Prenatal Care

Every class begins in a circle with a thematic discussion on a topic related to birth or motherhood. The wisdom, insight and discoveries women share in group discussion are then embodied through yoga poses, breathing exercises, meditations, dancing, and sometimes even through creating process art. Shelley’s classes always contain rituals promoting the emotional and spiritual support needed to listen to your heart, womb and baby.

Each class is unique and full of love and sisterhood.

Women come away feeling more connected to their bodies, babies and each other. They understand what it means to be a “Birth Warrior” and feel empowered to embark on their birth journey with courage and confidence.

Shelley lovingly and whole-heartedly supports her Birth Warrior Mamas on ALL levels:

• Physically: Women gain strength and flexibility while easing aches and pains.
• Emotionally: Mamas are supported through thoughtful themes, lively dialog and friendships.
• Mentally: Classes help cultivate a calm and meditative mind while reinforcing confidence and courage.
• Educationally: Mothers learn from Shelley and each other about their bodies and how birth works.
• Energetically: Women connect with the energy body, accessing and activating wisdom of the heart and womb.
• Spiritually: Shelley guides you deep into your own mothering heart, facilitating a connection with your baby and your highest, most Divine Self.
• Socially: Prenatal yoga is a great place to meet other like-minded women embarking on their journey into motherhood!

“I believe that these circles of women around us weave invisible nets of love that carry us when we’re weak and sing with us when we’re strong.” –SARK, Succulent Wild Woman

Mothers learn and practice labor positions that help alleviate discomforts associated with labor, while their partners massage and support them in these positions. Couples practice poses that help to open the pelvis and are useful during the pushing phase of labor. In addition, parents learn and practice vocalization (using sound in labor), synchronized breathing, pain coping practices, and massage techniques that are essential tools to be used during labor. Each class ends with a partner meditation and relaxation, leaving each couple feeling deeply connected to each other and the baby.

In addition to poses, simple meditations and breathing exercises are practiced to help cultivate a quiet mind and deeper connection to the partner and baby. