Blessing Rituals and the Role of Sisters in Childbirth

I found this post on Rixa's blog, Stand and Deliver, some time ago. I was surprised but also not surprised to learn that pioneer era women used to gather together and conduct washing, anointing and blessing ceremonies for women about to give birth. The words to the blessings are somewhat reminiscent of our current washing and anointing ordinances, but are specific to the needs of an woman about to give birth and to her coming child. Here is an excerpt:

"We anoint your spinal column that you might be strong and healthy no disease fasten upon it no accident belaff [befall] you, your kidneys that they might be active and health and preform [sic] their proper functions, your bladder that it might be strong and protected from accident, your Hips that your system might relax and give way for the birth of your child, your sides that your liver, your lungs, and spleen that they might be strong and preform their proper functions, . . . your breasts that your milk may come freely and you need not be afflicted with sore nipples as many are, your heart that it might be comforted."

I am not sure why this ritual or ordinance(?) was discontinued. But, even without the priesthood power to pronounce a blessing on our sister's head, we still, as women have an innate power or gift of healing the sick and comforting the downhearted.

I received a birth story (all 5) from Valerie Christiansen this week and in it she says:

"Studies have shown that women birth faster with a woman in the room, even if the woman is just sitting in the corner, uninvolved. After this experience, I came to believe sisterhood definitely plays a significant, spiritual role childbirth that we have yet to fully understand."

Even without reading the studies, I intuitively know this is right, but I will find them and post a link for the scientifically minded. I will post some more of Valerie's birth story later. All five births are riveting and totally different from each other.

Returning to the sisterhood thought, when I was pregnant, my midwife shared a story with me. I had a Sikh Midwife named Davi Kaur Kalsah. I am forever indebted to the Sikhs for supporting me on my spiritual journey during pregnancy. It was so nice to have a strong woman of faith attending me. Here is the story:

It happened when she was in training at a hospital in New Mexico near an Indian reservation. A Native American woman came to the hospital to give birth. The doctor Davi was working under was a little pigheaded, as she put it, and wanted things done his way (laying down on the hospital bed, etc.). But when he left the room, 3 or 4, maybe 5 women came in. They appeared to be sisters, maybe a mother, and a grandmother of the laboring woman. As she got off the bed into a squatting position, they all surrounded her and began praying and supporting her. When the doctor returned, he was surprised and intimidated by the powerful Native American Women circling his patient. He didn't dare interfere, and he was only lucky enough to reach in and suction the baby's nose when it came.

I loved this story. Davi told it to me because she said that when she had been meditating on my birth, she had a dream that like this woman, I would be surrounded by powerful women and by my ancestors. She was very in tune. I was surrounded by 6 beautiful women and who knows how many ladies on the other side of this blasted veil.

Availing Ourselves of the Priesthood

Avail is a great word. To avail one's self of something literally means: to use to one's advantage.

A few years ago my friend Kim told me that she had been married 8 years and had only asked for one blessing from her husband--when she was pregnant. I was shocked because I know her husband. He is a good man, and incidentally, I have had two very powerful blessings through him last year.

I thought that may be the problem was Kim. She's a beautiful return missionary who I know has a testimony of the priesthood, but she grew up with a non-member father. I thought maybe that was it--she have never learned how to ask.

But I had a realization last Sunday when I was talking to a friend at church about her week. Melissa is a professional woman who always appears to have it together, but she told me about how she felt very overwhelmed the week before. Overwhelm is often the state of a woman's existence in these times, but the look in her eyes told me it was something more. I don't know why, but I asked if she had gotten a blessing.

She said no. She was annoyed at her husband, who didn't understand all that she was going through, so she hadn't.

"Oh," I said.

Then I had this moment of clarity. I realized that because I have not had the priesthood in my home I have had to ask for blessings from other men, men I don't have to live with and be annoyed and otherwise effected by their imperfections. It is difficult for me to ask someone else's husband to come and give me a blessing--and between me and my daughter it seems like we need one every month. I always thought it would be easier when I had a priesthood holder in my home, but now I see that it might actually be harder.

The priesthood is perfect. It is God's power to men on earth. But men are not perfect, and this has kept me from asking for a blessing from certain people I judge as insensitive or who might feel put out. But it hasn't stopped me from calling someone else I judged as more perfect--like my old home teacher. (I remember being shocked one day to hear his wife say something about his annoying habits. I had forgotten that he was a real human, and a dude.)

So my questions is, how do we avail ourselves of the priesthood, knowing what we know about the men in our lives who hold it? Our husbands, fathers, brothers, friends. We may know on an intellectual level that it is not that man blessing us--it is God--but as with most things spiritual, intellect is not all that is involved. There are feelings, and if you are pregnant or postpartum, there are hormones.

One thought I have as I write this is that there is power in a routine. When I write every day at the same time, my body and mind are already getting ready before I sit down. I don't waste half an hour with false starts and procrastination. It is the same with my daily scripture study. So perhaps a monthly date with your priesthood holder is a good thing (especially while you are pregnant). It occurs to me that this is why home teachers are supposed to visit at least once a month, because the Lord wants the priesthood in every home at least once a month.

Of course, it is great to have the faith and humility to ask for a blessing when you feel you need one, but let's face it, many of us, despite great faith, won't ask--and it is those of us with this problem, who may need most to hear the words of God directly to us. A regular blessing date between you and your priesthood holder might eliminate some of the resistance to asking, give him time to prepare and be present, and bring you closer together.

I had some of the most powerful blessing while I was pregnant, and I know it was because there were two of us. I once had terrible anxiety thinking that my daughter might inherit some mental illnesses from her father's side. My home teachers came and blessed me, and in the blessing God promised that my daughter would be born "totally healthy and perfectly normal in every way." And I had no doubt after that that she would be. And she is.