The Things We Do For Love . . .

I've been thinking for awhile now that if our default mode was one of love rather than fear, we could probably make a big dent in the number of abortions that take place. 

Isn't that what everybody wants anyway?

No woman "wants" to have an abortion, even those of us who have had one. 

And duh, the pro-lifers are all against abortion. 

What better way to have it all?

And then a couple of weeks ago, my daughter's boyfriend showed me a perfect example. 

He made a decision based on love, not fear. 

He chose to walk in my daughter's shoes long enough to understand her reproductive choices were "their" reproductive choices. Her comfort or discomfort was his too. When she was not healthy, it impacted him also. They both knew before they began their relationship that they didn't want to have children. Neither pressured the other to think the same way about a future with or without kids. After watching her medical struggles for a year now with various hormones and patches and their impact on her body, mind and spirit, he decided he would do his part. 

He made a decision to have a vasectomy. 

Now, more than a few folks think he is crazy. Or, he's too young (26) to know whether or not he wants kids. He may change his mind. My favorite - why would he risk a knife to the "family jewels" in the first place? 

Maybe there is a new generation of men out there who are more open to this kind of sharing. I hope so. I've met men who refused to wear a condom, much less decided to have a vasectomy. This young man's actions seem pretty extraordinary to me. 

I don't know what the final straw was that propelled him to make this decision, but I know that he loves his girlfriend, my daughter, with his whole self. He's watched her pain and seen her anxiety. I believe he's felt these things with her. 

He made a choice for unity instead of separation. 

He made a choice to operate with compassion and love for the benefit of the whole of the relationship, not for the benefit of himself. 

He made a choice for love over fear. 

He leaned into, not away from. 

He built a bridge to greater intimacy, he did not dig a bigger moat. 

He earned his "man card". 

He's a modern day Knight in Shining Armor in my book. He's taking responsibility for himself and the woman he loves. He leaned into a decision that many other men don't ever make. He chose love over fear. (And, ironically, a decision that will hopefully prevent an unplanned and unwanted pregnancy). 

I don't know what will happen tomorrow, but I do know, as a mom, I couldn't feel more grateful for the partner my daughter is with today. 

Ahhh, the things we do for love!

What will you do for love today? Lol!

Namaste. 

A Manifesto

I heard Cheryl Strayed speak once about why she wrote her memoir, Wild. She said up until that point, her life was completely encompassed by the loss of her mother. The question that consumed her, "Why did she leave so young and so early?" framed her life.

That's how it feels for me with abortion. It began 30 years ago, in 1988, when my childhood BFF found out she was pregnant after being date raped (and drugged?) at a college party. She had been a virgin and had no idea she was pregnant.  Four years later, it became more personal for me when I found myself with an unplanned pregnancy.

Like Cheryl Strayed, there has been one experience that has framed my life. It all revolves around abortion. I've spent decades asking myself two interrelated questions.

Having been raised in a fairly strict Catholic household, the first question was "How do I get past this?", because the fact is, for me especially with my religious upbringing, it had some pretty intense fallout. Especially when I started having my own family and was able to "see" my decision as I watched my babies come into the world.

Once I was on my way to finding the answer to the first question, the second question that began to take over my brain was "Why does abortion exist?". I am still wrestling with that question. I have a lot of thoughts and information from my own experience and from listening to the stories of other women who made the same choice I did. I love the way the Universe works and I am seeing a tapestry being woven as I lean into this question with curiosity.

My purpose and direction gets refined and is having more clarity with time. The continued threat to a woman's reproductive freedom gives it more urgency. There are three distinct components to it.

I believe many women who've had an abortion(s) and have feelings of regret or grief afterwards often feel alone. The Pro-choice movement denies that there are aftereffects, so they mostly likely cannot find support there. The Pro-Life movement condemns their action. They may feel left behind or left out. Where can they turn? Where do they fit in now? Building community for women who've experienced abortion is the first part of my mission.

The second piece is to help those who have unresolved feelings from their abortion to come to terms with those feelings. After spending over a decade on find the answers for myself to question #1, I've come up with a three part process to help women address those feelings and bring them back to wholeness. Healing for women who've experienced an abortion is the second component of my work. 

The last aspect I feel deeply committed to is to bring healing to the divisiveness in our country around this issue. I think most women who've had an abortion never dreamed they'd be part of this "club" and would have preferred not to ever faced that decision. But our world, is not a perfect and safe place. We make this decision because it is the least onerous one for us. How can we make this world a different and better place where this choice isn't so necessary? There are ways to reduce abortion without taking away a woman's reproductive freedom. I believe we can come to more peaceful resolutions around this issue. This third component is imperative. 

Who am I? I am a woman, a mother, a sister, a daughter, a granddaughter and a girlfriend.

