53. [BIRTH STORY] WITH AMANA BE LOVE - HONORING DEATH & BIRTH - MEDICALIZED HOME BIRTH INFANT LOSS & FREE BIRTH
Amana has gathered over 40 years in this earthly realm where she has been captivated by pregnancy, birth, death, mothering, sociology, culture, nature, nursing, midwifery, reiki & mediumship.
Through her path of study, & exploration she has received degrees, certifications, traveled the world, attended many births & deaths, cultivated community, crafted ceremony, birthed her own babies & been initiated into the realms of death & grief.
Amana has alchemized her personal and professional experiences into supportive 1:1 sistership offerings for women who are motivated to deepen their understanding of themselves. To explore the decisions they are making for their own lives, locating their inner compass & birthing themselves anew into their next version of becoming.
Whether women come to Amana in the midst of pregnancy, grief or self discovery, her deepest desire is for every woman to feel the magic, intuitive knowing, strength and wildness within themselves.
https://www.birthingnova.love/
https://www.youtube.com/@amanabelove
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Music The Ancients (feat. Loga Ramin Torkian) by Azam Ali
Disclaimer:
The information and resources provided by me are not intended to constitute or replace medical or midwifery advice or a Mother’s intuition. Instead, all information provided is intended for education purposes only. My advice is not to be seen as medical diagnosis or to treat any medical illness or condition of Mother or baby/fetus.
AI generated transcript will have errors
Emily: Welcome to Soul Evolution.
My name is Emily, also known as the Birth Advocate. I am a retired nurse, health coach, women's circle and ceremony facilitator, and the host of this podcast. Here we dive deep to reclaim our rites of passage with a big dose of birth story medicine, intentionally curious conversations with embodied wisdom keepers, and a sprinkle of polarity as we will hold space for our men from time to time too.
I hope you find nourishment for your soul here, as you probably heard my course so youo Want a Home Birth? Your complete guide to an empowering, physical, theological birth is now available.
You can listen to episode 41 to hear all about it or you can go to my website www.birthadvocate.me course to learn more. I have poured my heart and soul into this complete guide to an empowering, physiological home birth course.
You will walk away feeling ready, body, mind and soul, knowing that everything you need to birth your baby already exists with within you. Your questions will be answered, guaranteed. Your fears will be quelled.
I walk you through, step by step exactly how to prepare yourself, your partner and your home for the most incredible experience you get to have in this lifetime. Birth is a sacred rite of passage worthy of honoring.
Do not leave it up to chance.
Stay tuned after the show to learn all about my Beyond Adola offerings both in person and virtually worldwide. If you're enjoying the content, please consider a donation to help cover the cost of production.
I alone schedule, record, edit and produce this beautiful labor of love. You can either donate through my website www.birthadvocate.me donate or simply venmo me at thebirthadvocate.
Reading your reviews on itunes and seeing the ratings on Spotify just makes my day. Please, if you haven't yet, take the time to do so now. It really helps expand the reach and send this episode to someone who needs it.
You will find photos and videos of my guests on my Instagram account, Earth Advocate. You can always email me at connectirthadvocate me. I'd love to hear from you. Now let's drop in to today's episode.
Today I have Amana.
Emily: Amana has gathered over 40 years in this earthly realm where she has been captivated by pregnancy, birth, death, mothering, sociology, culture, nature, nursing, midwifery, reiki and mediumship. Through her path of study and exploration, she has received degree certifications, traveled the world, attended many births and deaths, cultivated community, crafted ceremony, birthed her own babies, and has been initiated into the realms of death and grief.
Amana has alchemized her personal and professional experiences into supportive one to one sistership offerings for women who are motivated to deepen their understanding of themselves, to explore the decisions they are making for their own lives, locating their inner compass and birthing themselves anew into their next version of becoming.
Whether women come to Amana in the midst of pregnancy, grief or self discovery, her deepest desire is for every woman to feel the magic, intuitive, knowing, strength and wildness within themselves.
I hope you enjoy.
Welcome Amana, to the podcast. You are a sister from another Mr. Over there. Where are you at? In Oregon or Washington?
Aman: Washington state. Yeah.
Emily: Washington. Yeah. I, I think I found you because Anna, my mentor, went on your podcast and then we connected and then I came on your podcast and we're like, we're very similar.
I'm sure we have lots of differences too, but we're like both retired nurses turned like birth nerd. Just really like wanting to get our lives back to the rhythms of nature and just obsessed with all things women.
And you're here today to tell your beautiful birth stories and I'm just, I'm really honored to have you. So thank you.
Aman: Thank you. I'm really honored and excited to be here.
Emily: Yeah. So your name?
Emily: Anna.
Emily: Be love. Did you change your name? What is this?
Aman: Amana? Yeah, well, my last name isn't beloved, but over beat almost 20 years ago I sort of adopted beloved as my mantra. And so I like to just have that as part of my presence in the virtual world.
And it's one of those mantras that I repeat to myself daily.
Emily: And what does Amana mean?
Aman: Amana means faithful. It means like safe. There's looked it up. I've looked it up many times, but I can't always remember all the pieces.
I actually recently met someone who was from another culture and he said that Amana. Actually he couldn't even describe it in English language, but it meant something. Like he was like, so if I, if I were dying and I have my wife and my children there and I, I would tell my wife that our children are Amana with her like the safest that they could be.
