Reflections on birth, matrescence and the profound transformation of becoming a mother. Written from the threshold, as a doula, a practitioner and a woman navigating this journey herself.
In 1973, an anthropologist named Dana Raphael coined two words that would go on to shape how we think about birth and motherhood. One of them, Doula, became widely known. The other, Matrescence, remained largely absent from mainstream conversation for the next fifty years. Matrescence describes the transformation a woman undergoes as she becomes a mother. Not just the physical transformation of pregnancy and birth, but the complete neurological, psychological, emotional and
