Parent Blessing
Parents-to-be, may you have friends like these.
We were asked to bring marigolds in whatever form; fresh cut, potted or printed on clothing. The request had come from M’s partner. Thousands of small orange petals would light the baby’s safe crossing from gestation to life. M was 37 weeks pregnant. The birth window was open.
There were 12 of us in attendance, most of us parents. We sat on couches and on the floor with paper and pencils. M changed into a light cotton dressing gown, which slipped past her shoulders to her swollen belly. She hovered over a footstool at the front of the room.
‘I don’t know if I should sit on it,’ she said. ‘I’m scared I’m going to stain it. There are liquids just pouring out of me.’
‘I’m worried it’s going to give you an infection,’ the host said. ‘It’s never been washed. Let me cover it with something.’
A sheet floated over the stool and M sat. The host crouched and tugged at the fabric around her feet, adding more softness and volume. After a five minute seated pose, M stood with her arms behind her head in a show of confidence, wondering aloud how long she could hold it.
I glanced at the drawing next to me. The artist had used full charcoal lines, her subject safe and sound in her steady hand. I looked glumly at my effort, shaky and thin in schoolgirl grey lead. M made a joke about how pregnancy had made her vulva look like Homer Simpson. We said we could see it.
‘She’ll probably grow up loving The Simpsons,’ a woman said.
‘Are you having a girl, M?’ I said.
‘Yeah,’ M said. We grinned at each other, eyes filling up with tears.
M leaned back, eyes closed, long hair down her back, like she was dipping below the surface to spend some quiet time with her baby, only the two of them.
After drawing, M played a song she wrote after years of trying to conceive. She sobbed during the first line then fixed her mouth in a determined frown so she could sing the rest of it.
We took so many moons to find you / I can’t wait to have you here with me.
We were all crying. M had celebrated our pregnancies and births, our seconds and thirds. She had sat in safe passageways holding torches until her fingers burned. Now it was her turn and the stakes seemed impossibly high.
It was time for the ceremony. We sat in a circle with our legs tucked under us, most of us barefoot, a parliament of owls watching our duckling friend waddle across an open field. We knew it wasn’t just the baby who was about to be born. We were letting her pass quietly. It was the most meaningful thing we could do.
‘We’re here today to celebrate M,’ the host said, ‘who is such a special person to every one of us. M, do you want to share any fears or worries you might have about the birth or becoming a mother?’
‘I’m worried about my mind,’ M said. ‘How dark things have gotten in there recently, like really dark. I’m worried it’s going to get worse.’
Someone talked about when to seek clinical help. Another person said sharing with people was the key, and that everybody thinks fucked up shit.
M continued. ‘I know this is potentially triggering for people, sorry in advance, but I’m worried about my baby dying. I’m really scared of that. I think about it all the time.’
‘That’s a really valid fear,’ a woman said.
We waited in vain for the next part of the sentence. We all knew someone whose baby had died, or toddler, or 10-year-old, or teenager fresh into high school. The fear never went away. It consumed some of us. The host talked about the marigolds and how different the conversation about death was depending on spiritual and cultural influences. That we were lighting the way for her ancestors.
The host presented a ball of blood red string. ‘Now, each of us is encouraged to share a story about M, our hopes for her and any wisdom we can pass on as parents who have come before her and friends who sit beside her.’
Each of us wrapped the string around our wrist when it was our time to talk, mostly about how happy we were that it was M’s turn. She had infinite credit with us. We would float her through birth and matrescence on a platter of organic fruits.
The artist was sitting next to M on the couch. She turned to her and said, ‘You’re my family.’
‘I’m just so happy,’ a breastfeeding blonde wailed, both hands cradling their baby. A woman looped the string gently around their ankle.
The air had thickened with oestrogen. I felt a headache coming on. As I held the string, the words I’d written for the occasion blurred on my phone. They were neat and punchy, a remnant of my copywriting days, ready for several rounds of feedback before being printed on a tote bag for a line of ethical maternity swimwear.
But something else spewed forth; my need to offer my pain to the owls, maybe, in the hope that I could also float.
I wound the string lightly around my wrist. ‘I don’t feel comfortable with a lot of people, but I feel lucky to be here, like I’ve snuck in somehow. I’ve been a mum for 10 years now, but I missed a lot of my kids’ early life because of the depression…’
My voice sounded small and strangled. I thought I’d made peace with losing my kids for weeks, sometimes months at a time to postnatal / regular depression when they were babies, one-year-olds, two and three. I felt a heave cry rising in my chest, one that might open my ribcage and spill my organs on the handwoven rug.
‘But the kids are in vivid colour now. I can hear their different skips down the hall. It’s an honour to buy their soccer boots, you know? I’m glad I’m meeting you at this moment in parenting, M, because I’m ready for it now. Anyway that wasn’t what I was planning to say. I wrote a tea towel slogan.’
We laughed, relieved to close the ribcage.
‘Parenting is simple. And hard. It’s exhausting and exhilarating, it’s dull and fascinating. It’s crowded, lonely, hilarious, heartbreaking, terrifying, emboldening, infuriating, soothing, repetitive, bewildering. It’s an Epipen of life force between the eyes and a tranquilliser dart in the arse. You won’t know what you’re doing, but they will be your greatest treasure and you will be theirs.’
To close the ceremony, the host cut the string so we all had a piece to tie around our wrists, to be cut again when M’s labour began. Afterwards, we talked and ate and washed the dishes. M lay on the couch and chatted to a friend who was massaging her feet. It was a simple act of love.