by Veronique Rioux | Nov 3, 2022 | news
Can giving birth be a traumatic event?
As a mother of three children, I know from experience how birthing a child into the world can be a traumatic event. I don’t think we talk about it enough.
My intention in sharing my story is to help you share yours as well. It’s important to talk about your experience and to feel heard, to release some of the emotions and not just store them inside of you.
When I was pregnant with my first child, I read lots of books and watched birth videos. I was supervised by a midwife and followed the recommended schedule of appointments with my partner to be as prepared as possible.
Although we thought we were informed and prepared, it turned out to be a traumatic event, and we were not at all prepared for the way things went.
How a home birth with midwife turned into traumatic childbirth
We had decided to do a home birth with a birthing pool. We thought that being at home would be the safest and easiest option. Looking back, I wish we had visited the obstetric department at the hospital and seen how convenient, luxurious, and private it was. I also wish I had known how messy birth was, and that we had known about the cleaning up that was required after birth — which you don’t have to do at the hospital!
My water broke at 8 pm while we were watching a movie. I was lying down on the couch and heard a “pop” sound. I stood up, and water started to leak down on my leg onto the floor. We got excited and wondered what the next step was — should we fill up the birthing pool? Call the midwife? We decided to go for a short walk to help the labour progress, and started to monitor the contractions. The contractions were far apart, and we tried to rest that night.
The next morning, we called the midwife, and she came mid-morning. She said I was in active labour, dilated at 3 cm, and would have a baby by dinner time. I now see that this was a mistake that set me up with unrealistic expectations, and from that point on, I kept on looking at the time.
An unplanned visit to the hospital: emergency birth
At midnight the midwife told me that I was fully dilated and told me to start pushing, even though I didn’t feel the urge to push. As I started to push, my cervix kept swelling over the baby’s head and she had to put her hand into my vagina to push the cervix back over the baby’s head. I pushed for three hours without progress.
At 3 am, without any warning, the midwife told us that we had to go to the hospital. After 31 hours of labour, this caught us by surprise. She hadn’t advised us to have a bag ready just in case. I guess we should have known, but . . . we didn’t.
Once we arrived at the hospital, the doctor tried forceps, which was quite traumatizing on its own to see how much force and yanking the doctor used to try to get the baby out. When that didn’t work, we were told that they were going to do an emergency C-section.
My partner had to leave the room while they gave me a spinal, which is a little different than an epidural, but has a similar purpose. The anesthesiologist wasn’t careful or professional and kept trying to puncture me while I was having contractions. At this point, I had been through over 30 hours of labour without any sleep or much rest and I was exhausted. They punctured me over a dozen times before succeeding.
After they finally injected me with a spinal, they rolled me toward the operating room for an emergency C-section. My partner was allowed to be back with me. I remember not being able to feel or move my legs anymore, and crying, telling my partner I was scared while he was holding my hand. Our baby boy was finally born, and we were taken to a recovery room.
Complications
Over the next few days at the hospital, I kept complaining about a stiff neck and sore head. I was being told it was muscle pain from birth and that everything would be okay once I recovered. I kept saying that I know my body, and that it didn’t feel like normal muscle pain and stiffness.
I was sent home three days later, and the symptoms didn’t improve. They kept getting worse. I had to wear sunglasses inside the house because light was affecting me. I had a massive headache and couldn’t hold my head upright. When I started asking my husband if he could hear “bird noises” in the house, he decided to take me back to the hospital, where I was told that I was suffering from a spinal fluid leak. They had to take blood from my arm and inject it into my spine in the hope of “sealing” the leak. It magically worked, and I was sent back home to recover again.
This was a difficult adjustment, recovering from this traumatic event while also recovering from the C-section, and learning to look after our first baby.
Understanding Traumatic Birth
I wish the story ended there, but our son suffered a kink in his neck from the forceps, and it took us a while to realize it. He was crying all the time in pain, and we couldn’t understand what was going on.
The first couple of years as a parent were difficult, and I wish that I had had more support to navigate the difficult emotional recovery. Looking back, I wish that someone had talked to me about it, to help me process the event. This is where a counsellor can help you, through talk therapy and somatic processing.
Addressing Traumatic Birth Experiences
With our second son, I managed to have a vaginal birth after the previous C-section, and was only in labour for eight hours. The third time around, at 42 years old, was fantastic! I felt empowered, cared for, supported, and managed to have a vaginal birth without any tears because of the excellent doctor and nurse that were with us.
My partner caught the baby, and our third son came out into the world peacefully without even crying. It was beautiful. We’re feeling blessed and grateful.
Make sure you check my post about “Exercising During Pregnancy: My Personal Experience, Tips for Staying Healthy and Dispelling Myths”
You can slo check my post about “Nurturing Harmony: A Guide to Healthy Family Dynamics and Effective Parenting“.
by Veronique Rioux | Sep 13, 2022 | news
Favourite lessons from A Course in Miracles
A decade ago, a friend recommended that I do the self-study daily lessons from the book called A Course in Miracles, also referred to as ACIM, or The Course, written in 1976 by Helen Schucman.
