“I think I can feel my baby move,” Whitney said, her dewy
blue eyes wide with anticipation. Her voice rose at the end, turning her
sentence into a query. She was a few weeks shy of the second trimester of her
second successful pregnancy. Exuberantly curious, she sought validation for her
awareness. Whitney was more confident with this baby than her first, but on the
issue of whether or not she in fact could detect her baby’s movement, she was
uncertain.
The delivery of Whitney’s first child was by caesarean
section. At the time, and now in retrospect, she questioned the procedure. It
had evoked a prolonged and recurring experience of loss. She knew that she
wanted to deliver her second child vaginally, and that her doctor would object.
These were the thoughts dancing in Whitney’s mind when she
inquired about feeling movement. She pushed them aside to be attentive for her
doctor’s response.
“No, that’s not possible. It’s probably just gas,” Dr.
Carlson said, with a sweet, preoccupied smile.
Whitney genuinely liked her doctor. She knew that Dr.
Carlson was a good physician, and that she too was a mom. Dr. Carlson had
returned to her career after the birth (by caesarean) of her own daughter.
Whitney, on the other hand, had gone from being a successful businesswoman with
a top salary to being a full-time mom. She loved it! It was not Dr. Carlson’s
professionalism or commitment that troubled Whitney; it was what she suspected
Dr. Carlson did not know about a mother’s capacity to feel her connection to
prenatal life and development.
Whitney had learned how to be sensitive to her body and to
her own feelings since becoming a mother. She had also made it her job to learn
about the latest discoveries in embryology. Ironically, her baby’s caesarean
delivery was the impetus for her increased awareness. It had catapulted her
into a passionate quest for the truth about early life, her own as well as her
children’s. She was disturbed by the air of secrecy blowing around the cloak of
authority that she encountered in the medical world.
Whitney had also learned the essential parenting practice of
sorting her feelings and sensations until she understood their frequently
hidden meanings. This was the route to self-empowerment. She was reclaiming what
she felt she had lost during the delivery of her first child.
She knew she was looking for supportive mirroring from Dr.
Carlson about her baby’s movement, but when she did not get it, she reflected
on this instead of reacting to it.
Moments later Whitney determined that only she could address
her uncertainty about her baby’s movement. When she inquired inside, the answer
was definitely, yes, she could feel her baby move. In her first pregnancy, she
would have accepted her doctor’s response. Having traversed the painful
territory of post-partum depression that she now correlated specifically with
the unnecessary caesarean, Whitney had become much more confident in her
feminine wisdom. She could honor her hormonally endowed attunement to herself
and her child. She was alert to her own tendency to collude in an
institutionalized disempowerment of mothers.
As she reflected further on Dr. Carlson’s response, Whitney
wondered what kind of relationship she could have with a doctor who did not
trust a mother’s experience. Whitney dialogued with her unborn child. Silently,
but with passion, she said to her baby, “I recognize your movement and I love
it! I’m sorry I was not more confident earlier.” Her baby moved, subtly but
clearly, spreading out, stretching with relief in utero.
“Movements of the embryo and fetus are a fundamental
expression of early neural activity,” says embryologist Jan Nijhuis in his
groundbreaking book Fetal Behavior. “The fetus of 8-10 weeks post-menstrual age
moves spontaneously in utero under normal circumstances.”
Prenatal movement in the first trimester, and then the
patterns of movement that form in the second trimester, are the expression of
the developing baby’s nervous system. This primary neurological unfolding is
nourished and enhanced by parental awareness, dialogue and subtle touch on the
mother’s body that communicates to the baby. The entire family can participate
in this encouragement. The knowledge of how to do this is inherent in each of
us. It is part of the magnificent design of the human being. Excellent
education is now available to stimulate and sustain this natural wisdom.
Awakening to, trusting and acting upon our innate human connection is the joy
of parenthood.
Prenatal movement is preparation for neonatal activity. It
is also warm-up for the marathon of labor and delivery. It is designed to
result in the baby’s thrilling victory of entry into the arms of a world
already sensed and perceived.
Movement patterns in prenates are replicated in neonates,
demonstrating the continuity of neural behavior. The human fetus sleeps,
breathes moves, eliminates, and feels, sees, cries, initiates and responds. He
or she is acutely sensitive, as a result of constantly expanding neurological
capacities, to the surrounding environment and its vicissitudes.
The prenate communicates its experiences the only way it
can: through motility. Eye movement, heart-rate, respiration, gestures, and
elimination patterns speak volumes about the individual prenatal world.
Regularity of movement can be a sign of health whereas
deceleration or lack of movement can signal distress or concern. Certain fetal
movements may convey discomfort. By noticing movements or their absence, the
family can come to know its new arrival and begin, well before birth, to
integrate the baby into the family. Prenatal consciousness is neurologically
organized to be present, alert and receptive. The unborn baby delights in
recognition.