I believe in women's freedom, women's intuition and our ability to make good decisions.

I believe in the power of sisterhood to transform lives and the world.

I believe Divinity lives inside us and wholeness, happiness and joy are our birthrights.

And I believe the power of love and connection can make anything possible.

Grey's Anatomy Nailed It

Dear Pro-Choice Movement,

I don't want you to think I've left you out after my little meltdown with the "Pro-Life Movement", now known by me as the Anti-Abortion Movement. You need a new name too, because your name doesn't fit like a glove any more than theirs.

Are any of you Grey's Anatomy fans? Remember Season 11? That's the season Dr. April Kepner finds herself pregnant with a baby who's bones are so fragile, they are susceptible to breaking even in utero (Ostogenesis imperfecta 2). April is a devout Christian who lives and breathes for God. She is married to an atheist - Dr. Jackson Avery - creating a simmering tension between the two of them, culminating in the biggest conflict of all - whether or not to terminate their pregnancy. 

As the couple wrestles with their personal views on the suffering of their child, a climatic moment occurs in the middle of Episode 10. Jackson and April's mother are arguing in the kitchen while April is trying desperately not to be a part of their argument. Finally, April can't stand it anymore and screams at them,

"Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!  None of this is helping. You are not helping. Neither of you. I'm standing here listening to you tell me that God only gives me one choice and you telling me that I should forgo God's choice. And the truth is I don't know anything except that I am scared, and sad and I am alone.  You're both just standing there yelling at each other and talking at me, but I am alone and and it is terrifying!  And the louder you get the more terrified I become so I just need you both to shut up. Can you do that? Can you please both just shut up!"

Shonda Rhimes, the creator of the show, nailed it. This is exactly what's been happening to women who want to have reproductive freedom. They, like April, are in the middle of an escalating fight and the women you chose to help way back at the beginning have been tossed aside, scared out of their minds, while you battle for the win. 

Pro-choice movement, is this the way you help women? By defending their rights while avoiding their turmoil? You say your movement is here to help women - but I don't think you're listening very well. Many of us feel pain - physical and/or emotional pain - from our abortions, but you ask us to deny that pain, again and again and again. Your tactics on the battlefield are causing us to lose our minds! 

A couple of years ago, a woman named Emily Letts, filmed her abortion to show the public how easy and painless it is to have an abortion. Emily says she is uplifted and positively transformed by her abortion. No regrets. At the end, she is interviewed a month after her abortion and says she still feels great, empowered by her abortion. And while I believe that may have been true for Emily - she feels like she is a warrior for your movement and that she has just beaten the enemy - for many women, that is not the case. The writer, Katy Waldman, states at the end of the piece "And because the anti-choice myths are strong, the resistance fierce, the corrective must be too." 

You've gotten sucked into the gamesmanship of the anti-abortionists. You're reacting to them, not acting for a woman's best interest. Just like April, women are suffering on the sidelines while you engage in battle, ignoring the real physical and emotional needs of women who make a decision to terminate a pregnancy. 

Make no mistake, the strategies of both sides are about winning - not about a woman's life. Or I might add, that of her unborn child. Many women who've had abortions and who were once pro-choice, now feel abandoned, like Norma McCorvey, and are even choosing to go to the other side and take up the anti-abortion banner. 

And there it is. This is where we are now. Arguing. Fighting. At each other like Jackson and April's mom. And there are a million April's out there alone and sad and terrified and confused. I've seen them in support groups all over the internet. They need to know that what they went through was more than just a "right" they deserved. Having an abortion is a multi-faceted experience that can take it's toll on a woman in many ways. To ignore that is to ignore the group of women you say you are serving. 

So, pro-choice movement, I don't believe you have a woman's heart and soul in mind any more than the anti-abortion movement does.  You may be support a woman's right to choose, but I don't see any evidence that you are acknowledging the humanity of the women you purport to serve. Just like April, we've been left stranded, isolated and alone in the middle of the battlefield. Do you even remember what this battle was about? 

When the other side went low, with horrendous photos of fetuses and other vicious maneuvers, you went lower. Videotaping an abortion to "prove" that having an abortion is empowering and uplifting? I gotta hand it to you - there certainly is some shock value with that one. 

I don't know what to call you anymore. You may be pro-choice, but you're not pro-woman. The end is more important to you than the means it takes to get there. In th meantime, I will do my best to support women who still feel isolated, stuck, sad or regretful. Because I know there is A Third Way to do this. 

A Thousand Previous Outrages

Dear Pro-Life Movement,

We need to talk about your name - Pro-Life. It has to change. 

Last week I listened to the podcast, The Daily, by Michael Barbaro for the New York Times, on the issue of Roe v. Wade.  It was eye opening.

