From January 1, 2006 BirthLink Newsletter
Take care of yourself first. Please be careful about burnout! We all take on a great deal! parenthood, jobs, households, partners, birth activism, and community service. What are you doing for self care? Don’t laugh! We tend to give and give until we hit a wall somewhere. We usually scrape ourselves off it and go again, somehow. We must renew and regenerate ourselves on a daily basis. Create a daily self care plan. Love yourself first and you will have plenty to give others. Slow down and enjoy life.
It is always the few that seem to take up the call. Concentrate on your successes. Try to stay positive in spite of it all. As we go into the new year hold tight to the vision of birth as our right of passage. Undisturbed birth, breastfeeding and bonding are the best choices for a healthy society. Birth options for safer more satisfying birth must be available. We also support a preventative and nonintervention orientation to general health care.
As we begin our tenth year my hope is that women will wake up and demand to have safe healthy birth. Women have a choice only if they know what their choices are. We are protectors of that choice. I like the term birthkeeper. We are protecting the choice of undisturbed birth so women will be able to choose what is best for the health of their child. Historically it has always been a few strong women (and men who love them) who have fought for women’s rights. BirthLink represents a small but strong group of caring individuals who believe there is a better way to bring babies into this world. By working together we become stronger than our individual voices.
I am so grateful to all our BirthLink members who have committed themselves to making this world a better place by making birth a more empowering love filled event for families. I am so very grateful that we have so many choices in the Chicago area. I am so very grateful that we have so many health affirming and supportive options for our health care.
May you and your families receive many blessings during the New Year. I hope and pray for world peace and environmental health for all beings and our planet. Self love and self care is a great place to begin.