Want to know more about the Silent Birthkeeper course?
Are you interested in learning more about the Silent Birthkeeper one-year online immersion with Ruth Ehrhardt? The one-year online course is limited to a small group of people, as it is a personal journey we take together. It is an opportunity for you to spend time with yourself, delving into your relationship with birth, what it means to be a guardian of birth and what it means for you to attend births. The course is held within a tightly held container, and we do our best to honour the unique journey that each person undertakes. One of the beauties of the Silent Birthkeeper space is the diversity of the participants, not only from a cultural perspective, but we have people joining us from all corners of the world and so we get to gather in a monthly virtual circle from different seasons, time zones and hemispheres. The course begins on the 14th of November 2024. Early bird pricing closes on 30 September 2024. Bookings close on 4 November 2024. For more information see...
Read MoreTrue Midwifery is a safe space for ALL birth attendants…
True Midwifery is the home of The Silent Birthkeeper One Year online Immersion and a variety of other courses and workshops are offered online and in person in countries around the world. One of the visions of True Midwifery is to offer a safe space for birth attendants around the world. In a similar way that we want to offer safe spaces for mothers, and babies True Midwifery endeavours to be a safe space for those who guard and protect birth. Sadly there is a lot of fractioning, disparity and othering in the birthing world and the True Midwifery learning spaces endeavour to bridge that gap and to honour that no matter in what capacity we are attending births, we hold at the centre of our calling, the guarding and protecting of the mothers and babies. So we welcome anyone who is interested and feels a connection to birth. Part of what we celebrate in the True Midwifery space is the diversity of the community, not only cultural diversity but also the diversity of what the participants bring into the space. To find out more about the Silent Birthkeeper course see...
Read MoreEstablishing My Boundaries in Birth Work
How have I created boundaries for myself in my birth work? And why? Getting burnt out. 3 times…burnout is no fun and no joke. Big lessons here.Very quickly learned to say no to doula jobs that did not align with being able to support birth physiology and where I felt complicit in obstetric violence and violationDoing good things for my body, stopping bad things for my bodyTaking my time in coming home after births – especially difficult births. I am blessed to live close to the ocean. Taking a moment to sit on the beach, put my feet in the water and listen to the roar of the ocean is cleansing for the soul before heading back home to family life.I need to feel safe when attending birthsSpending time in nature regularlyHaving a designated on-call phone Saying no to people who don’t feel rightHaving a good support networkPrioritising balance in my birth work life and my personal lifeSleepingOnly travelling within a certain radius for births Whilst making this list, I realised how interwoven boundaries and self care are and how a boundary becomes a way to take care of myself, and how establishing a way to take care of myself, becomes a boundary…. As I walk this path, my boundaries have shifted over the years as I have grown and required different things in place. As a birth attendant, I step into intimate relationships with families, and as with any relationship, we need to assess and establish our boundaries within them. How do we best meet the basic needs of those we serve whilst taking care of ourselves? How have you created boundaries for yourself in your birth work? Compromise & flexibility in birth work is crucial given that we will encounter many diverse families wanting to make use of our services with expectations that may or may not be within our comfort zones or personal philosophies. So how do we know what healthy boundaries are?How do we implement them? What are the pros and cons of having and enforcing those boundaries? Join our upcoming study spiral as we dissect this topic together. For more information and to book your place see...
Read MoreI am Woman, Hear me Roar!
Thank you Mom for teaching me to Roar! For knowing deep down in your bones That inside you Was embedded A freedom That needed to be let loose And allowed to dance in the wind Thank you Mom For climbing the mountain And standing at its peak And roaring Roaring Roaring into the wind Letting the wind hear your anguish and your sadness and your pain Whilst we children giggled and tumbled and played in the bushes and amongst the rocks And felt bashful about our weird mom roaring at the wind Thank for you for teaching me to roar It is embedded in my spirit And I will never forget The image of you, my mother, roaring into the wind And seeing how the wind received you And roared back (written 09/08/2024 – Woman’s Day, South...
