Maternitate * Motherhood

Reflections of a becoming mother
May 2010

A friend told me once that she can only appreciate an experience in her life once it is over, I mean at the end of it. Well in my current situation, this sounds a bit familiar, but in a different perspective: somehow, you always find yourself drawn away from the present moment’s experience by an infinite number of issues that arise around you or inside you and that seem to be the most pressing elements of your life. I have just entered the last month (approximately) of my pregnancy time and here I am, realizing that I could have been more focused on the pregnancy and less on other – rather practical – issues.

I guess it is always a matter of own decision, determination and discipline: three very important d’s that we could actually apply to everything we do in our lives. It is by the way in which we “arrange” the different elements of our lives that we create the situations we find ourselves in. Of course, there are always a number of external factors that contribute, but it is probably our decisions and choices that determine most of what we undergo. My intention here is not to explain what is good and what isn’t, during pregnancy, or to bring in different perspectives on this matter and express a variety of ideas related to it. I simply want to tell about my own experience and my feelings, my thoughts, my questions during this time.

Often, I have asked myself how aware I am of what is going on inside my body, of the unbelievable processes that take place as part of another human being’s physical and spiritual development. And this development occurred inside me! This physical dimension of the pregnancy is sometimes the only one perceived by people; however, there is an invisible dimension as well, which finds various forms of expression and comprises its own processes. I have always found it, for example, very difficult to talk out loud to the baby inside my body – actually, I had no such urge, except for very few times. For me, the “talking” happens on another plane and what I mean is that actually there is some sort of communication between me and this baby, between the baby and me. Sometimes it is like the non-verbal communication between a human being and an animal; still, you cannot see the baby, but you can feel it and you know there is a very important physical connection between the two of you. This being is, in fact, not really part of my world; it is somewhere in-between worlds: it does not totally have a physical shape yet (not as we know it out here!) but it does have some physical shape… This being speaks about how we humans are formed, in body and soul, out of some other humans’ action and sentiment.

There is equal contribution of a man and a woman when a baby is conceived. Still, as the baby develops in the mother’s womb, the father’s contribution somehow becomes more blurry, unidentifiable, maybe even non-existent, depending on the case. What is now the connection between the baby and the father?
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I keep thinking that, once the baby is born, nothing will be the same anymore in my life. These 9 months are in some way a preparation for that state of things. This is the chance you get to understand how a new human being develops and gets ready to come into our world. My feeling is that, from its very conception, a baby is the mirror of what and who we are, as parents and as humans in general. We may not realize it or we may notice it later on in our lives. But the fact that I am pregnant tells me a lot about how the human being comes to live on Earth, about how it is formed, about the miracle of life. To a certain extent, it is almost like contemplating a plant producing new buds and the flower opening. However, in our case things are not so obvious, they are not being shown before our eyes like the plant shows itself (though, not even the plant shows everything). This entire process of growing into a human being happens within our bellies, inside our own bodies and usually, us humans are not very sensitive to this kind of phenomena… There are books that can help a future mother and father understand what is happening with the unborn child during each month of the pregnancy, from a physical point of view. But there is also observation and attention, there is feeling and awareness. Very hard to use… Sometimes you are not even aware that you are carrying another human being inside you, a fragile organism whom you are offering the conditions to form itself, to develop like the flower develops from the seed. Your belly becomes like that place inside the ground where the seed is planted, a warm dark place connected to the rest of the body and the rest of the world, which represents the most delicate and amazing space because it shelters the very formation of life. Your responsibility as a pregnant woman thus becomes huge! I often ponder about this and, as much as I don’t trust myself from time to time, this experience has made me realize that even self-confidence and responsibility are learned, that sometimes you just have to BE in a certain way – or you realize you ARE already that, because of the situation you are in.

I think this period is also very confusing, because your body and your being change so much and often you don’t know exactly what is happening to you and why. So it often happens that you don’t really focus on the baby inside, but rather on what is going on with your own physical being and self. Somehow, you know that the baby is not like one of your organs, but that it has its own personality, its own self, it is an entity of the same kind as you are, so you must treat it as such. In the beginning, this is hard to feel or be aware of. At the end of the nine months, it is so obvious! And your own attitude towards this new being changes along the nine months, as the “reality” of the baby comes closer and closer to the reality of our world. I am finding it amazing how physical, how material we are and how much this dimension of life matters during this time.
I have noticed, for example, that most often my baby reacts to my physical position and not so much to music or feelings or such things. If I adopt a position he or she does not like, I will definitely feel it! But then, maybe I am simply not so aware of the other dimensions… or maybe this process of the embodiment is just very important.

In any case, out of these 9 months, it is definitely the last ones that make you more aware of your pregnancy, that bring you closer to your unborn baby, that probably make you feel more. Is it because of the way we are, as humans, to a certain extent dominated by the physical, visible, solid aspects of our world and our lives? We may never even notice or feel that which is invisible, because it is so hard to do, because we are not used to it, because we don’t know how. You cannot see with your own eyes how your baby is growing every day during pregnancy – you have to use another “organ” of perception or maybe an organ of understanding, a faculty of the spirit etc. After all, life is not merely physical. But these different faculties, which allow you to see life in other dimensions as well, you need to develop and exercise permanently. I guess for a woman, becoming a mother can be a very good start for it! Some people start it before, others never do it. It may be more difficult for men, as they do not have a direct physical connection with the new being, like the mother has – on the other hand, this can actually make it easier for them!

Hmm, lots and lots of new experiences and feelings, many questions, unknown elements, different aspects of life. Sometimes you may think that you have wanted to have this baby and that you have determined its existence. But what if it is exactly the opposite? What if this baby has wanted to come into the world and you have just helped it, as an instrument for its becoming? I am definitely convinced that this is, possibly, the most intense and serious lesson about life that the human being (or at least a woman) can receive. Of course it is up to each and every one of us to see this experience as a lesson and to allow ourselves to be taught. In this case, we decide what we take from it and what we don’t, so we determine its impact – more or less consciously. I think is up to us how we “use” these 9 months and also, how we will use the rest of the time we spend as parents, to understand ourselves and our lives better, with the help of our children.