And that's something I just. Yeah. Learned in this last year and had never heard that.
Yeah. Interpretation of.
Emily: I feel those vibes. It's very midwifery, very mama.
Okay, so I know you just told me that you have quite a few birth stories to talk about and I'm sure there's medicine in every single one. So I would like to give you the floor to start wherever feels right for you and just take us on your journey.
Aman: Yes. So for me, I've been one of those women who from a very, very young age knew that I wanted to be a mother.
I would, you know, mother all the littler ones around me. I always wanted younger siblings, but I was the youngest.
I would take the parenting magazines from the pediatric office that I was in when I was little and read about mothering, babysat as soon as I could. I remember I was like under 10 years old and babysitting three, under three next door and just thought it was the most fun thing ever.
So I, yeah, always knew I wanted to be a mom, but also was waiting for the man that I knew would be the father of my babies. I could feel the presence of the spirit babies long before.
And when I found myself in my early 30s, I'd always thought I would have kids in my 20s. Like a lot of my friends were having their kids in their mid-20s.
And I was like, oh, feeling sort of left out in that moment and had just gone through sort of a big breakup. And I felt like I was at one of those crossroads where I'm like, Universe, like, I feel like you've put this longing in my heart since I was a kid.
Like, is this, is this my path or is there another way? Like, I was at the point where I felt like I just asked Universe to bring it to me or I was going to go a different way and just travel the world, enjoy my singleness, perhaps adopt kids a little bit later.
But I decided to create this, what I call the Soul Flame altar.
So I created this altar and I had one of my beloved friends had met her partner at this specific festival called Conscious Culture Festival.
And it was over like summer solstice weekend. And so I decided I was going to ask my soul flame to meet me at this festival. I bought a ticket to this festival.
I put it on my altar, along with all sorts of other things. I did a 40 day ritual before the festival each day, sitting in front of this altar, asking my soul flame and my soul babies to like, lead us together, asking that when we, when we met, there would be no denying the light in which we connected.
And yeah, just gave it up to the universe.
Found myself, went to this festival and, you know, just went around with this openness to perhaps meeting my soul flame.
And the first day was Friday, the day before the solstice. And it came and Went then. Then the next day on the summer solstice, I was walking around. I was at this one of the main stages where music was playing.
I was barefoot and dancing and just enjoying the energy and the space. This is land where our barter fair is every fall, and there's no cell service, and it's just, like, such a beautiful place to be.
And this little periwinkle butterfly flew from behind me, flitted around in front of my face, and then off kind of to the left where. And behind this speaker.
And I couldn't.
All I could see was legs, but I could see there was a man standing behind the speaker. And my first thought was just like, ooh, is that him? You know, okay, universe.
Like, is that him?
And so when he did walk out from behind the speaker, I, you know, was continued to dance and sort of made eyes at him, and he saw me. And then what I didn't know is just how shy he is, but he walked around behind me and sat with his friend that was in the, like, the studio booth or whatever.
And I turned back and looked at him there, and that sort of gave him confirmation that I was looking at him. His buddy was like, hey, I think this girl is looking at me.
And he was like, actually, I think she's looking at me.
And then he. So then he's like, yeah, watch this. So he got up and, like, walked to the other side of the stage. And of course, I did turn and look at him again, being like, are you the one?
And at that point, he did walk.
Walk towards me and came and introduced himself to me, and we embraced for a moment. And then he turned on his heels and walked away.
And I was like, okay, I guess. I guess he's not the one. Okay, universe. And I just kept on dancing, and I was just in this very open, loving space.
And then after that, I went back to check in with my friends who both had littles. Their littles were still sleeping.
And then I decided to go check out the different booths. So I walk around, and I am drawn to this one booth. And as I get closer, I didn't know, but my now husband, the man that had just said hi, introduced himself and then been too shy to, like, continue contact and hustled away.
He was in. It was Judith Brownhawk's booth. And he was on his knees giving her a massage. She's very tall, so he was, like, kneeling behind her, so he was the right height to massage her shoulders.
And she could feel the energy as soon as he saw me. And as soon as we, like, made eye contact, then she said, how about we make this a train, and I come into the booth and stand behind him and start touching his shoulders?
He said that, like, as soon as I touched him, that, like, the physical boundaries for him just sort of melted away.
So that lasted just for a few minutes. And then he and I stepped outside to the front of his booth, and so did Judith. And she gathered her. Her mixture, her smudge mixture of lavender, sage, cedar, and sweet grass and sprinkled it around us.
She said from that moment, she knew that we were going to be together.
Emily: Wow.
Aman: And just a little bit later, we walked to the back of her booth and we.
We speak about this and that. We just sort of, like, I sat down with him, we, like, sat down together, and then we had our first kiss. And, you know, later that day, the next day, he was just like, I had given up looking for you.
Like, thank you for looking for me. And his friends had, like, seen us from a distance, and they were like, oh, yeah, there's Owen and his woman or whatever. And then they're like, wait, what?
Owen and his woman, like, but everyone just sort of knew. He went back and told his friends when we separated to go, like, see our friends and then come back together.
