Biodynamic Massage for Abortion
After an abortion that I had in 2019 I remember feeling utterly bereft at the lack of support postpartum. I spoke to a Midwife who specialised in loss, I spoke to a therapist, I practiced yoga nidra at home, I walked for miles around the canals of London with my partner, I ate nourishing food, I gradually began to move my body again and went to a trusted yoga teacher that I knew could hold the quiet space I needed to claw my way back into my body and my sense of self.
Yet there are two things that have really helped me in particular since having my abortions. And I think it’s worth noting that my thoughts and feelings towards my abortions change and morph with time also. Different events in my life bring up different emotions towards them.
The first of which was speaking to an Abortion Doula - Zachi Brewster of DOPO in particular that helped me hugely. She spoke the language of abortion, she understand the nuance that I was trying to convey and she held such a gracious space to talk through my experience. She was the reason I trained to be an Abortion Doula and help others. Until then, even when talking to a trusted therapist, I’d felt my self overexplaining myself, unsure of how much I could or couldn’t say - unsure what their opinions were about abortion, whether they harboured judgement.
After my second abortion the thing I longed for most was a form of touch that wasn’t invasive or stripping - but I needed touch, an ‘other’, to help me be in contact with myself and ‘held’ in my experience. It wasn’t until I discovered Biodynamic Massage that I really found the modality for this.
I had my second abortion before I’d had Lucca. With time and space and no other person to look after than myself I found myself able to process my experience (although of course it’s still ongoing). I had a third abortion when Lucca was about 2 years old and it was quite a different experience - I was alone, I moved rapidly into looking after my then 2 year old that evening and had very little physical time to process what had happened.
How we experience our abortions is so utterly individual and unique - I can’t possibly speak for anyone else’s experience but my own. No two abortions are the same.
The thing about abortion, fertility and pregnancy and so many things I think connected with our womb health is that we carry them around with us all the time. Our story, our abortions, our wombs, our pregnancies that happened or didn’t happen - we are reminded of these stories almost daily. Either be it a felt experience and bodily reminders - blood, periods, changing shapes, unexpected bodily secretions or sensations - or be it things around us in nature or in our interactions with others. It can feel inescabapable and sometimes overwhelming. It can feel as though we aren’t in harmony with our body.
At other times we may feel totally numb, disconnected, not ‘with’ our body at all. We may rely on coping mechanisms that serve us well but then we no longer wish to use. We may actively seek to block sensations out until we are ready, if ever, to move with them again and allow them to be felt.
I may not be able to witness and be with my experience at all simply down to life committments and the caring needs of others.
It has been touch that has put me back in touch with some of my experience. It’s made me realise how much I’ve been carrying around, or pushing through or quietly stifling. Using a gentle, attuned touch such as that found in Biodynamic Massage has been quite life changing.
As an example. Whilst receiving Biodynamic Massage on my back I became aware of how much I felt I had to do on my own. How much I had to hold. I unable I was to ask for help, or receive it - or was the help there at all. How it felt to receive help, and gentle attuned touch. To have this person ask nothing of me, witness all that I am (warts and all?!) and be held in this form of therepeutic massage.
After a few weeks I received Biodynamic Massage on my tummy and, perhaps foolishly, I didn’t think a huge amount would come up at the time. That evening I experinced dreams - and I don’t usually remember my dreams this vividly. All linked to my intense love for Lucca and a fear of losing him. After only a 15 minute gentle touch and massage to this area. It was an eye opener as to how incredibly potent this form of touch can be and how important it is to be mindful of this, to go slowly and to be so attuned to the client and what’s coming up for them. It certainly stirred something within me.
I’ve found Biodynamic Massage to be just such a wonderful way to work with the body - I’ve met so many different parts of myself, often in relation to others, that I wouldn’t have met without it.