Today CIMS (Coalition for Improving Maternity Services) nationally releases The Birth Survey.  The major effort to make maternity care transparent is underway, and your story makes a difference.

Why?

• Pregnancy, a naturally occurring part of a woman’s life, is treated like a medical condition.  The baby is a human, not a tumor, and in a majority of pregnancies, there are few risk factors.  Many of the obstetrical interventions, however, increase the likelihood that a woman will have complications from her pregnancy/birth.

• The rate of interventions is more determined by the facility or provider than the woman herself.

• In places where statistics for interventions and quality of care have been made publicly available, maternity care has been highly receptive to quality improvement, most likely because there were so many simple improvements to make.

CIMS, Lamaze International, Citizens for Midwifery and other birth advocacy organizations strive to improve the quality of maternity care — to make it truly mother-friendly — and believe that through transparency, the change will come.

How?

• When you go to buy a new camera, you read the reviews, check the sites rating the hundreds of cameras you have to choose from and talk to your friends to see what they’ve had the best experience with.  Is choosing your maternity care provider any different?

• But when you go to look for a doctor or midwife, apart from checking the listings and talking to your friends, you’re not going to find which one has the best rates, provides the features that are most important to you — whether that be in natural pain management, low episiotomy rates or successful cesareans.

• So, The Birth Survey aims to list the providers and facilities.  We’re collecting data so you can have a “features” list, the statistics for interventions.  And, we’re hoping you will share your experience so that others can learn from you, even outside your immediate circle of friends or those who bump into you at the grocery store.  (We know you’ll tell your story to anyone who will listen!)

Take a step toward making mother-friendly care a reality for all.  Take the survey (if you’ve given birth within the past three years).  Tell your friends.  Let’s paint the picture of what maternity care is really like so we know how to keep it good but to make it even better.

It’s worth seeing again.  Brush up on your art appreciation, or just appreciate the art itself.  Imagine the story each woman could tell, that each image does tell.  The creator of this video, eggman913, deserves full recognition.  I love this.

Women In Art

(I’ll embed it after I learn how to do that . . . again!)

Have a beautiful day.

These past few weeks I’ve spent more time thinking . . . and reading . . . rather than writing.  I wouldn’t say that my well was dry or that I’ve spent time filling it.  I’d say I’ve been listening, which is the largest component in discernment.

In the coming weeks, I’m going to be working on a new site design, or branding, if you will.  I’m going to come up with a more consistent schedule of topics to reflect what is most dear to our hearts.  And probably most importantly, I want to work on building our community, sharing our stories so that we encourage each other along our journey, provide a little direction, maybe, if we need assistance.  Whether you’re a maid, matron or crone, you are welcome here, and I’m sure you have inspiring stories to share.  Contact me, and we’ll see how and if it fits.  Communication is what it’s all about.  Either leave comments or e-mail me — sara at everydaysimple dot org.  (trying to prevent spam!)

Together our stories weave a beautiful tapestry.  Collectively our creativity fluorishes.  Journeying together, the Divine is ever-present.  That is what being a woman is all about.

I’m not talking about canned* pie filling, either! 

My husband blessed me this year with a cherry pitter, and I couldn’t be more appreciative!  These cherries were picked from our aging tree out back and stored in the fridge for about a week.  My youngest sat beside me (practically in the sink) while I stood there for half an hour pitting cherries — much better than two hours using a knife!  I had been asked to make the pie sweeter this year, so I went ahead and tossed in some sugar with the cherries while they waited to become filling.

A few days later, I’m ready to make a pie, hubby having guests over and all.  So I rely on Betty Crocker’s cherry pie recipe.  I blend up a double pie crust.

Roll it out.

Use a pizza cutter to cut the top crust into strips.

Pour in the filling and top with a lattice pattern.  You can see the dots of butter under the crust.  Yep, this isn’t a low-cal pie!

We baked, cooled and enjoyed, especially served warm with some vanilla ice cream.  That’s what the end of summer is all about.  I should have taken photos of the blueberry pie I made two weeks ago!  That one didn’t last long, either!

*It should probably be noted for those of you who are only used to canned cherries that wild cherries have a tougher skin.  I think it makes it more hearty, but for some it takes some getting used to, right, dear?

My dearest husband, upon feeling better (from pneumonia this winter) and getting back in his groove, stated that he wanted a “flow” to the house.  He wanted a system.  My bursts of energy come and go with the moon, understandably, and I, too, get the feeling that we’re going to have to take an active role in channeling the energy in and around our home and affairs.  Great.  We have a heading.  We know what we want, but how to get there?