The first of this two part series begins by telling us about Norma Nelson McCorvey's (aka, Jane Roe's) life leading up to her desire to have an abortion - how she was raised in poverty by a violently alcoholic mother and abandoned by her father at age 13. She tried to run away from home many times, and at the tender age of ten, gets into trouble for stealing money from a gas station. After that, she's sent to a Catholic boarding school where she is sexually abused. After a stint at a girls' reform school, she is sent to live with a friend of the family, a man, who she says rapes her almost daily for three plus weeks.

She meets her husband at age 15, Woody McCorvey, who is also abusive and beats her relentlessly when he finds out she is pregnant. Unable to live with him, she returns home to her mother. The same mother who is a violent alcoholic. She becomes pregnant a second time and gives the baby up for adoption and it isn't until her third pregnancy that she reaches the decision to have an abortion. She's had one child, given another up for adoption and realizes she can't go through either of these alternatives again. To think the safest place she can find is back home with a woman who abused her as a child is mind-boggling.

Norma Nelson McCorvey

You can listen to the podcast, linked above, to hear more about her life story.  I haven't been able to stop thinking about her childhood all week.

How is it that we've spent decades being outraged over her desire to have an abortion and not in any story that I have heard or read are not outraged with how she was treated as a child?

Alcoholism, domestic violence, childhood sexual abuse are all part of the fabric of her young life - where is fury over those atrocities? How is it you say you are "pro-life" and yet the quality of this young life is so horrific and yet the details so absent from any discourse of what "pro-life" means?

Coincidentally, I happened to watch the documentary series on NetFlix, The Keepers, last week. Teenage girls were sexually molested and raped for years by clergy from the Archdiocese of Baltimore in this story and yet no one is talking about this either.

The quality of many of our children's lives is unimaginable. Who can truly imagine an adult violating a child in such monstrous ways? It happens in families and in the church. It is constantly swept under the rug and both the children and those who stand up for them are disregarded, made out to be crazy. The secrecy of what really happens behind closed doors has stayed locked up tight. Denial is a powerful force, but enough people have spoken out. It can no longer stay hidden.

And yet it is in the name of family and the church that we deplore abortion. The very groups that are so righteous in claiming they believe in and fight for life - the life of an unborn child - are the very ones who are either perpetrating or looking the other way when it comes to other horrors of childhood.

Pro-life movement - you need a new name. From here on out, as far as I am concerned, you are the anti-abortion movement. That is all. You may be against abortion, but you do not stand for life. If you were truly pro-life, we would be far more horrified by the thousand or more outrages suffered by Norma Nelson McCorvey before she ever decided she wanted to have an abortion. 

Which, at the end of the day, she was never able to have anyway . . . .

Sincerely,

Christina Haas
A Woman Who Will Not Pretend Anymore

I Might Have Been a Republican

If I was born 160 years ago, I think I might have been a Republican.

A new party, it was conceived in 1854 with the intention of abolishing slavery. Six years into it's beginnings, our first Republican President was elected - Abraham Lincoln. He lead us to and through the Civil War and the abolishment of slavery. It was party of rebels and activists, focused on human rights.

Yeah, I think I might have been a Republican if I lived back then. 

Fast forward to 2018, we have a different kind of Republican President. He's one who gloats about "grabbing women by the pussy", who tears children out of the arms of parents seeking asylum in our country and has just nominated a Supreme Court justice who he intends will make it his mission to overturn Roe v. Wade. It's not a party that's being lead by someone concerned with human dignity or human rights. 

Is this progress? 

This site is about caring for women who've had abortions. Make no mistake - the politics in the US right now are attempting not just to vilify women who would choose an abortion, but imprison them  by making it illegal. Like our President's election, which very few believed would happen, it is entirely possible that Roe V. Wade will be overturned. This is not a party I can support today and I have to imagine, Abe Lincoln is rolling in his grave watching the freedom of women now at risk.

Human dignity is an important aspect of being for life, "pro-life". And yet . . . .

Is it pro-life to imprison and separate families seeking asylum who are being persecuted in their  countries of origin?

Is it pro-life to have have the second highest rate of childhood poverty (after Romania) of 35 developed nations in the world? 

Is it pro-life to do nothing about gun control when our children can't be safe in their schools and even elementary school children are not spared from gun violence? 

Is it pro-life to prevent gays from having all the benefits and privileges of heterosexual couples? Is it pro-life to allow public establishments to refuse to serve someone of a different sexual persuasion? 

Is it pro-life to allow incest and domestic violence to occur because it is a family matter or because DNA should trump this type of "bad" behavior? 

I consider myself pro-choice, but I also consider myself pro-life. I believe all people deserve the right to live his or her own life under their own terms and with the same freedoms. Women and minorities deserve to be paid for the same job as a man at the same rate of pay. Children deserve to live without abuse or neglect and to have three meals a day in their bellies. We all deserve to love whomever we love - regardless of race, gender or religion. And this beautiful earth that we pillage and rape every day in the name of progress, I believe she is sacred and deserving of better treatment too.