Read MoreThe Gifts of Grief
I am grateful for the gift of tenderness that grief has brought into my life. I am grateful for how grief has taught me to feel the mossy softness of the earth beneath my bare feet. I never knew until this painful tenderness entered my life that the earth was so soft as she held my footsteps. I never knew that grief would make me feel so acutely, the loving coolness of the wind as she stroked my face, my neck and ran her fingers through my hair, ruffling it, making it dishevelled; releasing, discharging the heaviness, the weight of the sadness. Releasing the tightness in my shoulders, reminding me to breathe. Aaaah…. Thank you to the ocean that roars and mirrors my inner turmoil and yet gently laps and licks at my toes reminding me that….that I am alive? And oh, the sun, the welcoming warmth of the sun, that somehow reaches into the cracks formed within my heart and holds me, holds my heart, with such unconditional and loving tenderness. Like a mother bathing her newborn. Thank you grief, for the tears. They wash across my soul. And bring softness to my hardness. (Written 26/07/2024 the day after Nadia Maheter’s offering on Supporting Grief and Loss in Childbirth in our Study...
Read MoreHolding Death as Birthkeepers
“…if you are a birth keeper, you must also be a death midwife. If you support people to enter the earth realm, you must also become a midwife for those who pass on.” – Dr Mmatshilo Motsei The first time I ever saw a dead body it was a baby. I was 9 years old and we had very recently made the move to the farm. The little girl had been born on the drive to the hospital after her mother had gone into labour on Christmas Eve. She had emerged whilst the bakkie (the pick up truck) was winding down Gydo pass, to the town of Ceres. She had lain, wet and alone, at her mother’s feet and had begun to grow cold. By the time they had reached the hospital she was no longer breathing. (You can read AN’NOOI’S BIRTH STORY here) At the funeral, which was held in the bushman graveyard on the farm, her father unscrewed her little coffin for us to all see. The coffin was no bigger than a shoe box. She was perfect. Beautiful. Angelic. I will never forget her face and her little fingers. Her little body dressed and swathed in silken white. She looked like she was asleep… There was something so pure, so innocent about this death. Her mother sobbed at her graveside whilst the rest of us looked on not knowing what to say. My mother had been asked to oversee the funeral, she wore a big sun hat and read from the Bible. The women began to sing as the tiny coffin was covered in sad and red clay soil. Assie verlossers huis toe gaan Assie verlossers huis toe gaan Oh Here help my dat ek kan saam gaan Assie verlossers huis toe gaan (When the saviours return home When the saviours return home Oh Lord help me, that I may return with them When the saviours return home) ——————————————- Birth should be about life shouldn’t it? And yet, as Mmatshilo’s quote illustrates, we cannot work in the realm of birth without knowing that death walks along this life giving force as well. “We come from spirit, come from light, shining in the stars at night” – Martyn John Taylor (SHINE) The fact that birth and death carry a similar energy became evident to me after I experienced the massive loss of having my mother, my sister and my step father wrenched from this life. Whilst I grieved, I also noticed the familiar tenderness that comes with the thinning of the veils, the sensitivity, the vulnerability, the same openness that I had carried after giving birth. BIRTH AND DEATH ARE INFINITELY INTERTWINED It is very difficult to talk about and face death when it accompanies birth. And yet it is a conversation that needs to be had. How do we hold Death as birth attendants, birthkeepers, as space holders for birth? I am not sure that I have the answers … but I do my best to initiate conversations and to create safe spaces for us to explore these topics that are so emotive and important in this work. The following True Midwifery online offerings will explore this topic in depth and from different perspectives, in a safe and held container and within a beautiful community: 25 July 2024 – STUDY SPIRAL: Holding Grief and Loss in Pregnancy and Childbirth with Nadia Maheter 4 September 2024 – 15 January 2025 – Birth First Aid for Mother and Baby 14 November 2024 – 13 November 2025 – Silent Birthkeeper: One Year Immersion into True...
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