Childbirth, Eros and Sexuality
This has been a long requested Study Spiral and Debora is the perfect person to bring this offering to these sessions. She is a beautiful and tender birth attendant who truly understands what it means to guard and protect birth and she has immersed herself a myriad of teachings on intimacy, touch and sexuality. She has a deep understanding of how these worlds are intertwined and I very much look forward to what she will be sharing with us. In this session, we’re going to explore something truly extraordinary—the deep, interconnected system that makes human life on Earth possible. Menstruation, sexuality, orgasm, pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding are all part of one grand design—a bridge between dimensions. This system connects cosmic and earthly consciousness, the divine and the animal, celestial mechanics and our physical bodies. The reproductive-sexual system is the sacred shrine where life itself is propagated, and in this session, we’ll restore a vision that brings birth and sexuality together into a single, beautiful tapestry. We’ll uncover how the continuity of life—across all species—is intimately linked to pleasure and eros. Join us as we honor the extraordinary system that sustains life and explore how birth and sexuality are woven together in ways that are both powerful and sacred. About Debora In the field of love and eros, I am an all-round activist, from the political-socio-cultural to the holistic-spiritual-shamanic perspective. I practice Yoga of Touch and facilitate circles, retreats and individual session on pleasure, intimacy, sensuality, relating, communication, emotional and bodywork. I am a birthkeeper and doula, deeply involved in public speaking and advocating in this field. I deal with attachment parenting, spontaneous learning, non-directive education, trauma and conditioning related to the primal period and childhood, unlearning, paradigm shifts. Death and grief doula. Facilitator of group processes. Passionate about deep ecology, bioregionalism, biophilia, I accompany groups and individuals in nature connection activities, wilderness awareness, outdoor education and experiential learning. MusicArTherapist, percussionist, vocalist, performer, dance teacher. I make goddesses and vulvas from clay. Traveller, expert in divergent lifestyles, activist. Debora’s Social Media Links Instagram Facebook Telegram To book for the upcoming study spiral see...
Read MoreI hardly know where to begin to describe the impact of The Silent Birthkeeper course…
and the deeply safe and nourishing community that comes with it – has had on my life. I just gave birth to my firstborn. Having had the immense blessing of having my pregnancy unfold in tandem with this course. Currently he is nuzzled up against my chest in our dimly lit birthing cave. He’s 5 days old. I’ve felt the calling towards becoming a traditional birthkeeper ever since I was a little girl, listening to the tales of my grandmother. Of how the women of the frozen tundra gave birth, close to the fire, safely nestled inside their tents, with their sisters and grandmothers humming outside. The men out hunting, seeking an offering for a safe passage of the new soul. Never until now though, have I actually been present in a birthing space. The arrival of my baby boy was my initiation. Both to motherhood, and to the deep deep certainty that supporting women to feel empowered, loved and safe during conception, childbearing, childbirth and beyond – is a prayer I’ll devote my life towards. I’ve experienced first hand the impact that the teachings, love, support and wisdom offered through this course and its wonderful teachers – can have on a woman journeying towards motherhood. As well as on a birthkeeper at the very beginning of her path. It has taught me why birthkeeping matters. The importance of self care as we aim to care for others. I has made me realise how common it is for women to birth without having the basic needs of a woman in labour met. It has made me ask around among my own friends, sisters, mothers – and learn of their birth stories. Listening to them has made me realise even more the extent of the unspoken trauma that so many women experience during birth. Their feeling of loneliness. Of isolation. I am so deeply grateful to Ruth, Lana, Samara and all the wonderful guest teachers coming to us from all over the world. Showing up in this deeply held container to share their stories, their work and their experience with us. Truly it is such a gift. The teachings I’ve received and the friends that I’ve made here,I will carry with me for the rest of my life. – Noo, Artist, Mother and Silent Birthkeeper 2023-2024 Welcome little one! Your magnificent Mama! For more information or to book your place on the upcoming Silent Birthkeeper one-year immersion please 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 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 MoreWhy Birth First Aid?
The First Time I Ever Resuscitated a Baby on my own I remember the first time I had to resuscitate a baby on my own. It had been a fairly average first labour. It started in the middle of the night and trotted along into the new day. The mother was surprised at the intensity of the surges but she rode them quietly and stoically. The emergence of the baby was slow and as her mother crouched, she was born gently onto the floor onto a soft pile of towels. Some mothers scoop their babies up immediately, while others take their time, looking, smelling, and touching. Still, others need to take their time, first processing the enormity of the event before being able to look and engage. As long as the space is warm and the mother and baby are left undisturbed all are variations of normal. In this case, the mother was slow to interact with her baby, I believe she was initially taken aback at the sight of her newborn. It became evident that this baby was not responding after being born, not showing much muscle tone and not breathing. Helping Babies Breathe I had recently been trained in the Helping Babies Breathe (HBB) programme as a facilitator through Operation Smile and worked as a volunteer for some of their educational missions in Africa. What I love about this programme is its simplicity: its focus on normal birth, preparedness, its understanding for working in low-resourced and out-of-hospital settings, as well as the all important MotherBaby needs like skin-to-skin and not cutting the umbilical cord. As a skilled birth attendant, you make a difference In the HBB programme, we are taught that the majority of babies are totally fine at birth and require little more than skin-to-skin contact with their mother – but that around 10% require gentle assistance in transitioning from womb life. These are some of the skills we will be focusing on in the upcoming Birth First Aid series of workshops that I will be offering for the month of November. Extreme neonatal resuscitation is rare in healthy pregnancies and births and usually is an indicator of some other underlying issue. Why Birth First Aid? If we are attending births on a regular basis, especially when a birth is left to unfold as it should, we come into contact with the beauty and simplicity that is birth and we receive the regular imprint that birth works and that birth is safe. But every once in a while, nature throws us a curve ball, and in the same way as we expect someone who works with children to be prepared if a child chokes, we want to be prepared for those rare times when a mother or baby does require assistance. In the case of the birth I was describing at the beginning of this post/letter – it felt clear that this baby was struggling. Muscle memory from my HBB training kicked in, and with her cord still attached and intact, between her mother’s legs on the floor, we worked together to gently remind her that she needed to breathe. And she did… I invite you to join us We will be gathering weekly for the month of November on these dates: 2, 9, 16, and 23 November 2022 via zoom from 11am – 2pm SAST (GMT+2) COST: 130 Euro / 130 USD / 1250 ZAR All sessions will be recorded and made available to you for one month after the call For more information or to book your place please email me at truemidwife@gmail.com What we will cover over...
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