The question of whom and what the baby in utero actually is
and what he or she is capable of doing can best be answered by a respectful
collaboration between scientists, parents and people who remember their own
prenatal lives. Optimally, these three categories can be combined. Scientists,
like me, who are passionate about the role and function of very early life in
holistic healthcare, are building the case to demonstrate that prenatal life
is, in fact, the basis of all health.
Immune function, structural development, spiritual
wellbeing, relational health, confidence, and the capacity to respond to change
and threat in a balanced way are all formed by what transpires in utero.
Embryology bears this out. Of all the populations that will make the best use
of this information, parents, I believe, are the most significant.
The personality of the unborn baby is present and engaged
with its family from virtually the moment of conception, and some believe even
before. The baby is not only interacting, he or she is a full time student,
constantly learning and creating the blueprint for a lifetime of physical
health, relationships and motivation.
All relationships flourish with authentic and frequent
communication. This is as true for prenates as it is for husband and wife, and
for parents and children of all ages.
I am reminded of a story reported to me by a young friend
who attended a conference where insights into prenatal health were discussed.
He was inspired by what he heard. Soon after, he discovered that friends of his
had been told that their baby was breach and that a caesarean was scheduled.
This young man immediately went to their home, sat in front of the mother’s
pregnant belly, and begged and pleaded with the baby to turn. He spoke with
full commitment, faith and insistence. The baby turned and was delivered
vaginally.
What does embryology say about the prenate’s ability to hear
and respond to auditory communication?
Neonates as well as prenates, until relatively recently,
were regarded as being deaf as well as mute. Beginning in 1977, however,
research demonstrated that the fetus responds to sound from at least 12 weeks
in utero and perhaps sooner. Certain sounds, like the mother’s heartbeat,
elicit strong responses. The mother’s voice is decidedly heard, as well as the
voices of others in the environment. This is supported by the discovery that
neonates prefer the sound of their mother’s voice to other sounds.
Auditory sensory mechanisms begin developing during the
fourth and fifth week in utero and continue to completion by about the 25th
week. At the early stages, however, the baby can hear. A study involving
invasive sound at less than 24 weeks of gestation revealed that after hearing a
loud and shrill noise that evoked initial dramatic fetal movement, the fetus
stopped responding completely. The overwhelming invasion resulted in fatigue
and collapse. The fetus learned it was powerless to stop the invasion. The method
of the study disturbs me but I hope we will learn from this and stop such
painful experiments. However, we can take this knowledge and use it to protect
our own prenates from auditory assault!
How do babies reveal their memories post-natally? Long term
studies conducted by Italian psychologist Alessandra Piontelli and published in
her book From Fetus to Child show that babies who are frightened and insecure
in utero and who demonstrate this through their behavioral states, do the same
thing at five years of age and older.
Whitney’s experience of her first son’s memories of his
caesarean birth supports this theory. In the midst of storytelling, Timmy said
“Will our new baby have to wait to come out instead of pushing, the way I did,
Mommy?” At first Whitney stared at her son in amazement, and then she
acknowledged his wisdom, just as she had learned to acknowledge her own.
“Was waiting hard for you?” she asked her son. “It was very
hard,” Timmy replied. “I don’t want my baby to have to wait.” “OK,” Whitney
said, “I’ll do my best so there will be no waiting this time.”
Whitney learned how her child’s embryological behavioral
states continued into the birthing process when she went into labor. The
process slowed just when it should have intensified, causing even her midwife
to consider going to the hospital. It was déjà vu for Whitney and her family.
“It’s OK,” Whitney told her family and midwife, turning the
tables on her team. Weren’t they supposed to be reassuring her?
“My baby is just concerned,” she declared, smiling. “We need
to have a conversation.” Her body provided Whitney with the truth she trusted.
Her baby could and would decide the time of birth.
Whitney closed her eyes and commenced an internal dialogue
in which she encouraged her child to continue to journey forward and inquired
about what the difficulty might be. Her communion was a show stopper for
everyone.
“What’s he saying?” Timmy blurted out, unable to control
himself. He had always known he had a brother in there!
“He says that he doesn’t know if we will have time for him
because we are all so busy. He’s not sure we really want him,” Whitney said
softly, looking directly at her husband.
“Is that just you talking?” Blake asked, dumfounded.
“He’s been listening, watching and learning,” Whitney
answered, her face radiant in the greatest certainty she had ever known.
“OK,” Blake said, tears streaming down his face. “I’ll spend
more time at home. I really want to.” By this time he was sobbing.
The baby’s response was the biggest contraction Whitney had
ever felt. Within thirty minutes their baby was born. They named him Micah, the
merciful messenger.
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