Pro-life and Pro-Choice. I am both, and. 

And -  while sometimes, these values conflict, I believe in the end, it is my choice as a free person in these United States to decide for myself how address that conflict. 

From a President who abolished slavery to one who wants to enslave women.  Wow. We've come a long way, baby, and I'm not sure it's the vision President Lincoln ever had for his party or the Presidency. 

A Tale of Two Sisters - The End and The Beginning

Thank you to everyone who has read and followed my blog over the past five years. When I started writing about abortion, it was a mission spurned by my need for closure and understanding of my actions and experience. I wanted to share what I had learned and was learning so that others might have peace in their choices too. I never dreamed this last piece would take this shape.

In 1992, when I chose to have an abortion, I didn't think much past the end of my own nose. I didn't consider the moments leading up to that choice or how each moment of my life prior to that one informed my decision. I didn't think about my family tree or the possible impact to my family in the future. I didn't think about my unborn baby or what she might have wanted. I remember thinking that maybe, just maybe, if I acted quickly enough, it wouldn't be a baby yet. There was a deep, visceral fear - a fear that permeating my whole being. Was this my fear? Or the fear of generations before me?

As I researched and learned more about abortion, a bigger picture began to unravel. I felt for the first time, the double bind of the many women who become pregnant in poor or abusive relationships. I considered the conflicted feelings of a young, pregnant woman, once abused or neglected herself, struggling to hope for a better future for herself and her child. I began to explore the notion that as much as the decision to abort seemed like mine, and mine alone, it was all part of a larger symphony of souls, that never in my wildest of dreams, could I have imagined.

**************

Twenty years after my abortion.  I thought I was done with my healing and learning from that experience. I had come to believe that there was soul contract between my unborn daughter and myself, that she had known ahead of time what my choice would be, but that she chose to enter into this contract with me anyway. I saw her as a martyr, saint, an angel, for giving up her life for my lesson. I still didn't realize that in this belief system, I was still seeing my soul as less than perfect. I still saw myself as a sinner. 

Not long after I began writing, I had an encounter with an intuitive. This seer told me that my unborn daughter was very glad she had not been born. I remember wondering how she knew I had had an abortion, and if that was something she told every woman who had one - to make them feel more peace over their decision. She went on to tell me my unborn daughter, Mary, is around me constantly. But then she said something else, something that haunted me for the next four years. She said "your unborn daughter says she would not have been able to endure her sister's life. She could not have survived."

I felt like I had been hit with a ton of bricks when she said that. A recently lapsed Catholic, I was still highly prone to self-blame and flagellation and this statement gave me a lot to think about. Was I really such a terrible mother that she didn't think she could have found some happiness and joy in that life? Had I really done such a terrible thing by divorcing her father that I made all my children's lives tortuous? I had just moved my children 3,000 miles away from their father after a highly contentious divorce. I was in a abusive marriage, and leaving a man who didn't want to be left cost me a lot. Going to California seemed like the only way we would ever have peace again. Had I made a bad choice yet again?

*******************

Fast forward to the fall of 2015. My college-age daughter shares with me for the very first time, what her life as child was really like. How her father began molesting her at the sweet age of four years old, ramping up the abuse over the years in nature and frequency of the abuse until she was twelve. For many years, I had the feeling he was having an affair...I just never imagined it was with our little girl. How does one ever imagine such a thing? Years of odd and lewd behaviors flooded my mind and my body shook with the truth of knowing. Suddenly, everything in the past made sense.

Finally, I understood for the first time what my unborn daughter, Mary, meant, when she sent me the message that she couldn't have survived this lifetime. All that time, I made it to be about me. But all that time, it was about something more, something bigger than me. I wonder now, did I make that choice to abort because I was so afraid? Or was I hearing quite loudly my daughter's voice, telling me she couldn't handle that lifetime, a lifetime that would have been filled with sexual abuse?

I have come full circle on my blog about abortion, right back to my first month of posts, where I had learned on an intellectual level, the battle that women face on daily basis in protecting themselves and protecting their children. Only today, it's not just an intellectual understanding. It is one of an emotional and spiritual understanding that we are all connected, we are all part of the same Force, and almost nothing is what it appears on the surface - including and especially the experience of abortion.

Namaste.

Why We Need to Own Our Greatness

I had been swimming for 10 minutes in the pool when a woman ten or perhaps fifteen years my senior asked if she could share my lane with me. There were at least three other lanes with a single swimmer in them, so she had other options to choose from. When I answered that yes, of course I’d be happy to share my space with her, she explained that she was a very slow swimmer and hoped I wouldn’t be bothered by how slow she was. In that moment, I suddenly felt sorry for her.

