In high school, I did do a career shadowing project with a labor and delivery nurse. I was able to experience the birth of a little boy. There was a woman in excruciating pain and she was throwing up and everything but once her son was out and she was holding him you could tell that the pain and the sickness were a distant memory for her. It was amazing to watch and I will never forget it.
In South Africa, women are horribly afraid of giving birth. They are expected to watch another woman give birth in order to face their fears. After birth, the mother is to be secluded to her hut until the bleeding stops and the placenta and cord is buried. It is said that the mother bites the cord and placenta is buried so that it is returned to mother earth. After that the mother waits for her child to urinate and pass a stool before the child is introduced to the village outside of the hut.
I learned that birthing in South Africa is something that I would not be interested in doing. However, I believe that if I was born and raised in South Africa, I wouldn't know any differently and would very easily participate in the birthing rituals performed there. I can't wait to give birth in a hospital with doctors to take care of me and the baby and be my support system if something goes wrong.
Littlejohn, M. (2010-2013, November 2). Spiritual
Birth. Retrieved from Spiritual Birth: The Spiritual Art of Birth:
www.spiritualbirth.net
I think you have a GREAT opportunity here to use your pregnancy here to help you learn first hand as we go through the development of children. You are experience a pretty amazing thing right now, and to be able to read and learn about what is actually going on in there must be really neat!
ReplyDeleteThat being said, it really saddens me that women in South Africa view birth as such a terrible experience. I have heard of the huts girls & women go to during the menstrual cycle every month, and it is also secluded. So from what I am reading here it looks like the mother and the child are secluded together? Or do they take the baby away until the mother "ready" to go back??
It seems so strange to me, yet as you said if we were born into the culture it would be no different than walking into the labor and delivery floor in a hospital. To them I am sure that seems strange! Thank you for sharing this and good luck with your pregnancy and sharing your experience so far with us.