse?
Your Legacy - How knowing your Mother's (or another person's) story affected your birth.
Constant Nourishment - How your nourished your body, mind, or spirit during pregnancy, labor, motherhood.
The Spirit/Mind/Body Connection - How did your mind affect your body, or your spirit effect your body?
Re-birth - Whatever that means to you.
Unity - We are looking for stories about unity with your partner, unity with caregivers, unity with baby, unity with God, and any other kind of unity.
The Atonement - Any stories or essays about pregnancy and birth and how it relates to the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
Spiritual Experiences with Medicated Births - We're short on these. We aren't sure why. We know birth can be spiritual no matter what, but for some reason, natural birthers are more excited to talk about their experiences. So if you have had spiritual Cesarean births or spiritual medicated births, please share. Birth is a miracle no matter how babies come. The point of this book is to bring that back into primary focus.
Please send us your story as a word document or in the body of an email. Try to keep them somewhat short. I know it's hard. Please don't send links. Also, this is a spiritual birthing book for LDS women, so please do not edit things of a spiritual nature. Don't worry about being a fabulous writer. We are good editors.
We can't promise we'll use them, but we can promise to get your final approval before we publish them. So sit down and writer yours today and send it to me at ldsbirthstories at gmail dot com.
Preparation- I think the best thing I did to prepare was to hear positive birth stories. Though a compeltely non-birth-relatedc thing I did REALLY helped. We happened to have climbed mount timpanogos in utah long before we got pregnant- it was the hardest thing I'd ever done. I'm not in great shape, and about a third of the way up I thought I was done. I'm generally a quitter when thigns get tough, but not that time. We took it slowly, one step at a time, and arrived at the top just in time for a sunrise. I can't tell you how often the idea that I did it, I didn't give up, I perservered one step at a time, and that if I could do that, I could give birth!
ReplyDeleteLegacy- My oldest sister has left a powerful legacy. She's birthed 4 babies, all natural, and shown me and my other sister how it was done. Because of her, I never doubted I could do it. Being ignorant of my options and the risks was never an option. She set the stage for the next 6 babies born into my family, both the delivery and the parenting. And now, someday she will be a midwife and hopefully maybe someday I will too. It almost makes me think of conversion stories and how one person's conversion can affect hundreds of people.
You can use my birth story it is posted on my blog here.
ReplyDeletehttp://mayer-d-h.blogspot.com/2008/05/my-birthing-story.html
hope it helps
I just e-mailed all the LDS ladies that have taken my Hypnbabies classes. I hope some will respond!
ReplyDeleteI've had 5 babies, all with unique birth experiences, and I've had them in the hospital with medication, without medication, and at home. You can read an overall story about all 5 on my blog here: http://thegiftofgivinglife.blogspot.com/2010/07/updated-call-for-stories.html
ReplyDeleteAnd you can read about my breech home birth here: http://mamasandbabies.blogspot.com/2009/07/home-water-birth-breech-delivery-of.html
Feel free to use any of it, and I can write something up more specifically about any of the births if you want me to.
Thanks,
Cherylyn
For spiritual preparation, I tweaked my Hypnobabies scripts using ideas from a talk I heard in the MTC and a recent Ensign article from Elder Holland. I have summarized but not cited very well on a blog post: http://littletamfam.blogspot.com/2009/11/preface.html
ReplyDeleteLet me know if you want the cited version and I can take a few minutes to find the sources.
oops, I'm sorry for not reading more carefully that you don't want links. I'll send an email.
ReplyDeleteCherylyn-- Awesome story. I love it. I was hoping for an great breech birth story. I love that you did it at home in the water. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDelete