Spirit in Action
Midwifery - Martha Nieman & Brenda Gagnon
I have no hands but yours to tend my sheep. No handkerchief but yours to dry the eyes of those who weep. I have no arms but yours with which to hold. The ones grown weary from this struggle and weak from growing old. I have no voice but yours with which to see. To let my children know that I am out and out is everything. I have no way to feed the hungry souls. No clothes to give or make it and the more. So be my heart, my hand, my tongue through you and will be done. The enders have my none to help and die. Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark Helpsmeet. Each week I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service. Above all, I'll seek out light, love and helping hands, being shared between our many neighbors on this planet, hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred fruit in your own life. I have no way to open people's eyes, except that you will show them how to trust the inner mind. My guests today on Spirit in Action are Martha Nieman and Brenda Ganyan. Martha and Brenda are nurse midwives in Eau Claire with a few decades of experience between them. They share in this program of the spiritual nature of their work and how it flows from and is rooted in their spiritual lives. Martha was raised as a daughter of a preacher, eventually became an ordained elder in the Presbyterian Church, though she has now become a Quaker and transferred her membership to Eau Claire Friends meeting. Brenda grew up in the United Church of Christ, converted to Catholicism as a young adult, attended United Theological Seminary in the Twin Cities, and is currently a part of Unity Christ Center in Eau Claire. Before we speak with Martha and Brenda, let's first listen to a song by Carol Johnson called Welcome Little One. [Music] Welcome, Welcome Little One. [Music] May your feet be sure your heart be strong, lift your face to the store, and wet your tongue. If you're not where you go, it's where you're from. Welcome Little One. Welcome, Welcome Little One. Preations wonder, daughters, sons, and the gift of human thought will come little one. As you fly up light, a butterfly, embrace the cocoon that gives you life. We would love you, we'll be your guides. Welcome to this life, welcome, welcome little one. Preations wonder, daughters, sons, heavenly gift of human thought will come little one. A race for you and can't parade for birth and life, death and decay, life's circle dance, come join, come land. Life to life again, welcome, welcome little one. Preations wonder, daughters, sons, and the gift of human thought will come little one. [Music] I want to thank you Martha and Brenda for taking time today to visit with us in spirit in action. Are both of you not on call and not on duty today at Luther Middleford? The other midwives are holding down the fort, Annie Bailey and Tara Saban are our other partners at Luther Middleford. I'm sure that there's some confusion in some of our listeners mind when you actually say the word midwife. I think there is a nurse midwife which I think what both of you are, but there are also lay midwives. Can you either of you explain to me the difference between those two? Brenda? Yeah, and they are not really called lay midwives anymore. The ones that are doing home births who have birth centers like Paula in Menominee is actually a certified professional midwife. They are not registered nurses, they don't have master's degrees, but they are very well trained. They're actually working towards licensure in our state right now. qualified nurse midwives have been practicing in the United States since the 1950s. Obviously midwifery has been around since the beginning of time. It did go away with allopathic medicine coming in and making a stand on them. Physicians giving the very best care that was available to women. Women then demanded a more personalized type of care in midwifery, which included itself in the United States. The way that the certified nurse midwives are trained mainly is through a master's prepared program. We all have bachelor's degrees and went back and got our master's degree. Very intense training, like an internship at the end of the training. There is several other ways to obtain certification through degree programs, but that's the main way that all four of us have got ours. You mentioned that certified professional midwives do home births. Does that mean that you can't do home births? That that's not allowed for a nurse midwife as you practice it? Martha? No, there are nurse midwives, there are certified professional midwives, and there are even physicians who have home birth practices. So it's mainly a matter of the decision of the need, you know, from the community and the provider, making a decision of where their venue is going to be, where their philosophies, how they want to be involved with the established medical system, the kind of services they want to provide. There aren't any legal restrictions as to the location of birth. I have a friend who's from the Netherlands. She's a midwife there, and in that case they have typically about a third of all births in the country at home. What are the statistics like in the United States? Is it one tenth or one one hundredth of the people who have home births? Brenda? I honestly don't know the statistics. I mean, I would imagine that they would vary state to state dramatically, but it is very lopsided in our country. There is not a large number of home births. There certainly