In a Wisconsin farmhouse kitchen in the fall of 1933, my grandmother Julia is in labor with twins. She feels the tightenings and knows the babies are coming soon. Yet her heart is so heavy. In the last two years she lost 17 year old Emma to a drunk driver, and 10 year old Mary to diphtheria. My grandmother has already lost 3 children, the pain of all this loss is almost more than her heart can bear. She feels no joy at the coming of these last two. Now 18 months later Julia is at the cemetery burying Herman, one of the twins. 

6 children out of 13 are gone. It’s hard for her to love my mother, as the surviving twin  she is a constant reminder of those who are no longer here. My mom grew up healthy and 25 years later, she is in labor too early. Bleeding with strong contractions she desperately tries to hold on to her own twins. At the hospital they take her away from the labor and delivery ward because they don’t want her dead babies to count against their birth statistics. My mom gives birth to her still born babies in a sterile operating room. She doesn’t get to hold them or say goodbye. There is no counseling or support for this terrible loss. No one speaks of it to her again.

Two years later, as I grow in her belly, my mom still carries the pain and grief of that terrible loss. And so this grief and loss moves through generations, with no path to healing.  Death is not acknowledged.  Her heart is numb. Programmed in utero from her mother’s deep grief, reinforced with the loss of her twin brother and the loss of her twin babies, my mother lives with pain everyday.

You see, conception is the creation of a life. While you are pregnant every ingredient that makes this life comes from your surroundings including your emotions and the stress that you carry. Your hormones reflect this life experience.  And so our miraculous brain develops to face the stresses that our parents are facing. This is a survival strategy.  If a baby is born to parents who are carrying a lot of stress, due to internal or external circumstances, their brian develops to favor self-regulation.  If a baby is born into love and peace, the brain develops to support creativity and exploration.

So you can see the odds were against me but luckily, I stand here before you today. 

I remember when I was 12, my mother wanted to find a way to deal with tension and anxiety. Twice a week she would take us to long yoga and meditation sessions. This was the beginning of my healing. Peace, presence and relaxation are seeded in my being and here I learned what it meant to choose love. And now it’s my turn, as eight years later, I’m standing in my own kitchen feeling the waves of labor as I welcome my first baby filled with joy and happiness. I have healed this legacy of grief and pain and started down a new path, not just for my children and myself, but also as a midwife and guide for all who create life.