In today’s culture, birth is too often something we’re told to "get through."
Get through the pregnancy. Make it to 40 weeks. Get the baby out safely. Then bounce back. Return to work. Shrink your body. Smile through the sleep deprivation. Be grateful. Be quiet.
But birth was never meant to be just a medical event or a checklist milestone.
Pregnancy, birth, and the first 42 days postpartum (what many cultures have long honored as the sacred window of "lying in") are a spiritual initiation. A rite of passage. Not just about the baby, but for the woman becoming a mother.
And yet, our society has forgotten this.
We’ve traded ceremony for checkups. Intuition for protocols. Wisdom for data points. The sacred has been sterilized.
Spiritual bypassing
I want to name something here: spiritual bypassing can happen in birth, too.
It shows up when we brush over the physical and emotional intensity of this rite of passage and skip straight to “trust the process.”
When we package birth as a manifest-it-and-it-will-be-painless moment... without preparing the mother’s body, mind, or spirit of what's to come.
When we ignore the grief, fear, or trauma that may surface.
When we pretend the medical system is neutral or "just how it is.”
When we say all that matters is a healthy baby while completely dismissing the transformation the mother is walking through.
Birth is not something to bypass, sanitize, or race through.
It's messy. Wild. Physical. Raw. And holy.
Spiritual initiation
A spiritual initiation doesn’t mean it’s pain-free. It means it’s transformational.
It asks something of you. It invites you into a new identity.
One that will crack you open and put you back together again in a form that’s stronger, softer, wiser, and more attuned to life.
And your baby? They are on their own soul journey, too... That begins long before their first breath and continues through the portal of labor and birth.
The way they are welcomed into the world matters.
The energy of their first days. The arms that hold them. The nervous system they’re tethered to... it all imprints.
This is why reclaiming the sacred in birth matters. Because birth is where both the mother and the baby are born.
The medicalization of birth has its place. We can be grateful for tools and interventions when they are truly needed.
But when they become the default lens through which we view and shape birth, we lose something essential. We forget that birth is not just physiological. It's spiritual.
The first 42 days postpartum are not just recovery time. They are sacred. They set the tone for the next 42 years.
And yet, how many women are asked, “When will you be back to work?” before the bleeding has even stopped?
I believe we’re being invited - maybe even begged - to remember: birth is an initiation. Not a hurdle to overcome. Not something to numb ourselves out of feeling or conquer or get an "A" on. It is the great unraveling and re-weaving of a woman’s soul.
When we treat it with reverence, preparation, and space to integrate we raise not only more empowered mothers, but more rooted children. Children who know that life is meant to be honored. That their mother is wise. That transitions deserve time and tenderness.
If you’re pregnant, postpartum, or even years past your birth experience(s), it’s never too late to reflect with this lens.
What would shift if you saw your birth as a rite of passage?
What wisdom lives in your story?
What part of you was born the day your child came earth-side?
Want to hear more about how birth shaped me and what I wish every woman knew?
Listen to my recent episode on Metro Detroit Birth Stories, where I share both of my birth stories, and the spiritual and emotional growth that came with them. (Sharing and listening to birth stories can be potent medicine to respect, accept, and release any residual emotions or qualities you may be holding on to which are no longer be helpful.)
Ready to nurture your inner wisdom with motherhood to the next level?
Aligned Mother returns July 26, 2025. An in-person workshop to support you in integrating holistic values with modern medicine, reclaiming your intuitive power, and leading from within.
Space is limited and registration is now open - click here to join us.
This is your invitation to honor what’s always been sacred. Birth is not something to get through. It’s a doorway.