To honor the Equinox, Bea and I spent the day among standing stones, a half billion year old mountain range, wild thyme patches, and a lovely space dedicated to St Brigid.
I showed her how to walk a labyrinth. Many lessons about motherhood channeled in today.
Lessons about balance. About walking in darkness. About letting the path roll out in front of you. Having faith in the grand design of it all while walking in confusion (THAT is real faith!). In moments of fear, trust the path. Trust it enough to take the next step. Sure. Steady. That's all you need to do. One foot in front of the other, keep between the stones, and be the fool.
The lessons reminded me of my transition into motherhood. About a month after Bea was born, I was raging and angry and beyond confused about what I (my body, brain, and spirit) went through over those two years between babies. Being pregnant with Callum and losing him in birth, getting pregnant with Bea 4 months later and being terrified I would lose her too (despite all her assurances and messages🙌!), I saw that I was eating myself from the inside out. I had no way of knowing what came next and how to calm the beast.
I felt so much of myself slipping away. I felt overwhelmed by the loss. I mourned. No one talks about it, but giving birth to a baby is easy. Birthing a mother is the hardest fucking thing.
During that time I was working intensely with my therapist-- giving all my trust to him to help guide me through these passages and dark spaces. He reminded me that my body was a slurry of birth trauma, death trauma, and postpartum hormones. I was coming down from emergency surgery, someone else's blood being in me, and a newborn who needed constant nurturing.
He said: trust the path of the Dark Mother. Trust where she's taking you. GO GET LOST, kid.
No one. Not a single person. Ever. Ever! Told me that. We're supposed to stay tethered. Together. Here.
So with his warm hands on my shoulders and words that worked wonders for my heart, I let her take me.
Sometimes it feels like I'm drowning. Sometimes it feels like I'm walking on water. But I let myself get lost in the labyrinth of life, of motherhood, of being.