is women in our community and around our state who have had home births and have been extremely pleased with that kind of care. Since I don't know the stats, I don't want to even quote anything, but it's not a number that is like a third. And Martha? The last statistics I remember for the number of births that are attended by nurse midwives was around 20%. So home birth is probably a lot less than that since most nurse midwives practice in a hospital setting. This change that you mentioned, Brenda, from, I guess, essentially doctors being in control of it, doing surgery to get the baby out to more of a midwife presence. When did that really gather steam? When did that kind of change start to come into the public presence? With the resurgence of midwifery coming out of Kentucky, basically nurse midwifery, probably women in general demanded a different kind of care starting in the 60s. Midwifery started to very much grow in the early 70s. The biggest boom of nurse midwives coming out of college prepared, master prepared programs and attending births has increased steadily since the 1970s. I'm sure a lot of us have relatively little idea of what a nurse midwife does. Are you just a replacement for the doctor? Does that mean that doctor only comes in under emergency? What do you actually do as a nurse midwife? Martha? Midwives provide care to women who have uncomplicated pregnancies and childbirth, and that also extends to well woman care throughout the lifespan. So we provide the basic services of the actual physical care, but also expanding that to a more nursing model that includes emotional care as well as consideration of needs related to family and relationships with the community, emotional, spiritual aspects as well as purely the physical. So we, as far as function, perform a lot of the same physical examination and assessment functions that physicians do looking for any signs of complications that might require the involvement of a physician if there are problems found. There are some common variations of health that midwives can manage, but basically it's provision of health, an attitude of focusing on the natural course of events in a woman's life and helping her maximize her health in her normal life passages, as well as providing education and information that allows a woman to make a choice about what is best for her, since she is the one that knows herself and what she needs, what her strengths are, what her lacks and needs for information are so that she can choose her care, that best suits what she needs. We include the family. A lot of what we do is empowerment of women and giving them support and strength and recognition of their own areas of strengths and wisdom to maximize their quality of life. It's interesting that you use the word wisdom. The word for midwife in French is Sajfam, which means wise women, in fact. Is it a profession that men can go into? Are they specifically barred from being midwives? Brenda? I had a male midwife student with me as I went through the University of Colorado Health Science Center in Denver. He was a wonderful, wonderful, nurturing man and he became a midwife. Lots of people did tease him about are you a mid husband or are you a midwife? But what midwife means is with women. Anybody who is willing to be fully present with women, educate, empower is a midwife. Whether it would be, I mean, you know, in a global sense, any time any of us nurture each other, stand in the presence, are with somebody in non-judgment and unconditional love, we would be a midwife in that moment. So, yeah, men can be midwives. Martha? I'd like to add that midwife isn't necessarily even a title of a profession. And it can be men, it can be women, it can be doctors. I've known some physicians who function as midwives, even though that's not their title. And unfortunately, I've known some nurses and some midwives that I felt were not with women and were in a more functional and authoritarian kind of role. So, I think a lot of it has to do with a philosophy that a person holds. Is it a hard sell in today's medical world to advocate for midwifery? Earlier, Brenda, you mentioned an allopathic approach to medicine, to care. And I'm not sure that our medical world has changed from that orientation. Is it something that's really been hard to sell to the medical establishment? Brenda? In response to that question, I'm going to respond from looking at people who come in for our service. It seemed like probably 13 years ago when I started in this community, very much of the time I was doing a lot of education about what midwifery was in relationship to what a physician provided when patients came in to see me. But now, it seems like more and more people come in knowing somewhat what they're going to get from making a conscious decision to come to the midwifery group for a more personalized, potentially care. Wanting to know their care provider, even though there's four of us, they meet all four of us. So, each one of us have a relationship with that woman. So, when someone comes in to deliver their baby, they know that person. And actually, we come in when they come in and labor and stay with them through the whole process, which is a little bit different than the style of care that physicians give. I think that people are much more open these days to alternatives. They see that medicine, Western medicine has a lot of answers for a lot of people, but not for everyone. And they want to know beyond just, "This is what you should do." They