I’m sure we’re not the only ones who want to save money but not sacrifice quality.  We want to eat well but not blow the budget.  We want to practice right livelihood, but we want to get out of debt.  We want to trust the Universe to provide, and we want to know what’s going to happen when, where and now.  Like nearly everyone else I know, we want it all.  Pass the cake.

As the maternal head of household, largely in charge of maintaining course, what I want to know is:  do I follow the stars, trust my instincts and ride the waves, or do I chart the course, follow advice and charge ahead?  Am I a goddess or a chief officer?  Is my home my dominion or my business?

I believe the delightfully frustrating answer is yes.  Both.  I am living the new age now, and I have made my life my business.  The truth that pains us is that we want to draw these definitive lines, build these boxes around what we claim to understand.  Do we really want to set ourselves up for disappointment?  I admit, I want to get it right.  I want to do what’s best for me, for my family.  I want the “rules” so as to make it easy, clear-cut and simple to follow.  I want to succeed.  However, I’ve got to put my over-achiever ego in the backseat and let the goddess take the helm.  Everything these days points to going with the flow.  I’ll know when it’s time to chart a plan of action.

Maybe I should call myself a CDEG (chief domestic executive goddess).  If my kids start singing their ABC’s, at least I’ll know they’re learning something, and maybe it will point out for me the absurdity of titles anyway.  In the end, I’ll still be a MOM, no matter which course we take or what the ledger says. 

We’re still sailing now.  Let the wind blow.

I received an e-mail that reminded me today marks the anniversary of when the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.  The nuclear weapon was named “Little Boy.”  The one that was dropped on Nagasaki three days later was called “Fat Man.” (for more on the events of those days, you can visit Wikipedia.

In sixty-three years, am I correct in believing that weapons such as these have not been used?  But the potential of them is weighty, ever-present.  The intent for using them hasn’t gone away, either — power, domination, intimidation, destruction.  These are decidedly masculine attributes.  Is it mere irony that the names of the bombs are masculine, too?

We all have infinite potentiality within.  We have our feminine and masculine attributes.  We have our strengths and weaknesses, our superiorities and inferiorities, that which we build and that which we destroy within each of our feminine and masculine selves.  It is our responsibility to hold these in balance, yes?

That’s why we need each other, our community, to help one another find our balance, share our insights, give us another perspective.   Alone we can convince ourselves that we mean well, that our intent is good and true, our course of action the only way.  But our ego is strongest when given an attentive audience, the slope slippery once we yield to it.  And any one person in power is just as susceptible as the rest of us.

That’s why in America we’re supposed to have the system of checks and balances.  That’s why in families it can work best where there are two raising the children.  Left to our own devices, we can do some incredibly regrettable, irreversible things — when we are out of balance, out of sync.

For our own sake and for the sake of others, may we know peace, the true peace that resides within, lest we be our own worst enemy.

(No, I’m not pregnant now.  This is from our last pregnancy, with thoughts relevant even now.)

After receiving accreditation as a childbirth instructor, I figure I’m supposed to know all about natural childbirth, at least have access to unbounded information about it.  I’ve also been blessed with three healthy children.  So, at our fourth birth, it should be a piece of cake, right?  Most mothers know this isn’t true.  Every pregnancy, every birth is as unique as every child.  I still learn things in this pregnancy as we go, and as this is our first home birth, we’re not finished learning yet!  (Not for a few weeks, anyway!)

Regardless of what I have to learn, I’m still amazed at what my body, what women’s bodies, know to do.  There is a baby growing!  My children ask how I know how to make a baby.  I honestly tell them that my body is just the house for the miracle of life. The flower doesn’t have to know how to bloom; it just does.  Of course, there are ways to provide optimum performance, and I do better when cared for with love.  In the meantime, the process keeps unfolding until we have a baby.  Both the process and the baby are phenomenal.  Isn’t it amazing?  We know how to do this; we participate as closely as ever to the divine unfolding and revealing of life.

Birth may be an obvious way to observe a greater knowing, but I believe that we all also possess the ability to give birth to the divine in every moment, for in every moment we are given the opportunity to breathe.  We make a conscious choice about the energy we contribute in every situation, and we determine whether or not we follow our heart, the still small voice.  This doesn’t mean we have to be painting, writing, sculpting, dancing, acting, sewing, or whichever art you pursue every waking moment, but it means you do not deny yourself the opportunity, either.  I find it best to do what must be done when it must be done.  If it’s not bothering me, it can wait.  If I feel I can’t possibly think in this house because it’s too dingy and dirty, then perhaps I need to spend a couple of days cleaning.  I still need to maintain my connection to the Spirit of creativity.

Whether I’m writing a novel or birthing a child, I know I house divine potential.  Similarly, divinity abides with me as I clean or nurse or chauffeur.  I can do all things with love, and with love, I can birth well in every moment.