He told his friends, I just met my wife. Like, two weeks later, he proposed. Four months later, we got married.
And, you know, the first questions we asked each other sitting down in the back of that booth was like, how old are you? Are you married? Do you have kids?
Do you want kids? Like, we just went straight for it and knew that we wanted to make babies together.
Emily: That story was medicine for me. I don't know about anyone listening, but that was what I needed to hear right now.
Aman: Thank you. I love that.
You're welcome. Yes. So fairly soon after we were together, we were open to the possibility of conception.
And then a little while later, we did conceive our first little woundling.
And it was in October, at the end of October, we were preparing to leave on our honeymoon to go to Hawaii, and I started to bleed.
So I was about six weeks pregnant at that time.
And it was hard. It was amazing how, you know, just in those initial weeks, how attached and excited I was for this, like, first pregnancy. I had, at that point, been attending to births for a number of years with a practice of midwives doing birth center and home birth and just birthing babies.
I had been looking forward to it my whole life. So to have that first, first spark of life, that first woundling, leave Right away it felt like, you know, I don't know, it was hard.
And we were on our honeymoon, which we expected to be like happy and excited. And then I was going through the grieving process and it was the first time for Owen, my husband, to witness me in grief and like, you know, find the ways to support me that were nourishing for me.
But he, he did and I enjoyed being in the ocean at that time and getting to swim and release and, and yeah, just honor that little one.
And then near the New Year's that year, so that was, yeah, October, near New Year's, we.
Emily: What year are we talking about? How old are you?
Aman: 2014.
Yeah, I am about to be 42 and at the time, yeah, I was 31 and then 32.
And so we did conceive again and of course we're super excited. We had a little, you know, like a baby altar in our room set up and we're very like intentionally calling in our next soul baby.
And so this little one arrived and I found myself just a little more hyper focused on this being staying. And I remember saying, please stay, please stay to this little one.
And they did stay for that time. And I was really nauseous in that pregnancy, vomiting a lot. I was working in the emergency department as a nurse at that time.
I remember that was like fun.
Yeah.
And I found a single practice midwife that I was in alignment with and loved. And she. I had at that point sort of started to understand the dangers or harms of ultrasound.
So I had chosen at that point not to have one. I had spoken in my mind's eye to this little roomling and said like, if you need an ultrasound, just let me know.
Not even knowing what that really meant, but it is something that I said to her, didn't know she was at her at the time and you know, just continued on in this pregnancy just holding out for that, you know, knowing or hopeful that this little one, like I would get to mother them.
And yes, pregnancy is really hard, but there's an end point with birth. And.
And then when I was about six months pregnant and could feel her moving inside of me and we had, you know, started purchasing the different baby items and I started having this right sided, like flank pain and I just didn't know.
I thought maybe it was just a pregnancy related pain. I'd heard about round ligament pain and different types of discomfort that women have in pregnancy. So I sort of just chalked it up to some sort of pregnancy pain and continued on and it got sort of progressively worse.
And then I started having bloody urine.
And I never had a UTI before, but I had this bloody urine. And at that point, I decided to choose to engage with the medical system to get some more information.
And they told me that I had a blocked right ureter, which is the tube from your kidney to your bladder.
And I needed a stent placed or, like, a.
A bag out my back to, like, drain the urine. And that according to my blood work, I was going, like, septic. And so it, like, needed to happen soon because there was the potential to harm for me and for the baby.
So I did, at that time, based on what I knew, chose to have a stent placed to keep that ureter open.
Emily: Was there, like a stone blocking it, or was it from the pregnancy or something?
Aman: So they called it like a globular stone. I'd never had kidney stones before, but. So I had this, yeah, globular mass sort of that was blocking the ureter. So, yeah, they told me a stent.
I said, so like a cardiac stent, you know, because I'd seen actual cardiac stents and knew how small they were and the technology. And he was like, yeah, like a cardiac stent.
But later, when he actually pulled it out, it was this, like, horrible thing. Not high technology, much bigger, much longer than I.
Than he led me to believe, which was definitely frustrating. But anyway, I was. Stayed awake during this procedure. I couldn't actually see the stent that he inserted, but the stent is placed.
They're, of course, asking questions about my care and, you know, why I haven't had an ultrasound and things like that.
And at that time, during that experience, I did decide that I would have an ultrasound for this little babe. So a couple days later, after I was discharged, we had an ultrasound on this little wound.
And the doctor came back, the ultrasound tech went out, the doctor came back in. I never had an ultrasound, so I didn't really know what was normal. But she came, or he came back in and he told us that our baby did not have kidneys.
So without kidneys, one can't survive outside the womb. And without kidneys in the womb, like, also, like, lungs don't fully develop because it's. The amniotic fluid is like the urine, which isn't created when they don't have kidneys.
So I remember just asking to leave and went home and just broke down, wailed and cried.
Cries I've never. Sounds I've never made again, had never made before.
I remember being so angry at the world, angry at my body and yet, like, holding this little life that I could feel moving inside of me and just in disbelief that this little one, this was the only time that we would get with this little one, and at the same time felt it was so synchronistic that I would have this blocked right ureter.
And that was the path to find out that she did not have kidneys.
So in a way, grateful, because had I gone, you know, continue that pregnancy and given birth at home when she was born and wasn't breathing, we would have been like, rushing to the hospital or trying to resuscitate her and all these things.