want to know why. They want to know what their options are. Other resources to go to midwifery is very successful at giving women options. So, a lot of people are coming to us for that particular reason. There isn't a lot of friction between midwifery and Western medicine. I think that physicians in general noticed that the midwives do have a clientele, that there is a reason why we're there, that respect is growing for our wisdom, our medical knowledge, and the way that patients respond and our outcomes that are very good. Martha? I think that since the 60s, and that's the time in our culture when the attitudes changed from the focus on science and the expert in the 50s to a more grassroots, "Hey, we know something about ourselves and can participate in medical decisions discussions happened." And so, since that time, I think there's been an increasing teamwork that is developed. And from that approach, and I practiced prior to coming to Eau Claire in an environment that was not conducive to midwifery and was not welcoming to midwifery. But what was welcomed was the teamwork approach. Namely, there are certain skills and gifts that I offer to clients that fortunately, because midwifery has a focus on health, I don't need to worry about taking care of all the problems, you know, that can happen. But if there's a problem, then the physician is there, and so we work kind of in tandem. The nursing approach, the midwifery approach is that of health, and we are with the women in their experiences in health. If they need to have medical care that's, you know, complicated and involves a lot of intervention, then we can provide that form. And I think that that has been recognized as being a help, that there isn't any one person that can be all things to all people at all times, and that we each have our part to play. The reason I invited the two of you here for spirit and action is because I do see particular issues of birth and death as strongly related to spiritual work. Do you see the work that you do as specifically spiritual? Martha? The way my spirituality is developed, I see any profession as being an avenue for spirituality. I mean, I remember a grocery store clerk. She had spirituality in her being, and as she was cashing my groceries, it was just wonderful to be around her, so I think that anyone can tap into the spirit and action in what they do. I'm particularly blessed to be in midwifery because it's so easy. It's just right there, and it's possible for spirituality to get lost in the nuts and bolts of, okay, here you need to take this medicine and hear these symptoms and here's this intervention. It's possible to lose that, but the fact that we're dealing with transitions in life, rights of passage, very basic life experience as birth. I mean, the mystery is just right there, and it's an avenue, and I guess that's when I even first realized just in my own experience that just going through the experience of pregnancy and birth, it opens you up to spiritual things like other situations don't. Brenda? I'm like Martha, I believe every job could be turned into a service job in spirit, just coming with a good attitude, a loving heart, and me too. I feel like I'm blessed to be a midwife, that being my service work and my income. It is amazing every time to meet the women in the beginning when they first find out they're pregnant, watch them grow, watch them change, evolve. I talk to them about labor and delivery as kind of a spirit quest where they have to go to the edge, and then they come back, they give birth, they create life, and in that moment they're never the same again, they're changed. Those are spiritual moments, and they're also moments we never forget in our lives. We grow from those, we gain strength from them. Just the element of knowing that a baby that comes out is so fresh from God. Every one of them that comes in, I say, "Welcome to the world, you're here, we're so glad you're here." If I can get them alone, I say, "Okay, whisper to me, what was it like up there? I know you're fresh enough, you know?" It really is amazing looking into their eyes and knowing that we can do everything we can do in the most highest way for care, and everything is really up to God, creator. It's very humbling, very humbling. A lot of it's about surrendering and encouraging the woman to surrender, and also it's such a good opportunity to talk to women about faith, about trust, about their beliefs. I don't have any set beliefs other than I know in my heart that there's a higher power, and just helping them explore some of those things. It's an amazing time. Martha? The moment of birth that I find to be most powerful is right after the baby is born, and we pass the baby up to the mother, and the father is not always, but when the father or the family, the loved ones, they're all around that baby and all focused in, and it's just the epitome of love. It's just a cloud of love there, and it's impossible. I mean, I get goosebumps even now, just thinking about it. It's just so wonderful to see that outpouring of love for that baby. And to me, that is a perfect metaphor of God, and an example of that is what God is all about, and that's why we're all here. That's the essence of spirit, is to see that love just surrounding all of those people, and it just is wonderful. Then the packers being very masculine and not showing feelings to see tears in their eyes, it just opens your heart, and that's a time when everybody's heart is totally open. I guess another thing