It took less than two laps for me to turn that feeling into a pity party for myself.


She was actually quite a good swimmer. She was clearly faster and more expert at swimming than I. Within a couple of laps she had caught up to me. Another lap later, she had passed me.

Every four to five laps after that, she was passing me again.

What was my problem? How could a woman who was noticeably older and in her own words, "very slow", crushing me in the pool?


I have always loved to swim, but it’s only been in the last four months that I have made time in my weekly routine to do this past-time. I have been super proud of myself for slowly increasing my swim distance over the last four months to what is now just over a mile in one session.

I have shared lanes with other swimmers as I have progressed in my journey: some have been faster and others slower. Knowing I was a beginner going for endurance and distance, I didn’t mind sharing a lane. I managed to stay competitive with myself and was proud of how I was advancing.

Until today.

What made the difference on this day?

This woman’s self-declared diminishing of her talent triggered my own insecurities. If she was as very slow as she said, why was she swimming circles around me? If she was “very slow”, what the heck was I? Downright sluggish was one of the first things to come to mind. Slower than a turtle quickly followed that thought!


It takes me a good forty-five minutes to swim my mile and an eighth. Instead of relaxing into the meditative state that I normally sink into with each lap, my monkey brain was working overtime that day, berating me for not moving faster.

It took me all of that time to realize that her declaration was her “stuff” that she was dealing with and not something that was a reflection of me at all. But as I was showering and getting dressed after finishing my swim, the real “aha” moment occurred.

How many times I have done just the same thing as she did?

How many times have I not owned my greatness or talents for something I did, and in return made someone else feel diminished or less than?

When we own our greatness, we give others permission to own theirs.


We all shine brighter when we own our gifts. We are happier, more connected and more accepting of others when we acknowledge the truth of whom we are.

Let me ask you this: who would you want to hang out with more? Someone who beats themselves up all the time and lives in a state of “I am not enough”, or someone who lives from a place having a heart full of joy and gratitude for who they are?

I have lived in both worlds – in fact, most of my life was spent in the world of “I am not enough.” I had some wonderful friends, some of whom lived in the same state of not feeling enough on their own too. You know the saying, misery loves company? Well, that can be very true and I had quite a full “house” of people who thoroughly enjoyed sharing their woes.

Now, that I have put the past, including my pregnancy losses and those woebegone friends behind me, I have found a place of being where not only am I enough, but where I am pretty darn excellent at a number of things. I would rather live in this place of excellence and teach my children to reside in this same place of knowing that they are pretty freaking awesome too, than that place of feeling “less than” where I spent a good part of my life.


How about you? What are your gifts? Where is your greatness? And are you hiding those amazing talents?

Maybe it is in your smile, your laugh, or a twinkle in your eyes. Maybe it is a talent for acting, for being smart, for athletic prowess or sense of humor.

Whatever it is, will you take that in? Will you give your children, your friends, your partner, and your family permission to shine brightly too?


Take my word for it – standing firmly in the knowledge of your own greatness is THE best place in the world to live!


Namaste.

 

My Miracle Baby (edited 10/8/14)

Have you heard the famous Eleanor Roosevelt phrase, “You must do the thing you think you cannot do?” There is one time in particular in my life when I felt that thought run through me in a terrifyingly “I can’t survive this” kind of way.

Well, let me tell you, there is a BIG upside to doing the thing you think you cannot do.


Before I share what that was, I need to give you a little history…


A month earlier I had had a miscarriage. It was my fourth pregnancy and would have been my third child. As if the miscarriage itself, which took over a week to complete, was not painful enough, when I woke up in the recovery room at the end of that long week, I was suddenly transported back in my mind to the clinic where I’d had an abortion eleven years earlier.

At that time of my miscarriage, my husband was going to seminary school at nights to become a Catholic deacon, and the pressure I felt from my religious upbringing and his new vocation created incredible tension and anxiety in me and between us, to keep my secret. Although I did not know it at the time, our abortion was a reason that could have precluded his ordination. He was disconnected from our marriage in every way. I was in overwhelm and alone in parenting our two young children and now I had two dead babies I needed to grieve for, but could not. When I left for a healing retreat a month after my miscarriage, my husband sent me off with very clear instructions – “Do whatever you need to do to fix yourself and pull this family back together.” I was breathing and barely alive, but spiritually and energetically I was close to dying. 

At that retreat, I had to acknowledge that if I was going to survive, I would need to tell my story. I would need to say what I did out loud. And then, when that was done, I would need to acknowledge my unborn children and bring closure in a ritual similar to a funeral.

I had to choose. It was my life or death. Could I do the thing that I thought I could not do? 


To my great surprise and utter relief, I discovered that releasing the story and its attendant emotions brought me peace, relief and a new support network I never knew existed. My shadow side was exposed; my dark side was bared for the other women at our retreat to see. This opened a door to a non-judgmental love I had not experienced in a long time. Contrary to my thinking, my vulnerability and full disclosure did not make them hate me – just the opposite. I was welcomed into a hospitable and loving community unlike any I had ever known.

Two and a half months later, after doing these things I did not think I could do, I found out I was pregnant with my third child. 

At age 41, he was my miracle baby and a symbol of healing for all the inner work I had done at that retreat. I learned that good things have room to grow when the toxic emotions are released. I had created space for a new beginning, for both of my baby and myself. 

That little guy was born on October 12, 2004. In five days, he will be ten years old. Thank you my “I love you more” guy for all the lessons you have brought to me. Mama Chop loves you to the moon and back again.


Namaste.

 

PS: Next Tuesday at 6 pm PST I have the honor and privilege of being interviewed by Mama Char on her show, The Quirky World of Mama Char on Blog Talk radio. I will post the link on when it will air.


And…my new website is almost complete! Hurray! I hope you will catch my blog next week at www.unborn angels.com/blog.


Thank you!

 

What We Resist Does Indeed Persist

Do you experience struggle in your life?

And how does that affect your children?

This past weekend, Oprah had clinical psychologist and conscious parenting expert Dr. Shefali Tsabary as her guest on her popular TV show, Lifeclass. In a segment on sibling rivalry, Dr. Shefali asked one of the parents who complained about the arguments between her boys what battles she had in her own life. Talk about cutting to the chase! This mother knew right away exactly what she meant. Instantly, we learned about her recent life and death battle with metastatic breast cancer. Her inner struggles were being reflected outwardly through the sibling rivalry between her children.

As Carl C. Jung says “What you resist, persists”, and those hurdles tend to show up in the lives of the people and environment closest to us.

Last December a study on the relationship between traumatic events and inheritance was reported by the BBC. “The findings provide evidence of "transgenerational epigenetic inheritance" which means that the environment can affect an individual's genetics, which can in turn be passed on.” Now science is beginning to see that our unhealed wounds may be showing up in the future generations that are born from our genetic inheritance. Now that’s an eye-opener to me!

There is another scientific phenomenon that I have recently learned about called microchimerism. Microchimerism is when two genetically distinct cell populations are found in the same individual. It happens most often from pregnancy. Scientists have found that fetal cells can linger in the uterus years after the pregnancy is over, whether by pregnancy loss or birth. These cells can be found in the mothers, twins, or even siblings born many years later.  

To apply that theory into perspective to my life, my grandmother had an abortion prior to the birth of my mother. It is very possible that the cells from the aborted pregnancy were not only in my grandmother, but also shared with my mother, her next child. I have recently learned that I may have had a missing twin in utero that miscarried early in my mother’s pregnancy with me. Do I carry cells from my lost sister in my body? The possibilities are incredible to think about. This is a different situation than transgenerational epigenetic inheritance, but both ideas raise the same questions:

• How much awareness do we have of our ancestors’ lives on a physical level?
• Is it an accident that my grandmother had an abortion and I, her grandchild, did also?
• Is there healing that I can do to minimize this possibility happening in my daughter or granddaughter or great grand-daughter's life down the road?

• Plus how much of my ancestors’ stress and trauma do I carry in my body and how much of that, plus my own, am I passing down to my own children?  

I don’t know the answer to these questions… yet. But I do know that what I take charge of and heal myself from not only helps me be a happier and aligned human being, it also has the potential to do that for my descendents as well.

Wherever our pain lies, in secrets or shame from our past, I believe the greatest hope for the future lies in healing ourselves first. And then, finally, what does not persist, cannot exist.

 

Namaste.

Desperately Seeking Acceptance

 

My upcoming book, How My Unborn Children Saved My Life, is a spiritual story of my journey to wholeness. It navigates the terrain of abortion and narcissism and how my unborn children led me to find my way out of a world of unhealthy behaviors.

Often we do not realize how broken we are and it takes an earth-shattering event to shake us from the world of illusion that we live in. 

We are born and raised into a world that over time becomes our “normal” way of living. Yet we can become so disconnected from the truth of who we are that we have little hope of discovering who we truly are without a crisis to ignite our transformation. 

I recently met two women who grew up in a household where narcissism was their mothers’ defining character trait. Both of these women were givers and both of them wanted more than anything else to be loved and acknowledged by their parents. And yet their mothers were so self-centered that it was impossible for them to clearly see their daughters and recognize their needs. I understood their stories well. Their stories were so similar to my own. 

I realize as I come full circle in my own life and understand why I made certain choices, why my life brought me in the directions it did. I understand that as human beings we all have one thing in common:

We desire acknowledgment and love from our parents. 

