Emerging from the dark, still conifers - lessons and reflections of 2024 - gestating offerings and birthing new creations

It always feels good to practice some discipline with AI and technology which is designed to feed off your attention, so for this reason I haven’t been using IG for last month or more to honour my attention and this sacred time of rest and celebration with family. I have enjoyed and cherished fully leaning into this time of still quietness and melting into the dark dream-like states of winter.

I now wish to share some of my reflections of 2024 as well as some little eggs I am sitting on. The last year has been a time of great change and accomplishments…

I started the birth circle, first in my beautiful ‘witch house’ in the woods and subsequently at the farm. It has been the call to gather women and an ever-expanding community… unifying my two passions of growing and nurturing the land with growing and nurturing communities centred around mothers and babies is a dream come true, and something very central to my original vision when I bought this land 5 years ago with my ambitious, lovely friends and partner. I didn’t know at the time that I would be focusing on birth outside the system, which has been an unexpected gift of ever multiplying blessings – bringing me closer to myself, to my most authentic understanding of what it is to practice midwifery – being with woman in ways aligned with my true calling and purpose.

I recorded an episode on my favourite podcast @freebirthsociety which was delicious - you can find it here https://open.spotify.com/episode/7Gal6ncjc7hrbHbUyr3ANz .

It was such a gift to honour and tell my story from NHS Midwife to Sovereign Birthkeeper – it’s wonderful to have the opportunity to introduce women who don’t know me yet to hear my heart speak and see part of my internal compass, and for those who know me to learn more about how and at what points I looked to my compass and the way that was shown to me that have led to where I am now.

I ran the first Instinctual Birth Workshop series, inviting 5 women and their partners into our barn for 6 weekend mornings by the log burner learning about physiological birth. The sessions felt expansive and cosy and such a privilege to enjoy each other’s company; sharing fears and dreams through art and circle, cultivating self-trust through guided exploration and realignment with ourselves as the only one true authority in birth and life.

I continued to work with women 1-1 who were seeking authentic support in their pregnancies; with the willingness to find confidence and clarity to birth into the truest version of themselves. It has been an honour and a privilege to witness women who had previously traumatic birth experiences not aligning with their desires; leaning into motherhood with grace, remembering to trust their bodies and unleashing a power within that they didn’t know existed.

I am constantly realigning with my own authentic self through this work. When I am offered the opportunity to work with women working closely with regulated ‘authorities’, my heart aches and I deeply want to support them. There is always the ache of wanting to save a mother from people and systems that are not resourced, educated and supportive of mother and babies’ best interests. And I know this isn’t my individual thread in the whole weave of birth support offerings. I am reminded by purpose that I must stand in my truth. I am grateful that we have infrastructure and systems in place to save peoples’ lives when they want it. And I am passionate about letting it be known and shouting from the rooftops that we still have the choice to birth at home with whomever we choose.  I am passionate about women educating themselves on all the available options and most of all I am passionate about women remembering that they and their babies are not separate from nature, and that when we let go, surrender and flow into the mystery of life, beautiful change and transformation emerges through and around us.

Much of the processes that we go through as women in pregnancy are mirrored in my own work in birth – I regularly re-commit to opening and allowing space for ideas and creations to be conceived, gestate and birth through me, I trust the flow of wild waters which I can feel before it is already here in the expansiveness that ripples and expresses through me and which cannot be planned for. This community that has gathered, the beautiful peaceful births I have witnessed and the knowledge and experience shared between circles of women is all evidence of this. All emerging in divine timing and all totally perfect.

I am bursting with gratitude for all of this and for my life, my family and everything that has flowed and been created for and within this gorgeous community.

The Wildwaters are flowing towards offering more coaching sessions with women online and in person, this is something that brings me so much joy; more Instinctual Birth Workshops and some more new offerings for this year- to be revealed soon - which will be rich, nourishing, expansive, cosy and connecting in-person delights!

You can join me on Instagram @wildwatersbirth where I will be posting weekly updates, offerings and goings on in the community. I am always available by email wildwatersbirth@gmail.com for any questions or to drop me a hello. I will also endeavour to share my writings via blog on a monthly basis which you can read here and get email notifications by signing up to my newsletter here:

https://www.wildwatersbirth.co.uk/

Love and blessings to you - may there be Stillness, space, intimacy and sound community in the year ahead.

Livi