So rather than that, they did offer, when I was still in that ultrasound room, that they could send me up to OB and induce labor right then, I said no.
So for me, I chose to honor this little life for whatever long she was going to be there again. Didn't know she was a she, but just made really conscious memories with her.
Visited family, you know, read books, ate food and would be like, this is what a blueberry tastes like. You know, knowing that she was tasting on some level inside of me and just waited for her timing.
Had the opportunity to speak to some other women who'd had similar experiences, which was really helpful.
And, yeah, just continued a different type of, different way with the pregnancy. I have a beautiful community of women. I think there were like 14 of us. They threw me a blessing way, a different kind of blessing way, knowing that this little baby we named Hartley before they were born, knowing that that could be for a girl or a boy.
And they created this beautiful ceremony where they held me and my husband was a part of it for part of the ceremony. And they sang and loved on me and created little memories and wrote on stones for me.
Oh, my God. Yeah.
And I'll be so forever grateful for all the care and tending that I received in that time and just reckoned with continuing to want to birth at home at that point.
From the ultrasound, we knew that she was bummed down like Frank Breach, so bum first and likely to stay that way until.
Until birth. My same midwife, Tammy, was continued to work with us and was comfortable being there for her birth.
And on a Friday in August, in the evening, sensations began.
Emily: So how far were you? How far along?
Aman: Just a few days shy of 37 weeks.
Yeah. So labor began. I knew I didn't want to have any monitoring of baby during labor, knowing that there was a chance she could die, you know, during labor from cord compression, which is more likely because she didn't have much amniotic fluid because she didn't have kidneys.
So labor began, and I just wanted to slow it down and stop it. I didn't want labor to begin because I knew labor meant I was going to push her out, which meant she was going to be born and then she would die if she wasn't already.
And that was just too much.
So I did. I slowed down labor. I took a bath. And it. Labor was just gentle and slow, and it gradually progressed into the night and the next day and then the next night, and then it was that next early morning.
So we went through two nights, took place over three days.
I was in the birthing pool, and my husband was there with me. And I started having the experiencing for myself, that guttural push contraction that I had witnessed many other women experience before.
And that's when I called Tammy. She was in the other room, and she came out and her little bum started to emerge.
And then I remember her little legs flopping out, and she moved her legs. And so we knew she was alive in that moment.
And so I told my husband, like, you know, feel. Feel her move. She's alive.
Feel your baby move. And then for most of her head, until it was like this part of her head was there and pushed her the rest of the way out, you know, felt very.
Although I know I pushed some with the sensations. It was mostly my body pushing. And she popped the rest of the way out, and I pulled her up out of the water and held her.
And she took a few little. Little gasping breaths for a few moments and then stopped breathing.
She never opened her eyes.
And I just, you know, we held her there and sobbed looking at this little life we had created together.
And, yeah, we're with her for that little time. I burned my placenta in the birth pool and eventually was ready to move into the bedroom and lay down.
My husband took her for a moment onto our bed, and one of our dogs jumped up and to greet her. And when he saw that she wasn't moving, he was, like, nuzzling her to try and wake her up, which really touched my husband.
And he melted down again.
And then a little while after that, you know, her body started to change and look a little different. You know, when she was first born, she was all pink and plump and warm.
And then it became hard for my husband to witness her body at that time.
And yet I still wanted to hold her and examine her and kiss her and do all the things.
So I did. Took photos and did a ritual bath the next day with her Took her out into the sunlight.
We had a few different family members come and see her before, a couple days later, having the funeral home come pick up her body.
In Washington state, it's illegal to transport a dead body unless you have a certain license, which we, of course, didn't have. So that was, again, a part that was hard for my husband.
It was, you know, hard to see her body go, even though he was having a hard time with her body in the home.
It was another journey of us holding each other through grief and honoring each other's different paths and grieving and what we needed for ourselves and from each other and was just.
Yeah. Another sort of dark night of the soul and period of grieving we took.
After we received her ashes, we took a trip down the Oregon coast and into the redwoods and sprinkled some of her ashes, you know, at the ocean and with the forest and still have some of her ashes with us now.
And, yeah, through that, just met some really beautiful other women that had walked a similar path and found that really helpful.
A woman named Amelia.
She's, I think, Amelia K. Yoga. She has this Prana Vita brand. And she had her son Landon. Her first son, Landon, died a few days after he was born. And she created this Landon's Legacy retreat up in Canada.
And I had the honor to go and sit in circle with these other women and with her, and that was just so helpful. Actually, at that time of the retreat, I was pregnant with our.
Our son at that time.
But it just really.
There's nothing like being connected to other women who have walked that path.
Absolutely.
Emily: It is so essential.
Aman: Yes.
Emily: How amazing. I'm assuming those photos I saw this morning, where all the. The tapestries were hung up, that was your ceremony?
Aman: Yeah, that was Hartley's ceremony.
Emily: Hartley. Oh, my gosh. It is so incredible how ceremony can help us move through these times.
Aman: Yes, Yes.
I think it's Zenith Virago. She talks about, like, a good ceremony or ritual can, like, take the place of, I don't know, so many hours of talk therapy or whatever.
Like, she feels like it can help you to move through grief in just a very different experiential way. Yeah.
Emily: And just being held by your community.
Aman: Yeah.
Emily: Wow. Thank you so much for sharing that. That's a very touching story. Yeah.
Aman: So as I spoke, we then conceived again. A little. A little room lean and, you know, were. Was excited and hopeful and also the knowing that nothing is guaranteed in life.
I did choose in that pregnancy to have an ultrasound to see whether or not this Little one had all of their parts and had kidneys.
Excuse me, we had. My husband and I had had ultrasounds to know that both of us had both kidneys because if one of us was missing a kidney, which you can only have one and just not know it, then it would be more likely that we might have another baby without kidneys.
But because we didn't, we knew that the chances were slim that, you know, she just had this specific body and it was that. And it was unlikely that it would occur again, but we did check and that felt good to me to know.
And I also held the knowing that even with all his parts, like he could die before he was born or, you know, so it was just another thing to reckon with and hold in that pregnancy, I guess, in a way that I hadn't before.
Emily: How long between Hartley and. And this little woundling?
Aman: Yeah. So Hartley was born in August of 2015 and then our son was conceived. Is that right? Yeah, in the like spring of 2015.
Yeah, we can. We conceived again after a few months and was just excited and then also living with the knowing. And we had the ultrasound and knew that he had.
We didn't know he was a he then, but knew that the parts were there and continued to plan again for another home birth and was excited for that.
And I was 40 weeks on December 29th.
And that night, remember, just like hanging out with my husband, snuggling on the couch. And he went to bed a little earlier, which is unusual. I would be normally the one to go to bed early.
And then I joined him in bed. And early in the morning, I think 2ish or something like that, I woke up to sensations.
I tried to stay in bed and lay back down to see if I could sleep between them, but they woke me up and also urged me to my hands and knees.
Like I couldn't just lay through them. So then I. I quietly got out of bed and went out into our living room and. And labored for a while by myself, which felt really beautiful.
I decided to make some bread dough and rise it by the fire. It was very cozy, you know, snow on the ground, outside side and.
Emily: Yeah.
Aman: And then close to 6am I accidentally woke up my husband and he came out and was just so excited that I was in labor.
And it felt like once he was also in the space, it was like, oh, it's go time. It like took it up a notch and I could feel that energy.
And I decided to get in the shower just to like, see if that would shift the way the sensations were feeling, they were irregular but strong.
And he was working on, like, setting up the birthing pool and things like that that were in our living room.
But the shower, it felt like it did nothing.
It just, like, got stronger and stronger. At some point he called our midwife.
And then eventually I just build up our regular tub and lay down in there and that felt nice. I just went very, like, into the cosmos, out of body.
And at some point I asked him to just stop trying to fill up the birthing pool. He had done all the little, like, chores that I'd asked him to do, like, you know, clean the toilet in case I'm puking into it and vacuum and all the things.
But then I just wanted him to stay with me.
And we knew at that point that the midwife was getting ready to come our way.
And my water broke. In the water, the amniotic fluid popped and soon after I felt those, like, oh, the guttural pushing again. And I remember sort of being like, oh, but I.
I wanted. I wanted the midwife to be there. I sort of, like, held for a little bit and.
And then she arrived. And when she did, she could. We could already see his head was right there.
And seven minutes after she arrived, I pushed him the rest of the way out and brought him up to my chest and he cried right away, which is, oh, was such a blessing.
I had asked that of this little woundling to just cry, please, cry right away. Like, I know that there's a spectrum of normal transition with those first breaths, but I just hoped that he would cry right away.
And he did, and we discovered that he was a boy. And so that labor was about six hours, which was a big shift from my, like, 30 some hour labor across three days.
So I.
I felt a little stunned, honestly, at that point. It took some time to integrate that birth in a way that was like, I didn't feel as fully present in the moment as I had with Hartley's birth, but I, yeah, birthed his placenta into the bath and I chose to cut the cord between us myself when it felt right and got into bed and he nursed right away super well.
And it was just, yeah, such a blessing and so excited to have this living baby with me and all my dreams come true in so many ways.
And, yeah, it was a beautiful postpartum for the most part. I did experience some sort of, like, complex grief coming through with his birth, sort of circling back to Hartley's birth and some of the grief that just still needed to be Moved through with hers.
Yeah.
And yeah, loved, loved being his mom, loved caring for him. It was very fun.
And before he was two years old, we unexpectedly conceived again. Even though I tracked my cycle and knew when I was fertile, and yet we created a new little spark of life.
And when I, when I looked up their 40 week mark, it was my exact birthday, which is November 20th, which I was just like, whoa, a while.
Emily: Are you familiar with the natal lunar return?
Aman: Yes.
Emily: Do you think maybe that's when you conceived?
Aman: I think that's quite possible, yes. Absolutely.
Emily: For anyone listening who's not aware, I learned this through Jane Hardwick Collins.
When the moon is in the same phase as it was when you were born.
Apparently.
I don't know if it's anecdotal or observational or how they did it, but it's been proven that women can ovulate at that time.
Aman: Yeah.
Emily: And so there's potential twice a month that you can get pregnant. Not just that little, you know, four.
Aman: Or five day window when you're ovulating.
