Rose Sybil presents cultural endurance and civilizational renaissance as deeply intertwined with restoring authentic motherhood, illustrating how childbirth and child-rearing are essential experiences of spiritual and social initiation.
Fantastic article, All my kids born naturally and with the family present. We have a very strongly bonded family. And see the effect of the opposite in others.
I shared some thoughts on my restack, but want to add more here
My first birth was a planned homebirth. My midwife dropped my care the day my water broke when contractions didnt start immediately.
I felt forced by all around me to go endure an induction, a painful procedure to open my cervix, and rapid pitocin progression.
I went without an epidural for the night and begged, demanded a decrease of pitocin. The nurse and doctors argues with me during my torture, that they were "trying to save my baby". My reply was what is good for me is good for my baby.
At the heart of this is not risk mitigation or maternal fear of personal pain. It is the systems refusal to admit any minor risk to the baby.
They are backed by the full force of the state in this, in most cases. And by the reign of terror by usurious insurance companies.
There is no coming to terms with this without allowing ourselves to be open, not to the pain or death of mothers, but to the cycle of life for our children. Risk mitigation for the baby is completely societally and legally enshrined.
And yes medical power over people and children is a huge issue. Medical kidnap happens a lot with kids… and pharma dictates norms, one of the worst of the international oligopolies.
I agree about maternal initiation as well! Hope I'm not coming across as disagreeing. It seems like a secondary or primary root is all this red tape is done in the interest of the child (misplaced) and it nearly forces mothers into a place of stunted development. I feel like nursing my baby and cosleeping rebuilt my self confidence and knowing better now, I hope to do better with my upcoming birth. It is just so insane how the system rug pulls you into a nearly forced birth trajectory. This includes midwifery in many cases. Of course you can always free birth or seek alternatives, but people need to know that a physiological birth is hard to come by in the current system.
Oh yes, believe me I know. I’ve experienced some crazy births and hospitals myself. I was almost killed by one after my birth actually. It’s systemic and raising awareness helps to break the hold.
Oh I know each state has very differnt laws. In some states midwifery at home is still illegal, in some they have many things they have to send you to the hospital for by law that could be done with herbs etc., and it’s against the mothers wishes many times.
Risk management is how they got away with horrors during covid and ignore that medical malpractice is the third leading cause of death and not always classified right.
I’m so sorry that happened to you. There are other ways you can build more oxytocin layering too, it’s just the largest dump but a general trend that can show its effects on society and family dynamics. For those that have no choice there are ways to still build more connection.
I am quite old (85) and from an entirely, both sides of the family, immigrants. All my grandparents and most of my aunts and uncles were born "in the old country". So I don't know if it was those conditions of uprooted immigrants or those times of 80-90 years ago. But we children were effectively raised by the whole extended family. This was a huge benefit to the parents who in this way were not accountable for the entire lives of all their kids. Grandparents and aunts and uncles could always step in. I suspect this also helped - generally - with relationships between husbands and wives. But any of that took place outside the view of the children. So, you see,, the network was of great help for the entire family, not only the women - though, of course, the focus today (rightly, I think) is on the women.
Yes it helped everyone, not just mothers. That’s how my grandparents were raised and my dad. I even got the tail end of this and was basically raised with extended family. I’m so grateful for my grandparents, great aunts and uncles, and aunts and uncles in my rearing. It’s a huge part of the low replacement rates that we no longer have these support systems and a lot of mothers are more isolated than ever and so are men.
For many in America that is quite a romanticized view of extended family. I know many who were abused by their extended family, which caused rifts, wars, etc. in families. Even today there are more and more stories coming into the forefront of extended family abusing the kids too. A friend of mine that has recently passed on was abused by extended family and the division this caused affected him until the day they died. So you can't say this is necessarily the course for everyone.
Abuse within families definitely occurs and they should be removed from the family. Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen enough actually. In cases of physical abuse it can go way too far though my grandparents used corporal punishment with me in a more mild and corrective way that I do not consider that at all.
Any sexual abuse the person should swing from a tree.
