And so the yoga of motherhood began. It has surpassed all warnings in its extent of precious, heart-warming beauty and in its degree of difficulty.
I find myself on my yoga mat, after the emotional roller-coaster of the last nine months, a different person. A planned home water-birth turned into an emergency caesarean, then our young baby went through a very unhappy projectile vomiting reflux phase. After countless sleep-disturbed nights and an agonising couple of months of wrist tendonitis (aka “mommy’s thumb”), a few minutes of silence on a yoga mat comes closer than ever to true bliss.
When I found some students would habitually lay their mats in the same spot each class, I got them to swap places now and then to shift them out of their comfort zones. In my own practice I change locations and play with different poses in different sequences to avoid becoming stuck in habits. It brings a fresh new awareness that lets me experience my body in new ways. Our daughter Sereia has not just moved my mat, she’s thrown it right out the window! My practice cant take place at a fixed time, sometimes during her daytime nap, most times at night, other times not at all. I have learned that this sanctuary of yoga is not claimed by me as a right, but bestowed upon me now and then as a blessing.
My little girl has taught me a lot about the constancy of change. She has no routine feeding times or waking hours or even bowel movements. It all shifts and fluctuates. What it does is keep me very attentive. I don’t know what will happen next, so I have to be very alert and observant. So it should be in yoga. We cant take anything physical for granted. Each day is different. If we are alert, more is revealed.
Sereia’s coming into this world and my becoming a mother, has been a massive initiation. I feel I have passed through a wall of fire that has torched my individualism, so I’m now able to dedicate my days to serving my little offspring. The heart-opening power of nourishing a tiny creature from my own breast has far surpassed that of any backbend. When I hold her in my arms, I feel a surge of emotion. Fierce protectiveness, deep nurturing and a touch of fear that this being is totally dependent on me for survival.
Renewing my yoga practice with a stiff, exhausted body and a hazy sleep-deprived mind was a challenge. Yet wonderful, because after many years of feeling like much of it was quite effortless, I could suddenly really feel which muscles the poses activated. I realised what many of my students, who are parents or have demanding jobs (or both) and limited time to practice yoga, must experience. I felt how a tired body feels doing yoga.
I felt my arms shake and core muscles fight to keep me aloft in plank pose. I felt the strong pectoral stretch in a supine twist. In bow pose, my lower abdominals, tightened by post-caesarean scar tissue, pulled as they lengthened while my heels moved away from my head. Headstand, which was once unshakably solid, wobbled slightly, reminding me to become more grounded. While suffering from acute wrist tendonitis I was unable to do any weight bearing poses at all. It was an excruciating lesson in how students with wrist problems can struggle with yoga, but it also encouraged me to dig up a whole lot of other poses from the archives. I was guided in a new direction.
The details of my day and my work as a mother are contained in my body. Its often like opening Pandora’s box each time I visit my yoga mat. Aching wrists carrying, tight shoulders from lifting, tired legs from too much standing. I recalled the complaints of new mothers in my classes about stiff upper bodies and remembered how their shoulders would often stay up there, permanently engaged, as if constantly supporting the huge responsibility of motherhood.
This love, a mother’s love is different to anything I have ever felt. Watching my little one smile makes my heart bubble over. Massaging her tiny feet after a bath is such tender fulfillment. Hearing her melodious high-pitched chattering fills the air with magic and sweetness. How miraculous to watch her develop from a purely instinctive animal into a little person. After constantly puzzling about what went on in that little mind, gradually, like a dot-to-dot drawing, a picture is taking shape. Slowly a personality evolves and begins to be understood.
In this cotton-wool maternal cocoon, the world’s harshness seems so distant. One drizzly winter’s evening I was jolted firmly back into South Africa 2013.I was sitting in our bedroom at sunset in my gown, holding Sereia, who had just fed and was dozy after a last lullaby. I heard thudding in the other room. I called out, thinking maybe a friend had popped over. Next thing the bedroom door was opened by a man in a balaclava. My exhausted mind initially thought someone was playing a joke on me. I must have stared at him in disbelief for ages, but his demands for cash jolted me into action. In the breast feeding mother’s utterly calm state, I obediently handed over whatever valuables I could so the intruders would leave. My instant reaction was to panic about Sereia’s safety, but the thief quickly muttered: “Don’t worry, we wont hurt you, just give us money.” Looking back I am sure that at the moment he opened the door, he was as shocked to find a mother and child in what he thought was an empty house. I even sensed he was slightly ashamed. What level of desperation does a person reach to rob the mother of a small baby? Surely at some moment he thought of his own mother, or maybe the mother of his child.
The bedtime bubble is such a space of safety and pure unconditional love that violence is difficult. In my peaceful, nurturing state, fighting was the furthest thing I could contemplate. There was no chance I would lash out in defence. It didn’t cross my mind, even with all the adrenalin coursing through my veins. In those kind of situations in the past, I did try to fight. I believe my calmness kept us safe. And amazingly Sereia was still and quiet throughout. Even when they left, in a state of shock I just went back into the room, sat on the bed and continued to feed her. It was quite a while after they had gone that I called for help.
In so many ways, I am now a new person. I realise, that far more than physical, the yoga of motherhood is that of anahata, the heart. It is a brave heart that gives me courage to face whatever challenges are being thrown my way. The powerful, transforming force of a mother’s love touches all that I do.
As this blog is about to be published, danger came uncomfortably close again last night while I was nursing Sereia. I was blankly gazing at the gap of light that shone in under the bedroom door, when I noticed a shape there. ‘Strange,’ I thought, ‘that looks just like a snake’. Then it moved in an unmistakeable reptilian way, halfway into the room. I froze for a moment in disbelief, then stayed exactly where I was and called out to Ritchie in the lounge. Shocked but very efficient, he cornered our visitor on the other side of the door and caught and released it.
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