Emily: But also when the moon is in the same phase as what it was when you were born.
Aman: Yes, yes. I have another friend who had a conception at that time too. Like for her.
Yeah. So I just felt like that was so fun that this little one's 40 week mark was my ex. Like, how could. I couldn't have even like planned that. And I am a baby who or a human that is here that was conceived on birth control.
Like my siblings are four and five years older than me. They weren't trying to conceive me. And yet I came through.
So it felt like, okay. And this one, we also weren't like intentionally conceiving at that time. And yet this little one came through.
And so I was, I was excited. I didn't want a huge spacing between my kids and but this would mean that I would have two under two just for like a month or something like that.
So that was sort of exciting for me. My brother and his wife had just gotten pregnant like a few weeks before. So it's like, oh my gosh, we're gonna have like cousins the same age.
And how.
And then when I was about 11 weeks pregnant, I started bleeding.
And it, you know, I was hopeful that I'd heard, you know, all the different stories that sometimes women bleed and it, they continue on in their pregnancy and birth that baby and it's no big deal.
So I was hopeful for that. And yet I. The bleeding, it got heavier and heavier and more and more.
And eventually I Released this little wimbleing and had a beautiful midwife friend come and midwife me during some of that time, which was really helpful.
And again was just so sad and felt sort of betrayed by my body and just not trusting what was.
Emily: But you want to speak a little more to kind of moving through that. Trusting your body, being angry with your body or.
Aman: Yeah, I just. I.
What to say about it.
Yeah, at the time I just felt like I. I had done. I was self blaming myself for it and holding on to that a bit and feeling fearful, feeling like I definitely wanted another baby.
And I was like, is this the sign that there's not gonna be another one?
I.
It helped me to express. I mean, really, it was part of that grief. Right. The anger is interwoven. It was part of my grief.
And so it helped me to express the grief in different ways.
I created different ceremony and altars. I also liked to dance and move and shake and scream sometimes. Like, those things help me to express and release some of those energies.
Emily: It's so important for those listening, these emotions that we experience, you know, grief especially, like, it is just energy moving through. Just like birth, there's just energy moving through. We absolutely have to move it through us.
We are alchemists. We transmute the energy when it moves through us.
Aman: And I.
Emily: Not to like, bypass, spiritually bypass and you know, not being with your grief, but like, truly it is. It is just energy moving through us.
Aman: Yeah.
Emily: There's lots of lessons and gifts in the experience of allowing it to move through.
Aman: Absolutely.
Allowing it to move through and to move with it and release it.
Yeah. So, you know, it's so interesting what people say to you in these times. You know, people are like, well, it won't happen again and sort of other unhelpful things sometimes.
And some people thought maybe we just wouldn't, you know, try again.
I did feel called to be open to conception and we did conceive again.
And that next pregnancy was an early birth at about six weeks, so not as far along. Still sad, still hard, still something to move through and to honor.
And it was after. After that early birth that it was near the, like a couple months later, near the summer solstice. I remember just having another one of those times where I'm like, universe, like having this reckoning with the universe and being like, okay, I.
I can. I could be happy with just with this one Earthside baby. And yet I feel. I feel this like, spirit baby. I feel like there's this other one. And like, am I wrong?
And sort of asked Universe to bring her to me soon. Otherwise I was gonna just release trying to conceive anymore.
And it was on that cycle, near the summer solstice, that we conceived my daughter, now daughter, who's 4 years old.
So we.
Where do I want to start with her? So, yes, conceived her, Was super excited to be pregnant again and living again in that space of the hopefulness and yet knowing that this little moonling might also not, you know, grow to full term inside of me and be born and be alive.
But I was very excited at this point. I had. This is the time period when the term like free birth and the idea of free birth had entered my awareness and consciousness through the Freebird Society podcast.
And I.
I knew early on in that pregnancy that that's what I wanted to do. I remembered that, like, holding and waiting for the midwife to arrive the last time. And I just knew I didn't want that.
I just wanted to flow with the sensations and with the labor and not be waiting.
So that pregnancy again, I was super nauseous, puking, puking, puking every day.
My husband even bought me, like, a knee board for the. In front of the toilet seat and wrote me a little, like, love notes on the back of the toilet to be like, yes, yes, you are beautiful.
Yes, like that.
So that was hard because it was so interesting because her pregnancy really mirrored in a lot of ways Hartley's pregnancy, my first daughter in that nausea. My son's pregnancy. I had, like, none and puked, like, once from another from, like, an actual bug, not from.
So that was interesting. Some people were questioning if I was going to do another ultrasound this time to know if she had kidneys. And I decided I wasn't going to this time.
And so for some people in my life that felt like they. They would have made a different choice, but it was my choice. And so I chose not to, knowing that, you know, if.
That the chances of her not having all her parts were very slim. And even if she had, I would still want to birth her at home in this way.
So we excitedly planned for this birth.
And I, my first two, I had birthed in water, so I really wanted to experience a dry birth. We knew that this was probably our last baby, and so I decked out our living room with mirrors and photos of, like, my ancestors, my mother line, like, me with my grandmother, artwork of, you know, women and babies, and had this whole altar space and knew that if I, in the moment chose to have water that I could just get in our Regular bathtub and bird this baby there.
Like I had my son and I went into labor with her.