I like to think of initiation as a cycle. We begin the cycle in a state of wholeness, holiness, and health. We must sacrifice that at the beginning of the cycle and take the step into un-wholeness, unholiness, and sickness. This is the meaning of the word “sacred”, which means to make whole, holy, and healthy. Therefore, initiation can be thought of as a sacred cycle or a journey through the sacred, which requires us to sacrifice wholeness in order to incorporate something new into ourselves.
The Devouring Mother then represents the Mother who has not returned to wholeness, holiness, and health at the end of the cycle. This means that the cycle itself does not get completed and the unresolved trauma is carried on, usually in the form of psychological complexes. That was actually what Freud and Jung discovered, although psychiatry and medicine have now also been split up into separate disciplines, and we treat psychological and biological issues as separate. Modern science knows how to split things up, but not how to put them back together.
I would love to see more articles like this related to the female archetypes! This is one of the most phenomenal articles I’ve had the pleasure of reading in a long time. Thank you 🙏🏻
Powerful and precise analysis! I had 9 Nordic and Germanic aunts, uncles and cousins close by! How lucky I was and, until now, never knew my fortune! Thanks!
Thank you! I had wonderful extended family involvement in my rearing, can’t say the same for my children, but their children will have it again because I will be there for them.
Not the case when it’s holistic and in a female oriented setting with midwives. The hospital setting literally caused a lot of the stalling. The US has one of the highest rates of infant and maternal mortality in birth and the most medicalization compared to many parts of Europe. The revival of natural birth shows completely different stats.
Midwifing was pretty much outlawed in the early 1970s, and the AMA pretty much wanted to dominate and control the OBGYN narrative when it came to pregnancy. Generations of midwives who learned it from Mother/Daughter/Granddaughter were told they had to go to medical school and essentially be doctors to assist in birth or go to jail. This was especially true in Black parts of the south that were previously segregated.
That’s right. I have been a midwife and trained in the UK a few decades back. The days when we were truly ‘with women’ from very early in their pregnancies to helping them adjust to motherhood… Unfortunately it’s too medicalised and expectations for all sorts of reasons have impacted badly for women and families
Fantastic article, All my kids born naturally and with the family present. We have a very strongly bonded family. And see the effect of the opposite in others.
Thank you. That’s wonderful to hear and I’m sure you will both restart those extended family support networks for your grandchildren one day!
I shared some thoughts on my restack, but want to add more here
My first birth was a planned homebirth. My midwife dropped my care the day my water broke when contractions didnt start immediately.
I felt forced by all around me to go endure an induction, a painful procedure to open my cervix, and rapid pitocin progression.
I went without an epidural for the night and begged, demanded a decrease of pitocin. The nurse and doctors argues with me during my torture, that they were "trying to save my baby". My reply was what is good for me is good for my baby.
At the heart of this is not risk mitigation or maternal fear of personal pain. It is the systems refusal to admit any minor risk to the baby.
They are backed by the full force of the state in this, in most cases. And by the reign of terror by usurious insurance companies.
There is no coming to terms with this without allowing ourselves to be open, not to the pain or death of mothers, but to the cycle of life for our children. Risk mitigation for the baby is completely societally and legally enshrined.
And yes medical power over people and children is a huge issue. Medical kidnap happens a lot with kids… and pharma dictates norms, one of the worst of the international oligopolies.
I agree about maternal initiation as well! Hope I'm not coming across as disagreeing. It seems like a secondary or primary root is all this red tape is done in the interest of the child (misplaced) and it nearly forces mothers into a place of stunted development. I feel like nursing my baby and cosleeping rebuilt my self confidence and knowing better now, I hope to do better with my upcoming birth. It is just so insane how the system rug pulls you into a nearly forced birth trajectory. This includes midwifery in many cases. Of course you can always free birth or seek alternatives, but people need to know that a physiological birth is hard to come by in the current system.
Oh yes, believe me I know. I’ve experienced some crazy births and hospitals myself. I was almost killed by one after my birth actually. It’s systemic and raising awareness helps to break the hold.
Oh I know each state has very differnt laws. In some states midwifery at home is still illegal, in some they have many things they have to send you to the hospital for by law that could be done with herbs etc., and it’s against the mothers wishes many times.
Risk management is how they got away with horrors during covid and ignore that medical malpractice is the third leading cause of death and not always classified right.
