Blessingways

A Mother-Centered Celebration

By Kelly Burgess

Bonnie Walker of Bend, Ore., first heard of Blessingways when she was invited to a friend's ceremony. She found it such a powerful, moving experience that when she became pregnant with her daughter she decided she wanted one as well. This was especially important to her since she was planning a home birth.

"It's very powerful to realize that all of these women are thinking of you and praying for you while you're in labor," says Walker, founder of WebBabyShower.com. "This gives the expectant mother a lot of spiritual support."

The Blessingway is part of a Navajo tradition encompassing much more than the transition into motherhood. It is a ceremony that hopes for good luck and good wishes for those who are experiencing any transition. The idea is to ensure good luck, good health and blessings.

From the Navajo tradition, the idea gradually made its way into the mainstream via the midwives and natural birth movements of the 1970s, says Yana Cortlund, a co-author of Mother Rising: The Blessingway Journey Into Motherhood (Seeing Stone Press, 2004). It is still primarily doulas and midwives and those who have had Blessingways who continue to spread the word about his special celebration.

Out of respect for the Native American culture, the modern Blessingway does not try to duplicate the Navajo ceremony; rather it appropriates the idea of giving strength to the new mother by building a spiritual community around her. Beyond that, it helps the woman find her own strength and abilities by connecting her with the tradition of motherhood. However, you don't have to consider yourself spiritual or religious to get a powerful, emotional benefit from a Blessingway.

"There certainly is a spiritual component in terms of trying to connect, but what we're trying to connect to is open," says Cortlund. "I did not consider myself spiritual or religious at all when I attended my first Blessingway, and that's OK because you can connect emotionally through the women in the circle by sharing their strength, or connect through yourself through the innate power women have. This is about our ability to give birth. We're made for it and western medicine has kind of lost that. Mothers have kind of been removed from the birthing process. This is a reclaiming of self."

Want to see more?

• Childbirth the Bradley Way
• Active Birth: The New Approach to Giving Birth Naturally
• Birthing from Within: Experiencing Childbirth in Your Own Way
• Talk about it!