is that here is this baby that's born and is absolutely untouched, new to the world, complete innocence, pure, and just to look into a newborn baby's eyes. And just see the utter potential that is there in that being, just being able to love that child and wonder, "Okay, how is this baby's life going to bloom and blossom and grow?" I mean, it's impossible to miss. Part of what happens is that scene draws everyone, and everybody knows that's been around birth, is that everybody shows up. The animals at the farm come up to the farmhouse. People will come around, even in the hospital setting. They're just drawn to that because it is so attractive to be a part of that mystery and a part of that wonderful situation. That's something that I noticed in my own birth experience that I first realized that sense of awe. I could feel that being at the center of that, and as a woman, I don't know, I suppose it's pride of a sort, but to think, "I'm this part of creation. Here's new life here, and it came from me." There's been a lot ever since the rise of feminism about honoring or not honoring women. That is one time in our society that recognition of honoring of women is noted. In the caveman days when we had no idea where babies came from, and men didn't realize what their part was in it, women were viewed as goddesses at that time. Because all of a sudden, this whole person came out of this woman, and she was honored as a goddess, the honor that we see for women that are pregnant. That does my heart good to see that. It is exemplified in people, strangers, asking how you are. People come up and touch your stomach. There's this resident who drove me crazy when I was pregnant. I always had to put his hands on my stomach when I was pregnant. It was irritating, but that's honoring. That's honoring right. I think it's really wonderful, and I think part of what is spiritual for women in that situation is they realize the uniqueness that they have, the power that they have. That connection with creation, that they deserve love and honor and respect, and sometimes they don't get to know that in other settings. That's what I especially love to see is women honoring themselves and feeling so wonderful about themselves. They've come through this trial, this challenge, this initiation, and they feel that sense of strength that comes from spirit, I think. And Martha, as you were speaking, you mentioned about the innocence of children. I was raised Catholic, and in Catholicism, you have infant baptism because you have to get rid of original sin. I'm a Quaker now. I don't think the same way. What concept do either of you have about this sinfulness, blessedness of the child as it comes out into the world? Martha? Well, I guess I see it going back to Eden, and when I see a baby born, it's like we're all back in Eden before the fall. And so, theologically, I don't view this baby as being tainted already by sin. My personal belief is of a creator that is loving and good and creates only good things, and that, in fact, there's a Catholic Matthew Fox who has a whole developed theology about that, namely, that no, we are not created sinful. We are created good. So, that's where I come from. So, I do not view babies as being sinful or dirty or have anything that they need to atone for at that point. There are others that may disagree with me, but that's my particular belief. And just the example of Jesus, Jesus never ever had anything bad to say about children. In fact, He suggested that we should all be like them. So, we all need to become a little bit more childlike in our attitudes and the way we are to each other and the way we are to God as children to a loving parent. When my son was born, my ex-wife would just say, "How could anyone imagine that there is some kind of sin connected with this blessed child coming into the world?" And when I got home from work one day when my son was nine months old, she said, "Mark, I found out original sin starts at nine months." She saw a look across his face, which was just contrary and mean. And she said, "Okay, nine months, that must be when it happens." Martha? Well, I think that because we are human, we all have the potential for evil. And we have the option to choose how we are going to respond and act in our lives. And so I think that's where we have to get into a decision-making position. There's a lot of remnants of spare the ride and spoil the childhood. If you listen to a baby's cries and answer all the time when they're even in the first year that you're going to spoil the child somehow. And in the first year, babies don't have those little machines that are when they're everything, "Okay, now, what can I do to get my way?" So I think that there's a grace period that we have. The other part, and it's one of the essence of Quaker, beliefs is that there is that of God in everyone. And that is, I think, the truth and I think that's where our life leads us to return, namely, what we do in our life is a struggle to get back to that original state in which we were born, namely that of innocence and purity and total connection with Spirit and God. I think now it might be a good time for me to invite each of you to give a little bit of both your professional and religious spiritual history. How did you get to the point where you're doing this work? And I think particularly I'd like to hear what motivated you towards this particular spiritual avenue of living things out in your life. Brenda? I became a nurse midwife. I had never heard of