How do you support a young woman who is preparing to give birth to a baby she won’t raise as her own?
Friends came to me as they prepared to welcome a baby through an open adoption. They wanted to do something for the birth mother - their niece - to honor her pregnancy and support her impending childbirth while making space for the sorrow around giving up her child.
A contemporary baby shower with its silly games and consumer-fest of tiny outfits and parenting gear clearly wasn’t called for. What were the alternatives?
Blessing Way ceremonies were becoming popular but we were loathe to appropriate this sacred Navajo religious rite. So we started by trying to clarify our intentions: What were we trying to accomplish with this ceremony? Why was this important…to the birth mother, the adoptive mothers, the larger family? What kind of experience did we hope the birth mother would have? What did she need to carry her through the physical and emotional labors ahead? How could we as her community express our support, our love, our pride in her, along with our concern?
We gathered ideas from the internet and other sources, but - most importantly - we talked to the birth mother about what appealed to her. Ultimately, we incorporated a variety of elements.
Friends came to me as they prepared to welcome a baby through an open adoption. They wanted to do something for the birth mother - their niece - to honor her pregnancy and support her impending childbirth while making space for the sorrow around giving up her child.
A contemporary baby shower with its silly games and consumer-fest of tiny outfits and parenting gear clearly wasn’t called for. What were the alternatives?
Blessing Way ceremonies were becoming popular but we were loathe to appropriate this sacred Navajo religious rite. So we started by trying to clarify our intentions: What were we trying to accomplish with this ceremony? Why was this important…to the birth mother, the adoptive mothers, the larger family? What kind of experience did we hope the birth mother would have? What did she need to carry her through the physical and emotional labors ahead? How could we as her community express our support, our love, our pride in her, along with our concern?
We gathered ideas from the internet and other sources, but - most importantly - we talked to the birth mother about what appealed to her. Ultimately, we incorporated a variety of elements.
We pampered her, hiring a henna tattoo artist to adorn her as we wove a garland for her hair from flowers each of us had brought, and created a necklace of beads, one from each of us. We listened to her: she spoke to each participant in turn about her hopes and her needs. We pledged our connection to her, symbolized by looping red strings around our wrists, tying us all together, then cutting the links at the end of the ceremony, leaving individual bracelets to be worn until her childbirth was finished. We each left with a candle to light when we learned that her labor had begun.
Perhaps the most significant element was the circle of women who attended. She chose her mother, her step-grandmother (the mother of one of the adoptive moms), the birthfather's mother, the two adoptive mothers, and two of their closest friends (who would be the baby's aunties).
Together, we aligned ourselves with women who throughout time and every culture have gathered to support their sisters and daughters through childbirth - and we made sure that Caroline's place in this lineage was fully honored.
Perhaps the most significant element was the circle of women who attended. She chose her mother, her step-grandmother (the mother of one of the adoptive moms), the birthfather's mother, the two adoptive mothers, and two of their closest friends (who would be the baby's aunties).
Together, we aligned ourselves with women who throughout time and every culture have gathered to support their sisters and daughters through childbirth - and we made sure that Caroline's place in this lineage was fully honored.
RSS Feed