Reclaiming Wellness: Birthwork

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This webinar is a part of the series Reclaiming Wellness which unpacks and breaks down the complexities and assumptions surrounding diverse methods of expression, engagement, and wellness – and its personal and communal impact on our health. Join us as we move beyond the dominant narrative to explore our connection to land, tradition, and art.

What do we all have in common? Something that connects all 100+ billion people who have ever lived on Earth?

The birthing experience! Through one way or another, we were all brought into this world through the process of birth. So why is a process that is so common, so innately human, also so often left out of public discussions? Why is an experience as beautifully diverse as the human population often presented so homogeneously in western culture, media, and medicine? And how might this perpetuate harm, isolation, and institutional racism?

Join us for Reclaiming Wellness: Birthwork

Reclaiming Wellness: Birthwork is a conversation with holistic birth-care panelists about the process of birthing beyond hospital walls. The panelists will also converse about the ways community-centered practices and pathways prioritize the integral wellness of child-bearers, children, and community.

This free webinar seeks to highlight community-based models of care and the colonial harm they counter. We will discuss the ways our communities can work together to rebuild trust in our own bodies and birthing practices, and resist the historic and widespread violence enacted by the myth of modernity and the erasure of holistic and traditional culture-based practices.

This event has passed! Watch the recorded session below.

Meet Your Speakers

Tema Mercado of La Matriz Birth is a Xicana homebirth Midwife in San Diego and Partera Profesional Certificada in Mexico, mother to six children, and a grandmother. She believes that birth work can change the world and has dedicated the last 10 years to birth and reproductive justice on the U.S Mexico Border serving families on both sides of the border. Learn More.

Rochelle Vincent (she/her) is the owner and practitioner at Lotus Birth & BodyWorks in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is a Certified Birth Doula and has a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology and Public Health from St. Catherine University. At Lotus Birth & BodyWorks, she practices as a Full Spectrum Birth and Bodyworker that aims to provide high quality, compassionate care, that centers the experiences of BIPOC folx. Learn More.

Rhonda Lee Grantham, founder of the Center for Indigenous Midwifery, is an Indigenous Midwife & Herbalist from the Cowlitz Nation, a Salish-Sahaptian tribe of SW Washington that translates to “Seeker of the Medicine Spirit.” For over two decades, she has been actively catching babies and supporting programs within tribal communities, both at home and globally. As the founder of the Center for Indigenous Midwifery & the Canoe Journey Herbalists Project; she is guided by her lens as a cultural anthropologist and Native woman, along with her passions for global health, family wellness and culturally-centered care. She is honored to share stories, skills, and struggles in dedication of her organization’s mission; “Strengthening indigenous communities by honoring & reclaiming Indigenous midwifery care & family support.” Learn More.

Events Details:

Date: April 23, 2021

Time: 4:00 pm

Location: Online

Cost: Free