midwifery as a nurse. I had grown up in the Midwest, and midwifery tends to be a more liberal type of being. I was very conservative there. So when I went to Colorado and I was searching for a place to dig my roots in, I wanted to find something to get my master's degree in. So I went to several different departments and worked as a nurse, and then I went to labor and delivery and instantly fell in love with the whole experience. But more than that, I could empower a woman all the way up to the very moment of the baby coming out, and then if a physician who wasn't fully present would come in, the woman's power would be completely taken away. I would see her going from a completely interactive, fully present person in the moment, and then by being treated, like she's won in a million, like a number, not listened to. For an example, a woman saying, "No, please don't cut my bottom. Don't give me an episiotomy unless I really, really need one." Well, I do them routinely, cut the bottom. The woman, I literally saw women fall back in the bed and become invisible as their baby came out. And this was several years ago. I'm just sure that doesn't happen very much anymore, especially here in Eau Claire. But that drove me to know that I needed to be in a position where I could empower women all the way through the whole process, that I could prevent anyone from taking their power away. And spiritually, I grew up in a Protestant, United Church of Christ background, converted to Catholicism at 19, raised my children when they were small in the Catholic Church, and I still love the ritual of the Catholicism. I did not always believe in a lot of the rules and regulations related to the Church, so the dissonance actually made me look for somewhere else, and then I became Methodist, did a lot of youth group mission trips, and that was very fun and exciting. And then now I go to Unity, Christ Center here in Eau Claire, which is a very ecumenical view, a very large view of God, all loving, compassionate God, which definitely resonates with me. I also have a significant group of friends who are practicing Native American spirituality and doing earth-healing ceremonies, water-healing ceremonies, and have been a part of that, and that's been a fabulous, magical experience. Oh, and by the way, at one point, when I was a midwife, I was really searching for answers, and I wasn't finding them in the church setting. In fact, I was in a class where we were studying the Old Testament in the, you know, the most amazing story in the Old Testament pretty much is the Moses story, but I didn't understand why it was written, Yahweh hardened Pharaoh's heart. I couldn't understand why it would be written that way and why God would harden Pharaoh's heart, and when I asked about it, I was told I wasn't supposed to ask that question. You know, I was being disrespectful, and I thought, I have got to go somewhere where the scholars are speaking about how this is written, who wrote it, what is the information so that I can make my own decisions about some of these things. So I went to seminary. I went to United, theological seminary of the Twin Cities. I'm 12 credits short of getting a master's degree in theology of arts. I was going to go and get an MDiv and become a pastor, but once I got there, I realized that that really wasn't what I was called to do. And ultimately, I thought I was going to continue in this and become a pastor or a care at a hospital or do something like that, but I got divorced and I was being pulled a million different ways. Soul caretaker of two children, full-time working as a midwife, trying to still go to seminary. And so I prayed. I prayed about what I was supposed to do, and it hadn't entered my mind that I should stop seminary. But I actually woke up, semi-woked up about four o'clock in the morning on this particular morning and heard a voice say, quit seminary. And so that day I called him and withdrew. It was a huge, wonderful experience to go in and see what the scholars are saying about how the book is written and who were the first theologians and what were the Christian theologians saying now versus then. And it was very interesting, but not as spirit-filled as I thought it would be. Much more academic, educational, and that has been what my experience with higher education has been anyway. Not always living what they're preaching, kind of. So that's been, you know, just part of the experience. I had the opportunity to see midwives at work during my undergraduate nursing program at the University of Illinois in Chicago. There was a staff service of Nurse Midwives at Cook County Hospital. What I saw were women who were giving care to women, trying to personalize the atmosphere of mass production of labor and birth, very large inner city hospital. The labor room was one big giant room that had cots all around the outside and curtains in between and long row of delivery rooms and a lot of intervention and a lot of impersonal care by necessity. Fathers were not allowed into the birth floor for three days. So their wife went into the emergency room at Cook County and they had their baby by themselves in a mass production line of labor. And then postpartum, they were on their own until they got to go home. And that was the first time that their family was involved. And so it was wonderful to see the example of the midwives trying to make a difference in that kind of situation. And I decided that's what I would like to do. I would like to be the person that's the