So her like 40 week mark was March 16th and that was of 2020. So it was when like things were just unfolding. I had luckily like finished my work in the hospital and that's when I never went back to work in the hospital after that.
So I was on maternity leave and awaiting this little one as the world was sort of up in arms and just in an odd place.
And I remember totally expecting her to be a Pisces because of her 40 week mark and that my son had come like right then and I didn't anticipate going past 40 weeks yet.
She stayed in my womb until 41 weeks and a few days.
And at that time, you know, at first I had like around her 40 week mark I was like wanting her to come and then I just eventually released into her own timing and it was yeah like 41 weeks and a few days again early hours of the morning, around 2am Again I woke up.
This time the sensations were just strong and hard right from the beginning. I had to get out of bed and I went out into the living room and was trying different positions, different motions and I felt like I just, I.
There was nothing that shifted the sensations for me the way that they had in previous pregnancies. They were just so strong. I remember putting my hands on my womb and saying like slow down, gentle, like let's take our time and tried different ways of orienting my body and nothing changed it.
So after about an hour I was like, oh yeah, I want some witnessing some holding from my husband. So, so I woke him up and he came out into the space and that was, it didn't really didn't change the sensations but it did feel good that he was there.
Uh, I will back up and say so my son was about three at this time or he was three years old at this time and he, when we were talking to him about the labor he had expressed that he would like to be present for this baby's birth.
And so we, you know, I showed him different pre birth videos and we talked about it a lot and uh, I did invite my mother in law to be his sort of like safe person there, knowing that at three he might say he wants to be there but at the moment actually not want to be there.
So she happened to already be there and spending the night with us that night, which was lovely.
And I remember her waking up and she was sort of in the space for a bit and I just didn't actually want that extra witnessing. I asked her to go downstairs.
So she went downstairs.
And being the, like, birth nerd that I am, I've always loved birth. Birth photos, birth videos. I decided. I had decided that with this one, I really wanted a video and photos because even though I had been the one experiencing it, like with my son, there's something about when I was in it, I couldn't remember all the things.
And so it would have been nice to have or I wanted to be able to reflect and watch myself.
So in those.
In that time of labor, my husband did call my two dear friends, so Rickana to take photos and my friend Clementine to come do video.
And a little while later, they, you know, sweetly arrived and were just so beautiful in the space. It felt really good to have them there and sometimes chat with them in between sensations.
And their presence was just so holy and lovely.
Uh, and her labor just continued, continued. And I found myself eventually on. On the floor, sort of reclined into my husband, which is a position I didn't expect myself to be in for birth.
And yet that's where. Where I was. We had a big mirror in front of us, which was sweet because then I could. We could make eye contact through the mirror, even though he was holding me from behind.
And I'd gotten this round mirror that I could put down lower so that I could see myself opening and put it under me if I wanted to. When I was up on my knees and she continued to just come hard and fast, it was just very strong.
And as the sun started to rise, about four hours after labor began, those big sensations, those pushing sensations were happening. And I put my hand on her little head inside of me and held her in.
I held her in for several sensations. I was. I was not prepared. My body was not prepared. I just didn't feel ready yet. So I. Even though there was pushing on my hand, I pushed back and held her there for several sensations and then eventually let my hand release.
And on the next sensation, her. Her head emerged.
She did her little. Her little turn, and then she was born up to. About her belly button. She flopped onto the ground between my legs, and she had the umbilical cord kind of like a.
Like a sash around her. That was. I felt like I couldn't get her the rest of the way out. I was trying to reach for her. I asked my husband to help me bring her up and pull the cord over her head.
He was tentative about that, you know, and eventually he just brought her up high Enough that then I unwrapped her umbilical cord and she, she cried right away after that and brought her up to my chest and looked down and said, oh, you really are a girl.
And my husband said, we have a baby. And, and my son. Yes. I didn't speak to that. My son was also right there with us at that time. We'd woken him up a little maybe an hour before, and he was just so sweet in labor and wanting to attend to me.
And we all just cried and smiled and it was just so beautiful. I remember my mother in law, she's British and I remember her like patting my cheek and saying, well done, well done.
Those pictures though of that moment where.
Emily: You were looking at your husband and she's patting your face. Oh man, the oxytocin is so palpable. I'll post that one for sure on Instagram.
Aman: Yeah, please you. Yes.
So it was just we. Oh, I don't know, just so happy, so excited, so grateful, so simple. You know, labor started and began, you know, finished. And then I, a little while later, while we were still on the floor, I felt the urge to birth her placenta.
So I asked for the little pie dish. I know a lot of people use bowls, but I was like, but a bowl can be high and I don't know if I want to raise up that high.
Pie dish is a great size. So I just slid the pie dish under me and her placenta slipped out and it was sweet. And then everyone orchestrated the movement from the living room floor into the bedroom where we could get all cozy.
And we did.
And they gave me food and drink and we just looked at her in awe.
And a little while later, when I felt the time was right, I invited those three other women to burn her umbilical cord with me. I'd gotten four long tapered beeswax candles and my daughter was laying on the bed just like watching the whole thing, mesmerized.
And we all held litten health arc candles and sang the we all come from the Goddess a song and we shall return.
