Where I am and what I’m doing

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Over the last year as more and more of my time, focus, and attention have shifted to Brigid’s Grove, my posts at Talk Birth have become more sporadic. Two things have happened this month that made me realize it is time to officially retire from my commitment to this blog. I was on the trampoline with my kids one beautiful spring afternoon. I like to lie on my back and look at the “hoop of the world” as the trees are framed by the safety net around the trampoline. As I laid there, it came to me with crystal clarity: “I need to retire as an LLL Leader.” I’ve been a Leader for ten years. My ability to continue to serve in the capacity and level to which I was accustomed and expect of myself was dramatically impacted by having our fourth child. I took a maternity leave and expected to pick back up more active involvement after his birth. He is almost eighteen months old now and not only have I not picked it back up, I have let it drop back to virtually nothing. And, I no longer see any remaining crack of space in my time or life to pick it back up. It was beautiful, important work. I gave a lot to it. I was very good at it. And, now I am done.

This weekend I went to a spring festival. While I was there, I met three beautiful women. One was a midwife, one was a student midwife, and one was a pregnant woman. We chatted and connected over postpartum care (including photos of clots), belly casting, and midwifery legislation. And, I realized I felt “far away” from it all. It felt like something distant or removed from me. Like, “oh yeah, this Molly. The one who is into all of this stuff, who is current, who knows, who is enthralled by conversations about birth.” It wasn’t that I wasn’t interested, per se, but that my interest felt detached, removed, like I was accessing something “old” rather than something current. And, in that moment I knew: Talk Birth is complete.

Talk Birth as a site will remain as a storehouse, resource, and database of my past posts and content and I may periodically update it or release from my draft posts from their dusty prison, but I will no longer be updating or maintaining it on a regular basis. I do envision putting all of my class outlines, articles, and information-based posts into a “Best Of” compendium or educator’s resource packet at some point, but I have no idea when that will rise to the top of my priority list.

When I wrote my first post here in 2007, intended solely for a local childbirth education client audience, I had no idea that Talk Birth would grow to have well over a million hits as well as give birth to my passion for priestessing and for goddess art, and lead me into the fulfilling work I am now doing.

My heart has been in service to women and women’s empowerment work since before I was even a legal adult. How I express this service has gone through several evolutions. The time has come for me to lay aside this birth-oriented expression of my commitment to women and to continue to pour my heart into what I offer through Brigid’s Grove. Feel free to join me there.