I’m so sorry that happened to you. There are other ways you can build more oxytocin layering too, it’s just the largest dump but a general trend that can show its effects on society and family dynamics. For those that have no choice there are ways to still build more connection.
I am quite old (85) and from an entirely, both sides of the family, immigrants. All my grandparents and most of my aunts and uncles were born "in the old country". So I don't know if it was those conditions of uprooted immigrants or those times of 80-90 years ago. But we children were effectively raised by the whole extended family. This was a huge benefit to the parents who in this way were not accountable for the entire lives of all their kids. Grandparents and aunts and uncles could always step in. I suspect this also helped - generally - with relationships between husbands and wives. But any of that took place outside the view of the children. So, you see,, the network was of great help for the entire family, not only the women - though, of course, the focus today (rightly, I think) is on the women.
Yes it helped everyone, not just mothers. That’s how my grandparents were raised and my dad. I even got the tail end of this and was basically raised with extended family. I’m so grateful for my grandparents, great aunts and uncles, and aunts and uncles in my rearing. It’s a huge part of the low replacement rates that we no longer have these support systems and a lot of mothers are more isolated than ever and so are men.
For many in America that is quite a romanticized view of extended family. I know many who were abused by their extended family, which caused rifts, wars, etc. in families. Even today there are more and more stories coming into the forefront of extended family abusing the kids too. A friend of mine that has recently passed on was abused by extended family and the division this caused affected him until the day they died. So you can't say this is necessarily the course for everyone.
Abuse within families definitely occurs and they should be removed from the family. Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen enough actually. In cases of physical abuse it can go way too far though my grandparents used corporal punishment with me in a more mild and corrective way that I do not consider that at all.
Any sexual abuse the person should swing from a tree.
I know these things occur.
Great post.
I like to think of initiation as a cycle. We begin the cycle in a state of wholeness, holiness, and health. We must sacrifice that at the beginning of the cycle and take the step into un-wholeness, unholiness, and sickness. This is the meaning of the word “sacred”, which means to make whole, holy, and healthy. Therefore, initiation can be thought of as a sacred cycle or a journey through the sacred, which requires us to sacrifice wholeness in order to incorporate something new into ourselves.
The Devouring Mother then represents the Mother who has not returned to wholeness, holiness, and health at the end of the cycle. This means that the cycle itself does not get completed and the unresolved trauma is carried on, usually in the form of psychological complexes. That was actually what Freud and Jung discovered, although psychiatry and medicine have now also been split up into separate disciplines, and we treat psychological and biological issues as separate. Modern science knows how to split things up, but not how to put them back together.
I would love to see more articles like this related to the female archetypes! This is one of the most phenomenal articles I’ve had the pleasure of reading in a long time. Thank you 🙏🏻
I appreciate that. Thank you for taking the time to read it.
You might also like this article:
https://arktos.com/2023/05/28/birth-and-battle/
Powerful and precise analysis! I had 9 Nordic and Germanic aunts, uncles and cousins close by! How lucky I was and, until now, never knew my fortune! Thanks!
Thank you! I had wonderful extended family involvement in my rearing, can’t say the same for my children, but their children will have it again because I will be there for them.
Non-medicalized birth was responsible for substantial maternal and infant mortality and morbidity.
Not the case when it’s holistic and in a female oriented setting with midwives. The hospital setting literally caused a lot of the stalling. The US has one of the highest rates of infant and maternal mortality in birth and the most medicalization compared to many parts of Europe. The revival of natural birth shows completely different stats.
Midwifing was pretty much outlawed in the early 1970s, and the AMA pretty much wanted to dominate and control the OBGYN narrative when it came to pregnancy. Generations of midwives who learned it from Mother/Daughter/Granddaughter were told they had to go to medical school and essentially be doctors to assist in birth or go to jail. This was especially true in Black parts of the south that were previously segregated.
That’s right. I have been a midwife and trained in the UK a few decades back. The days when we were truly ‘with women’ from very early in their pregnancies to helping them adjust to motherhood… Unfortunately it’s too medicalised and expectations for all sorts of reasons have impacted badly for women and families
Big agree. Even in the states it varies a lot state to state.
I will be thinking about and rereading this. Thanks for the recommendation.