friend of this woman at the other end of the table, so to speak. That's a big part of what Midwifery is for me. I don't know. It's my calling in life. I have a natural proclivity and I don't know if it's a gift or not of holding the space, which is what midwives do. At least I try to do is give a woman the space to tap into her strengths and her needs and her desires and her abilities and give her that space to express those things. My spiritual background, I'm the daughter of a Presbyterian minister and so I grew up on theological discussions at the dinner table. I've been most of my life a Presbyterian, but as I reached the, I don't know, I guess I was mid-life. I made a switch to the Quaker faith because the way that the Quakers are and the things that they believe more closely resembled how I naturally was. I am an elder ordained in the Presbyterian Church, although I've shifted my membership to the religious society of friends. And part of what I like about Quakers is, you know, a main tenant is expressing in your life and conducting your life in integrity with and acting out what you believe in what you do every day. How long have each of you been midwives and what did you do before that? Martha? I've been a midwife for about 24 to 25 years. I was pregnant with my daughter when I went through my midwifery program. That was, that was a really interesting to experience that educational process, not only with my mind, but also with my body and soul. That has informed me through the rest of my experience. I was a nurse on a medical surgical floor near North Side Chicago Hospital. I then took a job in labor and delivery at Prentice Women's Hospital. So I got to see all the state-of-the-art high-tech style of labor and birth there. I went back to midwifery after I'd gotten some experience under my belt, and then I've been in midwifery practice more or less ever since that time. I did take some time out when my second daughter was born, and I was teaching women's health, OB, and pediatrics at Northern Illinois University. In a transition between midwifery positions, I had the opportunity. It was totally unexpected. I was looking for something that I could do interim between midwifery positions, and I was drawn to a position as a nurse in a hospice agency. I view that as a gift from God because it was the other end of the spectrum from birth, but in many ways it was exactly the same. The role that I took as a hospice nurse was midwife at the other end of life. The questions were the same. When is it going to happen? At birth here, when is the baby going to be born? At the end of life, when is this death going to occur? I see ladies going through labor as they are giving birth to their children, and I see the dying person in their family going through labor in the birth process. There's the same essence of all of the superfluous aspects, the details of our daily life are stripped away, and you are confronted with the absolute essence of what it means to exist in this universe. The birth and love at life, and facing death and that passage into another unknown. The connection with spirit and the ministrations of spirit, the grace that comes upon you in times of those particular trials is the same. In both settings, I see that you are absolutely rich and need nothing else as long as you have loved ones around you. You can have all the money in the world, but if you are alone at those times, you have nothing. It was a total eye-opener, and I think that that was just an active grace that I had that opportunity, so I could make that connection. Have there been any experiences that you have witnessed of people going through especially apparent, especially powerful spiritual transformations as part of birth? I think it's the norm to have transformation at that point, but are there any particular examples that you can speak of where people really found their way forward into completely new spiritual space? Martha? Well, just in general, I see it in every labor and birth that I see. I'm going to say, "Oh, I'm just such a wimp. You know, I'm going to have an epidural and I'm such a wimp. I can't do this." But what I always see, no matter what the birth situation is, a woman who is simultaneously totally vulnerable and at the same time is absolutely strong because that is what every woman is called to do in labor. At some point, she has to connect with that whatever it is inside of herself that gets her through. Sometimes it's prayer. I've prayed with women who want to pray through their birth. Sometimes it's just that presence holding the hand, helping as the father gives support or the family gives support. But in the long run, it's that moment when that woman gets in touch with what that is that she needs to get herself through whatever experience that it is. Actually, that kind of paradox of strength and vulnerability is actually biblical. There is a verse, I think it's something back in the Old Testament that talks about, low to the woman that's in labor at the time of birth because she's absolutely vulnerable and then needs to rely on the strength of God to save them in that particular situation. There are barriers to progress in labor. What we notice on the surface are the physical ones. We're always checking for progress of the cervix opening. And what I have seen is that the physical barriers follow the inner spiritual and emotional barriers. One of the most powerful stories is the descent of Anana, which talks about Anana who was a goddess in Babylon. In order