Black Lives Matter

Until Black lives matter fully in society, no lives matter. Until Black lives are honored fully in society, no lives can truly matter. Until Black lives are celebrated fully in society, no lives are.

Although right now my account is basically just my personal musings on my pregnancy loss and my spiritually, I have bigger plans behind the scenes.

I am training to be a pregnancy loss doula, and I'm glad my training is just beginning.

I'm glad because I can state now, even before any services of mine are available, that including tenets of Black Lives Matter in my training and in my future services is important, is everything. Because Black Lives Matter is everything. 

And my pregnancy loss doula services are and will be integrally connected with these values. That your baby matters, your grief matters. Your baby should be honored, your love and grief for them deserves to be honored. Your baby is to be celebrated. Your motherhood, your fatherhood, your parenthood is to be celebrated, with or without a child in your arms. All people, all BIPOC deserve this honoring and celebrating of their babies.

And I see that BIPOC have more hurdles to their grief, their pregnancy losses, their health, their access.

I've waited to write this because I didn't want to take up precious bandwidth of BIPOC voices that need to be heard at this time.

But I don't want to stay silent on my stance any longer. I stand with Black Lives Matter.

I am committed to dismantling the racism I know exists in me. The racism that makes it so much harder for BIPOC to live without fear in this society. It's in me, it's in our broken system.

This dismantling means listening deeply to diverse voices, including diverse voices in any blog or videos or whatever I will create in the future. Being able to point clients to a diverse list of therapists, grief groups, etc. so that they can find safe places to heal and grow. Seeking out diversity in my own learning.

I will not settle for “I can do better.” That's not enough. Anti-racism must be an integral part of my training (reading and learning from BIPOC about their experiences with pregnancy loss and death.) Anti-racism must be an integral part of who I collaborate with, read blogs on, work with behind the scenes and in public. Anti-racism must be an integral part of how I will intake potential clients, how I will work with them, how I will learn to listen deeply to what they share, to what they need.

I know I will fail. I know that there's much I need to do. But I also know I can grow. This is not a one day project. It is the project of a lifetime. 

And while listening and learning I will continue to stand with Black Lives Matter.