Motherhood Blessing for Violet Carol

Help us as a community support and nurture this new mother-to-be as she begins to make her transition into motherhood.

Hi, I’m Emma and if you are new, welcome! In this space, I explore mothering, healing, shifting patterns, and learning what it means to be ourselves in motherhood. I hold space for mothers to share their truths and experiences of motherhood. I invite you to read this to learn more about Being in Motherhood and how to contribute to this space.

This idea of a motherhood blessing is inspired by the ceremony called a Blessing Way, which originated with the Native American Navajo people, where a woman is celebrated as she gets ready to transition into motherhood. The ceremony is intended to help the mother-to-be receive support and feel empowered as she nears her birth.

The purpose is for the soon to be mother to be nurtured by her community.

I want to introduce you to

Violet Carol

, who has been reading the Unspoken Words series and saying how she can’t wait to participate, and how much she is learning from us sharing our experiences.

I thought in this post we could honor Violet as she prepares to make this grand transition for the first time. All the rituals related to the research I did on motherhood blessings are not quite able to be done through a virtual space.

But what we can do, and what we as a community are good at, is offering loving and supportive words to one another.

As you read Violet’s introduction below, keep in mind the intention of what blessing(s) would you offer her as she begins this new journey.

Here is Violet…

Hello, everyone, from my plushy body pillow in my eighth month of pregnancy with my first baby. My tiny human in utero, Joni Roo, also sends her greetings from the womb with an impressive punch to my ribs. I am honored to be able to share this space with you, courtesy of the kind and talented Emma, and even more grateful that I am a few weeks away from entering motherhood.

I didn’t always know that I would want to become a mother. The desire to have children has slowly nestled its way into my psyche after I married my husband last July. We formed our first little life in August 2023, and I miscarried five short weeks later.  The weight of that loss struck me unexpectedly and profoundly, and it was in the overcoming that I realized how powerful and miraculous it is to create and sustain life (and how much of it all is out of our control). In October 2023, we conceived again, and my Joni started growing rapidly inside of my body that has now become her own home.

I have tried to embrace every moment of matrescence these past 32 weeks: the pain, the fear, the enthusiasm, the fascination, the misery, the anxiety, the hope, and the love. I feel settled for the first time in my life, like a portal has opened in my soul and like my heart has doubled in size.

But I have also felt isolated, trying to keep myself wrapped tightly in my inner circle and seeking to form new bonds with those who are experiencing the same rollercoaster of emotions I’ve been riding for nearly a year. It is hard to find community when everything is changing so rapidly, and you feel yourself becoming something new, unrecognizable but just right.

Writing has always been my coping mechanism. It is how I explain, process, reflect, and understand this curious world. After a tumultuous first trimester, I felt a pull to purge my overflowing thoughts and so I started my Substack, Mother Love Letters.

I feel my words morphing as my body continues to change and as my mind continues to shift to fit the shape of this grand new chapter in my life. The last thing we should ever feel in matrescence is loneliness, and I strongly believe that words can comfort and swaddle us to sleep in much-needed peace. It has now brought me to other writers and mothers and readers and lovers of all things honest and raw.

The more I’ve written about navigating this process, the more I’ve sought to learn from the experiences of other mothers who have come before me. As I enter the final phases of my first pregnancy, I would love to hear about life after gestation. While I carry my baby girl, I also carry these questions:

Can one prepare for the postpartum period, or do we just take it in stride like everything else that radically changes our lives?

Does anyone else fear that their baby will not love them back?

What do you wish someone would’ve told you before your first baby was born?

How do we continue to connect with ourselves when we become the lifeforce for another?

What does a newborn baby really need?

What are the best ways to support each other in each new phase of motherhood?

I appreciate and welcome any wisdom, truths, and anecdotes that you feel comfortable sharing. I will hold your words in a tight spool with the huge love I’m holding for my Joni, and I cannot wait to unravel them when she is born.

What blessings would you offer Violet as she prepares to make her transition into motherhood?

Thank you for reading!

Please, share your thoughts and wisdom in the comments with us. If you are expecting or know someone who is, share this post with them. If you want the Being in Motherhood community to hold space for you (or another’s) motherhood blessing, send me a message.