to achieve or find wisdom, she was called to the underworld to visit her dark sister, the queen of the underworld. Part of her journey was having to go through these gates and descend into the underworld and at each gate she had to give up something in order to pass the gate. And we all come to whatever challenges in our life and for women in labor, it's the challenge of getting through labor and the pain. There's all sorts of fears and ideas about how labor is supposed to be and how we're supposed to act in labor that come from all of the messages that we've received from society, from our parents, from our friends, about how we should do this like there's a right way to do it. What has to happen in labor is a woman has to surrender herself. She has to be able to let go of all those things that are creating barriers for her to being totally open and totally surrendering to this experience that is happening with her. And that's another really great metaphor of labor and birth. It's a metaphor of the spiritual surrender to God, to the higher power that will allow us enlightenment, that will allow us to connect with the spirit. All barriers have to be down. It's the same with sex. All the barriers have to be down in order for you to feel that connection so that you can have holy sacred sex. It's the same situation in order to get to that place where you're able to totally let go and let that baby come out and be born, you have to let all those things go. That's what death is, surrender to the beyond and to the spirit. It's expressed in all different ways over all the faiths that are in the world. And that's what the Descent of Anana shows. Anana has to be stripped to the bone and she has to recognize that the dark queen, the dark side, that not nice person, the wild woman, screaming, sweating, a hair is a mess. That's what you have to do. You have to be willing to go there in order to make that progress and birth not only the baby, but yourself as a new person. And that's part of what the transformation is, is accepting that part of yourself. And I did see a woman do that. It was so interesting. I have enacted the Descent of Anana for various prenatal groups. And it was a woman who wasn't actually that I remember part of that class, but I was with her in labor. It was a long labor and nothing was happening. She was not making progress. She was getting discouraged. And it was in the middle of the night and I was sitting at her bedside. And she said, "Out of the blue, I don't know where it came from. Tell me the story of Anana." So I did. And at the end of the story, she said, "I'm feeling different." And I checked her and she had made a jump. And she was ready to deliver her baby. To me, that was kind of a miraculous thing. I've seen those kinds of things happen. And a lot of times it is that spiritual and emotional surrender to, okay, whatever it takes. I'm willing to do that. And I actually have a quote. It's a bit of prose written by a woman, Ruth Schweitzer Mordecai, based on a quote of Anais Nin. And I'll read it. What she says is, "Childbirth is an act of surrender unique to women. We allow another being to grow inside our bodies, share our nourishment, and stretch us to the limit." And in that ninth or tenth month, beyond until finally the gestation culminates in labor when the contractions of our bodies have their own rhythm, sometimes taking us where we would rather not go. It is a birthing of something that is a part of and a part from ourselves. It is a surrender to both a profoundly, wholly experienced, and a painfully earthy one. In this act, we are in touch with what it feels like to surrender on many levels at once, to let boundaries between ourselves and another blur. The surrender to this process is a model for spiritual surrender, for inviting God to live in us to be nourished and to be born. Perhaps we are all meant to be mothers of God. There's a song that I think exemplifies that so wonderfully, and I get chills every time I listen to it. That's Amy Grant's Breath of Heaven, and if you get a chance to listen to that, I recommend you do because it expresses those kinds of things. [music] I have traveled many moonless nights, cold and weary, with a baby inside, and I wonder what I've done. Holy Father, you have come and chosen me now to carry your son. [music] Cold as stone, must I walk this battle alone, be with me now, be with me now. Breath of Heaven, hold me together, be forever near me, breath of Heaven. Breath of Heaven, light in my darkness, pour over me your loneliness for you are only. Breath of Heaven. [music] Do you wonder as you watch my face, if a wiser one should have had my place, but I offer all I am? For the mercy of your plan, help me be strong, help me be, help me. Breath of Heaven, hold me together, be forever near me, breath of Heaven. Breath of Heaven, light in my darkness, pour over me your loneliness for you are only. Breath of Heaven, hold me together, be forever near me, breath of Heaven. Breath of Heaven, light in my darkness, pour over me your loneliness for you are only. Breath of Heaven, breath of Heaven. I think I want to toss in my own experience. Of course, I don't have the equipment to deliver a child from my body in the same way, but I did father my one son, and I experienced a miraculous thing when he was born. I looked down upon him and my eyes filled with tears because I understood for the first time in my life that without any hyperbole whatsoever, I would give my life that this child could