I suppose I was about 6 months pregnant when my partner at the time and I toured the hospital where I was to give birth. As soon as we were outside again, I completely broke down. “I can’t be in a hospital!” I wailed. “I just can’t!” Whether my response was due to remembered trauma from my toddler-era hip operations, or just because I felt so deeply that giving birth shouldn’t be equated with being ill, I don’t know, but I switched practices soon thereafter to a group of midwives affiliated with a birthing center. Too many pregnant women are deeply interfered with, kept from their own bodies’ wisdom and the knowledge of ancestors and healers. Every time I hear about somebody turning the western medical “pregnancy as probable medical disaster” idea on its head, I am so grateful!
Thank you, Nicole Gonzales and Changing Woman Initiative, for your hard work, kindness and depth of vision around working with birthing wisdom from your Navajo tradition and for modeling how to center traditional and cultural birthing knowledge!
https://www.abqjournal.com/1208637
I’m a typewriter whompin’, card catalogue lovin’ white girl from back in the day, and I yearn for a time before the covers of trade paperbacks were all squidgy, so you can imagine that I don’t actually understand what a pingback is. I do know that it can in some way be part of spreading the love, and since that’s what I’m all about at The Total Femme… every Wednesday, I pay homage to the laughter, love, and inspiration to be had elsewhere online.
At the Total Femme, my intention is to post three times a week: Meditations for Queer Femmes on Monday, Pingy-Dingy Wednesday on Wednesday and Femme Friday on Friday. Rather than play catch-up in a stressful fashion on those weeks when life prevents posting, I have decided to just move gaily forward: if I miss a Monday, the next post will be on Wednesday, and so on. Thank you, little bottle of antibiotics for inspiring me in this! (“…if it’s almost time for the next dose, skip the missed dose and continue your regular dosing schedule. Don’t take a double dose to make up for a missed one.”)
The Total Femme 