Womb Trauma Recovery Yoga can help.
Womb Trauma is something that everyone is likely to feel the effects of in their lives, regardless of gender. This might not make sense for some who think womb trauma is simply what women experience when their uterus has been damaged or violated in some way. It makes much more sense when we remember that all of us were born from a womb, and in most modern societies, the fundamental systems are based on domination of masculinity over femininity. This foundation of our societal systems automatically traumatizes every woman and womb living within them by undervaluing the importance of the feminine and denying equality, sovereignty, and the mutual respect of partnership to women. On top of that, add the traumatizing effects of domestic and sexual violence which is all too common worldwide. This does not just affect women. It affects everyone born from the wombs of the women this effects. That translates to everyone, regardless of gender.
My definition of womb trauma includes the trauma we all experience while developing in our mother's womb. Any stress or strain a mother feels about becoming pregnant or while pregnant is felt in a magnified way by the developing fetus inside of her. Each trauma our mother experiences, small or large, profoundly influences our development. Our DNA receives information from the stress hormones coursing through our mother's body and develops our body accordingly. I feel that most people do not know what it is to be truly relaxed because of this state of affairs. Even the most well supported mothers still have the stress of knowing that ultimately their lives are dominated and controlled by men and masculinity.
Of course there is a wide range of intensity with this womb trauma, from nearly imperceptible due to family and community structures that value equality and partnership much more than the norm, to extreme due to domestic and sexual abuse taking place during the pregnancy itself. But we all have it to one degree or another.
The affect this womb trauma has on our lives is just as varied in intensity as its sources. I feel that much mental illness comes from how our DNA is influenced by trauma in utero. I feel the same way about many illness that are considered to be hereditary. I also feel that subtle discontent, difficulty in relationships, mild to severe phobias, structural imbalances in the body, and challenges blossoming into our soul purpose can all be traced to this womb trauma and addressed by resolving it as well.
As we learn more about how to heal trauma, we discover that unresolved trauma perpetuates more trauma and wounding. People who hurt others are doing so because they were hurt. And people who keep getting hurt can often see repeating pattern of that hurt that seems to be reproducing similar circumstances in their lives over and over. It is my feeling and experience that these repeating circumstances are calling our attention to the original traumatizing event, demanding we bring healing to it.
To address my own womb trauma, I have spent my entire adult life exploring healing methods that seemed to have the potential to liberate me and my loved ones from these repeating cycles of suffering. I have found yoga and other somatic healing modalities to be the most effective for this. But not just any yoga. Most yoga where I live in California is quite athletic in orientation and easily becomes another strenuous accomplishment on the list of things to do, contributing to our constant state of fight and flight. I have found that in order to truly recover from the often deeply buried trauma of the womb we must focus our yoga practice much differently.
There are 4 key aspects I feel are important to focus on in a Womb Trauma Recovery Yoga practice:
1: Breathing practices that focus on relaxing the nervous system and discharging stored trauma and emotions from the body
2: Movement that activates the body's instinctual trauma recovery and healing abilities, often unstructured and quite unique to each individual
3: Vocalizations that activate the healing power of pleasure and emotional release
4: Bringing our attention and intention to the womb space, pelvis, reproductive organs, navel, and pelvic floor.
I have been combining these elements of practice in my personal yoga practice and in the classes I share for some time now and have experienced powerful liberation from chronic womb trauma symptoms like feelings of despair, fear, relationship friction, isolation, abandonment, and more. My students have also reported powerful transformations in their lives. As we are liberated from the crippling effects of unresolved womb trauma, we can focus our energies on actively participating in creating the changes we need to eliminate the sources of this womb trauma and return to harmonious partnership with each other and our beautiful planet.
I am starting an online series of Womb Trauma Recovery Yoga classes on Saturday, February 22nd at 11am Pacific time. You can gain access by signing up for 7 day free trial of the monthly membership in the Womb Centered Healing Temple here: https://www.samamorningstar.com/womb-trauma-recovery-yoga-sign-up-p
I hope to see you there.