exist, that if there was a bullet coming, I would take the bullet rather than have this child die. It's paradoxical in that I was so grateful that I had been given this gift of not attachment to myself, that I was willing to die for this other person, and that felt like a tremendous gift to me that I was able to give this away. Brenda? I too will relate my story about giving birth to my first daughter as that gift, that gift of heart expansion. It was so miraculous when she came up on my chest and I saw her for the first time. My heart literally felt like it exploded. I could feel the physical sensation in my chest expanding, and that sensation of knowing in that moment that up to that point, I had never loved anything so much in my life. To feel that impact so greatly, I think is kind of what you're describing with how you felt about your son and what a wonderful thing to share, two people to share in that moment and even more people than that in a large family. I always talk to the second time moms, they'll tell me a lot about their first one and how they're growing and what they're doing, and I can just hear the love coming out. When I was pregnant with my second child, I actually had moments where I was worried about loving her as much as I did the first one. So I talked to the women because I figured it's kind of a universal experience that us as women have, and I know I feel the same way, you know, I hope it will be okay. And I'm like, that's when I discovered how God loves all of us, is because when I had the second one, my heart expanded even bigger and I loved them both. And that is truly the first time it dawned on me how there isn't a limit to love and that each time it expands. It's just an amazing thought that as we grow and as we give birth to our children and our life, you know, that our heart actually expands each time. And so there's a limitless amount of love available, and love is truly the only thing that is real. And if we could just remember that, then we could live on peace on this earth with the earth, with each other. We need to move in that direction. If we could just give peace a chance. Martha? I agree with what you both have said. The thought that springs from what you have said is when I see that baby that's first born. The other thing that I recognized apart from what you said is that that being does not have to do anything in order to get this love, which is also a basis of all face. There isn't anything that you have to do or say. There isn't a ritual that you have to go through that baby gets love. That person gets love no matter what. And that is the perfect example of the unconditional love and forgiveness. We don't have to do anything to merit that. Just that being makes that possible. And I think that it's helpful if people can recognize and remember that they were that baby. And transfer that idea to themselves as well as to other people so that we don't have to compete or strive or beat, you know, another person out. We just have to be. I think I want to toss in one more comment of my own. I was at a national quicker gathering where a woman was presenting a workshop. And she does translations of the Bible and she's frustrated that in much of the religious world God is always father. And she sought throughout. I mean, God is clearly Abba's daddy in some of the scriptures. What she found was that the word that God loves us with loving kindness, that that Hebrew word that gets translated as loving kindness is actually God loves us with a warm love. That when we have God's loving kindness, it's God loving us with God's warm. Brenda? There's a passage in Isaiah that describes God as mother God. Personally, when I do pray, a lot of times I do say mother father God to be inclusive of all of those energies of love. But in Isaiah, it says, even if the woman nursing her child forgets her child, even if the baby that kicks in a mother's womb is forgotten, I will not forget you. It's a very maternal view and a very loving expression of who God is for all of us. Martha? In anyone who's ever breastfed a baby knows that if you don't feed that baby, you get pain. And so a breastfeeding woman, it's almost impossible to forget that baby and God's love is even more steadfast and unforgiving and unswerving. I want to thank you both Brenda and Martha for spending the time here with me and doing this work which is so obviously so profusely spiritual at both ends of life. Thank you. Namaste. You've been listening to an interview with Martha Neiman and Brenda Ganyam, Midwives in Eau Claire. You can hear this program again via my website northernspiritradio.org where you can also find additional information and links about this and other programs. Music featured in this program includes Breath of Heaven by Amy Grant and Welcome Little One by Carol Johnson. The theme music for Spirit in Action is "I Have No Hands but Yours" by Carol Johnson. Thank you for listening. I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit. You can email me at helpsmeet@usa.net. May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light. This is Spirit in Action. I have no higher call for you than this to love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. To love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. Music. [Music]
Martha Nieman and Brenda Gagnon are nurse midwives in Eau Claire with a few decades of experience between them. They share of the spiritual nature of their work and how it flows from and is rooted in their spiritual lives.