I’ve tried many times, but had such a difficult time with the Christian terminology that I couldn’t get through it. Then when I started my three-year Transpersonal Therapeutic Counselling program with Clearmind, it was part of the program. We were strongly encouraged to work through A Course in Miracles, as many other universal spiritual teachings also recommend it. In fact, it’s often referred to as a system of spiritual psychology.
What is A Course in Miracles and what has it taught me?
Since the book first came out in 1976 it has been translated into 27 languages and has been distributed around the world.
The premise is that the greatest “miracle” is the act of simply gaining a full “awareness of love’s presence” in a person’s life, designed to bring a state of happiness and peace to the student through the application of its principles.
“A Course in Miracles is a modern-day program for healing the Mind, removing all judgment, learning to trust the Higher Self/Holy Spirit/Intuition, and coming to consistent Peace of Mind.” —David Hoffmeister
The Course aims to help us remove the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence and to start listening to our inner teacher, the “Voice for God.”
The 1250-page, three-volume curriculum consists of a Text, Workbook for Students, and Manual for Teachers. It teaches that the way to universal love and peace—or remembering God—is by undoing guilt through forgiving others. The Course thus focuses on the healing of relationships and making them holy. A Course in Miracles is a universal spiritual teaching, not a religion.
The lessons do not require a lot of time, nor long practice periods, but they do require a willingness to question every value one holds, beliefs as to what the world is all about, and the willingness to see things differently—through the eyes of God.
The teachings of the Course are non-dualistic, based on the belief that there is a oneness which connects us all. It’s a unified field of awareness where everything is completely connected. Every star, galaxy, atom, and molecule are all connected, even though the ego believes in space, time, and distance, which makes it seem like we’re disconnected and separate.
The physical world we appear to be in is an illusion of our own making. It is a manifestation of our false belief in separation. There is no separation between God and ourselves or therefore, between any of us.
God is love, eternal and infinite, and all there is. We are God’s one creation. God only creates beings like Himself, and we remain as God created us, innocent and whole. God did not create pain, death, guilt or fear, so although they exist in our experience, they are not real.
The Course aims at removing the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence. Rather than trying to change external circumstances, the Course teaches us to change our perceptions about the world.
My insights
As I worked through the course, I realized that I couldn’t recognize my own perfection. Feeling either “less than” or “better than” kept me in constant separation thinking. I spent so much energy either defending or attacking this idea.
We keep feeling unworthy because we keep denying the worthiness of our brothers and sisters. The judge feels judged, and the attacker always feels attacked. It’s an inside job.
Through the teachings, we seek not to change the world but to change our mind about ourselves.
The peace of God is reached through the practice of forgiveness. ACIM is teaching us about our perfect equality; that everyone and everything is perfectly equal. We are reflections of this Divine Oneness. We need to be freed from all these ego beliefs of inferiority and superiority, of having a false sense of pride, as well as shame and deep unworthiness. All of these concepts are part of a mask that’s worn to act as a cover over our true Christ Identity.
The study and learning of A Course in Miracles can be like climbing a ladder. Each rung represents a new realm of understanding where beautiful pearls of wisdom have more and more depth the higher one climbs. It’s a pathway of quantum forgiveness.
The psychology concepts ACIM talks about are projection, repression, and denial—the dynamics of the ego that keep us trapped. We remain locked in defense and attack whenever we are using these mechanisms. That’s what the Workbook is about, clearing away the ego debris from the mind, and learning how to trust in Spirit and let go of judgment, criticism, and condemnation.
Every lesson gives an opportunity for deeper learning. That’s why there are so many books that try to explain and deepen the teachings of ACIM! There are also study groups to help really embody the teachings.
For example, let’s work with this one for a moment: “I am never upset for the reason I think (Lesson 5).”
Whatever you’re upset about is an illusion. I am more interested in the truth than in the stories we make up. Come back into right mind and be miracle-minded. Notice that every time we’re upset, we have given meaning to something that is not true.
Practice saying, “I am never upset for the reason I think. I am willing to know the truth and light up my mind. To find the kingdom within and stop looking outside of myself.”
The only happiness there is comes from finding the kingdom within. Let’s align with truth.
Favourite lessons from A Course in Miracles
- I see only the past (Lesson 7)
- I am determined to see things differently (Lesson 21)
- God is in everything I see (Lesson 29)
- I am not the victim of the world I see (Lesson 31)
- I could see peace instead of this (Lesson 34)
- My holiness blesses the world (Lesson 37)
- God goes with me everywhere I go (Lesson 41)
- There is nothing to fear (Lesson 48)
- I am the light of the world (Lesson 61)
- Love holds no grievances (Lesson 68)
- I am entitled to miracles (Lesson 77)
- I am spirit (Lesson 97)
- Forgiveness is the key to happiness (Lesson 121)
- Love is the way I walk in gratitude (Lesson 195)
- Today belongs to love. Let me not fear (Lesson 274)
- All fear is past and only love is here (Lesson 293)
How does this land with you? Have you ever studied A Course in Miracles? Would you?
Want to read more? Check out my post about Healing power of counselling session outdoor.
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