So that felt really lovely. And I know some people talk about it taking a long time or it can. It definitely can with one candle, but with four, it wasn't that long.
And yeah, felt so lovely cozied up in bed. My son climbed up in bed. He was, you know, like touching her little cheeks.
When she was ready, she started nursing and also nursed very well. And we began our life as a family of four.
Emily: Amana. Such gorgeous stories. Oh my goodness, I'm just integrating.
You know, what really sticks out to me is this one of the gifts, you know, that come with the death portal and just being.
Having had that embodied experience, you know, how much more deeply you must feel the joy and the gratitude for the life.
Aman: Yeah, I know. It's so. It is so incredible how with. With the pain, like the pain and the suffering also can open us up to that greater joy like you're speaking of and love.
And I know that I mother these little ones in a way that I. That I wouldn't had. I not had that experience with Hartley and these other little woundlings.
And what would you say?
Emily: What would you say you're doing differently that you think you may have?
Aman: I don't know that I can name like a thing I do differently, but I feel like with the energy of the mothering, that, having that experience, experience of having a baby be alive and die, it's like the preciousness of the life of my children.
I like every life is so precious.
But having that lived experience, for me, I felt just magnified that like, precious, magical nature of our children and that unique, specific life that will never be repeated.
Emily: Yes, precious is exactly the word.
Emily: Ah.
Emily: Oh my gosh.
Wow.
I would love if you wanted to share a little bit about what you're doing in the world today to help serve women and you know about your podcast and just all of the things that you're involved in.
Yeah, gifts. Because you too, you do different moon, at the different phases of the moon. You're coming on Instagram and sharing about and pulling cards and. Yeah, appreciate that.
Aman: Yeah. I just, I love connecting with other women. I have, I call myself now like a world bridger, a birth walker, a death walker.
I did work in palliative care as a registered nurse for eight years or something like that. So I really do.
I really am comfortable holding space for both end of the spectrum for birth and for death. And we all, you know, experience those both.
And I love connecting with the moon and orienting my life around the moon, which helps me to orient towards her more often and be in connection with the rhythms of this beautiful earth.
I do one on one mentorship with women for in the seasons of pregnancy, birth and mothering. For the most part, I offer specific, like, grief offerings for women who have had babies that die or other deaths or grief in their life.
I have a Mother Baby Village gathering that's currently in person, but I've had many requests to also have one online. So I think that's coming in January of this next year.
So I'm excited to hold that space virtually so that more of us can come together and honor these seasons of our life.
And I do mediumship readings and yes, on Instagram, I do these moon soul messages, which are quarterly. So on the full moon, the new moon, and the half moons.
And my podcast, the Heart of the Soul, where we remember what it means to be wild women.
Emily: Yeah, see, we're the same.
Aman: Yes, we're the same.
Emily: Just a different flavor, which is perfect.
Aman: Totally. I mean, I love that. Yeah, Soul is also in your podcast name, which is so wonderful. There's that resonance with even just that word soul.
Emily: Yeah, for sure.
Well, I am just incredibly grateful to have spent the last hour with you, hearing your stories. Thank you for sharing, for allowing me to witness, and for giving the gift of all of this medicine to all of the listeners.
Aman: Thank you. Thank you so much for holding this beautiful space where I could share from such a felt sense space and for creating this podcast and being who you are in the world.
So grateful to be connected.
Emily: Thank you for listening, listening through to the end. I do hope you found good medicine in today's episode and that it encourages your own soul evolution. I have a few new offers, both in person and virtual, that I'd like to tell you about.
Beginning in January, I will host a free in person perinatal Women's circle for anyone trying to conceive, pregnant or postpartum, seeking community and support. There will be a focus on preparing for natural birth and healing from birth trauma.
Children are welcome. You can sign up via my website. I also now offer a monthly online virtual village circle for families seeking an empowering physiological conception, pregnancy, labor, birth and postpartum.
It's just $10 a month or free when you purchase my online course. So you want a home birth? You can gain access by signing up via my website.
As always, I host women's circles once a month at my home in Southern Maine. All women are welcome. For details, go to my website.
I have 20 years of experience in the medical localized system. I let my nursing license expire in 2023, and now I walk with women seeking a physiological, instinctual and deeply spiritual conception, pregnancy, labor, birth and postpartum journey.
I help prepare and repair for the most expansive rite of passage that women get to experience in this lifetime. It is my greatest honor and sole mission to hold sacred space and witness women as they claim their own inner authority and power.
I am a fierce advocate and guardian of natural birth, using the culmination of my life's experiences, including my own embodied wisdom when it comes to being a home birthing mother.
Nearly two decades of experience in our healthcare system and a year long sacred birth worker mentorship with Anna the Spiritual Midwich.
I support births with or without a licensed provider present at home birth centers and the hospital.
I offer birth debriefing and integration sessions for women, their families and birth workers.
I offer offer therapeutic one to one sessions, individually tailored mother blessings, closing of the bones and fear and trauma release ceremonies.
If any or all of this resonates, I offer a free 30 minute discovery call.
If you have a birth story to share or if you're a embodied wise woman, witch healer, medicine woman. I am also interested in sharing your contribution to our soul evolution.
You can book in via the link in the show notes.
Thank you so much for your love and support everyone. Until next time, take really good care.