Our unborn children are no different.

I believe whether we have had an abortion or we have lost children through miscarriage, they are spiritual beings who chose us as their parents. They saw a beauty and light in us that made them want to be a part of our lives. 

Part of the healing journey from our pregnancy losses is their healing journey as well. They desire what we also desire – acknowledgement and love from their parents. 

It makes sense, doesn’t it? How many of us strived for a good part of our lives wanting to be seen and cherished by our parents? How many of us studied to get straight A’s or perhaps even developed a negative behavior just to get our parents’ attention? I think it is an unusual human being who has not been caught up in wanting such recognition. 

Why would our spirit children, our unborn angels, be any different?

The moment I connected with my unborn children, my life began to change. The heaviness in my being lifted and my transformational journey began.  

In fact, opening up to the bond of my unborn has led me to a deeper connection with my embodied children. Both my born and unborn children have taught me so much. The very least I can do is acknowledge and thank them for it.


Namaste.

Why We Really Need to Tell Our Stories

My good friend and author Susan Westbrook, of the extraordinary new book The Five TibetansYoga Workshop, believes that “We tell our story so others will tell theirs.” It is in telling our story that we give others permission not only to tell theirs, but if we do it right, sharing with an open heart and deep vulnerability, then they will share their story the same way.

But sharing our stories honestly and with integrity isn’t always easy to do.

Last week, at a conference of transformational leaders and visionaries from around the globe, I had the opportunity to speak to the concern of being vulnerable and authentic in storytelling.

I shared with the audience how difficult that experience was for me. I wrote no less than six drafts of my story for the Amazon bestseller, Pebbles in the Pond –Wave 2. I think the actual number was eight, with the final version coming out in draft nine. Each draft took me deeper into the land of vulnerability and opening my heart. Each draft brought me closer to the truth of who I was. You see, by committing to writing this story, I had also made a commitment to myself. Sharing my story has certainly given others a place of comfort in sharing theirs, but it also gave me a chance to know myself better; to take responsibility for my life, and to finally begin to live as an empowered woman, not a victim.

Writing and sharing my story was a spiritual practice; one that brought me profound inner healing. 

What I didn’t share at the conference last week was that writing my story was not something I consciously chose to do. Just like being awoken from the repressed feelings of my abortion when I had a miscarriage, the sharing of my story was something that chose me.

I spent years doing the inner work I needed to do to heal from my abortion. And yet each time I thought I was done with it, I received a message from the Universe gently letting me know that there was still much more work around this subject that needed to be addressed. No matter how much I tried, I couldn’t escape it. My grandmother’s confession was my first realization of that, but over time the message was felt in other ways as well.

Never in a million years did I imagine I would write about pregnancy loss, abortion and our unborn children – definitely all of them suppressed, stigmatized and “woo woo” subjects. I was forty years old before I knew that my life’s work would include a significant component of energy around these experiences. Even then I did not envision that I would be writing about them for the whole world to read.

But this thing that I did not imagine, it kept coming back to me. Just when I thought I was done dealing with my abortion, my unborn daughter, or my grandmother’s startling news she shared with me, these events would weave their way into my prayers and dreams and remind me of their presence, of their stories and of their love.

Yes, it is true that I tell my story so others can more easily tell theirs. I also tell my story as a conduit so that my grandmother’s story and my unborn daughter’s presence can be acknowledged and appreciated. You see, for in doing so, in listening to the inner promptings to open my heart and let out the good, the bad, and the ugly, I find I am transformed as well.

Thank you Mor-Mor and Mary, for reminding me of this fact last week.

Namaste.

 

Why Take Sides?

It was on my mind for years. Literally. Am I pro-choice or pro-life? I used to wonder what was wrong with me that I couldn’t pick a side and stay with it.

 

And you know what was wrong with me?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

When it comes to the topic of choice where life is concerned, taking a side seems like the only way to go. Abortion isn’t the only part of life where this decision comes up. What about euthanasia or doctor assisted suicide? Are these issues really so straightforward and uncomplicated?

Before I had an abortion, I was pro-choice, although with the stipulation that it was something I believed in for other people and it was not something I would ever do. Can you feel my judgment oozing out of those words?

Even after my abortion, it made me feel better to believe that I had a right to choose what to do with my body. It validated the experience for me. My choice – my responsibility, but also my justification.

But then a miscarriage activated memories from the abortion that I couldn’t escape and I found myself beginning the process of healing from my abortion.  

At this point, I made a 180 degree turn around from my previous pro-choice stance and became pro-life. Healing was hard work and I had repressed a lot of negative emotions. Releasing all that toxicity was excruciating. I wanted to save anyone else from the trauma I experienced. At the time, a devout Roman Catholic, I confessed and repented my choice. In many ways, becoming pro-life was a way of restitution for me.

