Raeven GD

The latest post (raeven.substack.com)

LoftSanté, the clinic where I work, has just updated their mission statement. It's lovely :)

Les thérapeutes chez Loft Santé visent à offrir un espace chaleureux et accueillant pour tous. Nous reconnaissons notre responsabilité à incarner et promouvoir la diversité et continuons à nous éduquer afin d'offrir le meilleur soutien possible à nos clients.

At Loft Santé, we seek to provide a safe and welcoming space for all peoples and recognize our responsibility in continuing to educate ourselves so that we can better support those who entrust us with their care.

Another piece up on raeven.substack.com - on being an ancestor to yourself and figuring out how to love all our ages.

““5 is way better than 2,” says my nephew, who is 5, sauntering away from our near 2-year-old. But of course he would think that - he knows about Pokemon and superheroes. He’s allowed TV and he can run fast. From that perspective 5 IS way better than 2. But I remember when he was 2. I was crazy about him then. I remember his pleasant, quiet companionship and his fearless scaling of jungle gyms. But how can I possibly explain to him that all ages are perfectly human and all worth loving and difficult in their own way?”
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Bloom is a book I wrote during my pregnancy.

It’s about about experiencing your pregnancy as sacred and clarifying our relationships during the process. Includes week by week reflections, meditations and enquiries.

Available on Gumroad - ciao bye amazon for now -link in bio! PWYC.

Your support arise SO appreciated! Special discounts for birthworkers (DM me ❤️)
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Heyo - hope the winter is proving to be a no-time, no-momentum, no-competition, deep time to rebuild while in re-chrysalis.

New post on raeven.substack.com - hella short, on rest. Babel Fish, last month’s post, was a long piece on figuring out how to “be” in that ever tangled and growing relationship with family, inherited and chosen and born to.

Be well ❤️

Write about work-human to mom-human transitions and their edges @ raeven.substack.com

Our son learned how to blow dandelions today. “Phfff phfff,” he whispers, imitating me. We’re in a quiet part of the park hedged by rusty fence, surrounded by puffy weeds.

I’ve gone back to work and while I’m happy there and he’s totally happy at daycare, I get flustered transitioning from being cerebral and organized to being “mom,” which I associate with being able to read our toddler and not caring if putting on shoes takes 10 minutes. I cherish all my ways of being but the transition between them can be difficult and it triggers my impatience.

My Jewels: a post on memory and parenting and how hard it is to share the magic

A typical text to a friend: Example 2:
O and I had a great, casual coffee date hang with a friend and he walked around the neighborhood with a ton of confidence.

Vs what it really feels like:

Best Run Ever”: at the cafe, before daycare. Mama forgets to ask for decaf and Ozzie gets halfway through a cake muffin before he’s interrupted. HIGH ON SUGAR he toddles over to the free book shelf outside the bookshop next to the cafe. He eagerly picks up and flips through the pages of a book by Robert Bly called “About Men.” It was the only one left on the shelf. Not the hot topic du jour, I ponder, jittering. In any case, that is not of his concern for he REFUSES to give it back, walking very close to the shelf, then shaking his head and muttering “no, no” as he heads back to the poussette, book clasped to his chest. Reasonably, he concedes the book in exchange for a red leaf, which he wraps around his fingers and coos to as I run us to garderie. 

Link in the bio, the latest: “Rest in What You’ve Created.” In honour of all we contribute to the things we feel we can’t control.

It feels like good instincts.

Like yesterday. Someone actually spat at me, at a far enough distance that it hit neither me nor my poussette.

My body was on fire, I could have attacked this person, instead, I witnessed myself flip him the bird and call him "fu**ed up and rude" as I walked myself to the other side of the street to speak to a lady who commiserated and posited calmly that "he probably wasn't all there." Rest in what you've created - the ability to walk away when you'd go mama bear on someone's butt. Mainly because you remember that you really don't know how to fight.

Rest in what you've created - the instinct to walk away, but the wisdom to create brief community of "being seen" when things out of your control come and mess with your juju.

Each bodywork modality has its own way of reading the body. In osteopathy, as I've understood it, we are narrating a tale of interrelationships: local, regional, global and contextual. I'm doing a little series on how an osteopath thinks. This week, it's about babies and breastfeeding. Local: hey look! This baby has a hard time opening its mouth. I'm wondering about muscles around the mouth and base of the tongue. Regional: how's that neck moving though? Can it move backwards to help the baby open its mouth? Global: Are there major tensions in the spine? Has this had an effect on how baby digests? And if so, I would wonder about the mobility of the structures on the pathway of the vagus nerve, which is responsible for digestion.

Contextual: Were there any interventions during the birth? Is the child-bearing partner able to rest and focus on breastfeedng? Is there education around skin-to-skin and wearing baby?

Local, regional, global, contextual, these are the stories I tell myself as I practice.

Black Out Curtains Today's match up: Pratyahara (retreat within the senses) vs. a baby crying