The Silver Child

On New Year’s Eve I was feeling very cranky and as if there was energy blocked in and around my back that I just couldn’t work out.  So I decided to take a ritual bath to cleanse myself and to try to create a grateful attitude in myself to replace the surliness… it’s usually easy after I’ve let myself be reminded of the incredible blessings I’ve received.

I ran the bath and poured in salt.  Then I  got in on my hands and knees, which made me think of what I’ve been reading the past few months about childbirth & home birth and how supposedly giving birth in water is the easiest possible way and this train of thought led me to have a kind of weird fantasy/daydream experience:

I saw myself as in labor (even though I was not physically pregnant) and then I was giving birth to a silver child.  I took it on my belly to recover from birth and watched as the umbilical cord pulsed more and more gently before finally stopping.  Then I moved the child to my breast and cuddled it for a while.

As I lost sight of this vision, I started to wash, praise, thank and bless my body parts.   I felt peaceful, powerful, contented and deeply grateful.

Thinking about this experience, I noticed that the childbirth imagery is all very much as I would imagined it when I was a child: pain-free and big-belly-free.  This reminded me that I have always disliked baby dolls and only played with them as a child when one of my friends told me to.  I’m hoping that this is partially the dreams and fantasies I should have had while I was young finally being able to express themselves.  All of my interest in the miracle of childbirth disappeared for me when I was about 10 or so and I asked Mom to tell me what childbirth was like, expecting to hear a story of wonder and excitement like I’d heard from my then best friend’s mother.  Instead, my mom said that having a baby was like having to poop and not being able to.   That essentially destroyed all interest I had in having a baby until I’ve recently been working to reclaim that.

(Also, have you noticed that I like to visualize silver people?  Anyone have any thoughts on that?)