But atoning for my choice didn’t open me up to the whole story of my life and why I made that choice in the first place. It blinded me to the deeper parts of my story and kept me in shame – for I was continuing to judge myself.

The truth is I had my own issues to resolve around worthiness and self-esteem. And I am finding that so do many, many others, both men and women.

I met a woman the other day who told me she moved to California from New York forty years ago. When I asked her what brought her out here, she shared in lengthy detail the traumas of her childhood, still fresh in her mind like they had happened yesterday. The anger, bitterness, and resentment after all this time were still raw for her. Most of us aren’t that expressive, especially to a complete stranger, yet many of us hold onto some very deep childhood hurts for far too long.

Am I pro-life? You bet. I believe most of us believe in the sanctity of life. It is sacred and beautiful and miraculous. Just think about how any of us came to be here – who could ever have imagined an egg and a sperm united to create each one of us?

Am I pro-choice? You bet. We all deserve the right to choose what to do with our bodies and our lives are precious too. Do I have any less right to live my life on my terms than anyone else?

In the over two decades since my abortion, I have been on both sides of this conversation. What I have found after being in both places is that I actually am in reality in both places. I value life AND I believe in a person’s right to choose.

 

I have been studying abortion for over a decade and what I have concluded is that there isn’t a person I have yet to meet who isn’t both pro-life and pro-choice. We think that abortion, like euthanasia, war, poverty, and violence, is a black and white issue… but it’s not. It’s full of story, nuance and lots of gray areas. Maybe the real story behind this question is not which side we are on, but what we do to honor the life that is here already.

Namaste.

 

PS: Here is a link to a short movie (21 minutes) with actor James Cromwell that I saw this week about taking sides. It’s current and powerful. Can you imagine a world where we lived in unity instead of separation? http://bit.ly/1vT5Jcu

 

A Missing Link in Women's Sexuality

Do you read self-help or self-empowerment books? A lot of women do and there are some great titles and subject matter to choose from in the marketplace. Some of my favorites from the past year are Patricia Davis’ book The Diva Doctrine, wake-up call life coach Amy Ahler’s Big Fat Lies Women Tell Themselves, and Mama Gena’s School of Womanly Arts by Regina Thomashauer. Not only are these books incredibly useful, but each author is simultaneously entertaining and vulnerable – a necessary and winning mix.

I recently finished reading Mama Gena’s School of Womanly Arts. It was published in 2002 and was ahead of its time in what she had to share with the readers about how to live a rich and joy-filled life. In her chapter on Sensual Pleasure, she writes “Women are taught to have a lot of shame about their sensuality. Sensuality and pleasure are areas that most women don’t talk about, don’t feel comfortable with.”

As a former Catholic, I was taught that my female body was created for only one purpose – to procreate. I learned about how it worked in fourth grade health class and that was the extent of most of my sexual education. I love reading these types of books and discovering new insights from other women’s experience, because they are so different than my own.  

And yet there is another huge part of almost every woman’s experience that I still don’t read about – how to handle unplanned pregnancy. Statistics estimate that approximately half of all pregnancies today are unintended. In a recent conversation with a friend, I commented about this and she replied, “Christina, I don’t know a woman in my circles who hasn’t had to face this situation.” Wow. That’s a big elephant to have sitting smack dab in the middle of any room!

Have you ever had a “pregnancy scare?” A deeply rooted fear or anxiety that you might be pregnant at a time when you were not at all prepared for that possibility?

After telling my story to a group of women recently, one woman came up to me afterward and shared how sexually active she had been in high school and how she had not used birth control at all. She was blown away by the possibility of how different her life would have been if she had not been so “lucky” and had gotten pregnant during those years. There were tears in her eyes as she began to understand the different path her life could have taken.

I am grateful for the plethora of books out there today that help women know and love themselves better. These books open up topics and share stories that are intimate, vulnerable and tender for many of us. I continue to look for books that include a discussion on unplanned pregnancy, including the possibility of abortion. I am not talking about a pro-life or pro-choice book that supports a political or religious position concerning this issue, but a book that is raw, honest, and clear about the effects of facing this dilemma. If we have shame about our sensuality, imagine the shame around experiencing an unplanned pregnancy, particularly one that results with an abortion. We still have a lot of ground to cover girlfriends, and it’s time to get going!

My current project, my book How My Unborn Children Saved My Life, is an answer that I can offer to bridge this gap in today’s popular self-help literature, which challenges our beliefs around self-love and self-worth. I faced this situation three times in my life, each with different consequences, and all are a significant part of the larger tapestry of my life.

As I write, I will keep reading, trying to find a book that is not afraid to tackle this difficult, but virtually universal conversation as I evolve deeper into my own experience.

Namaste.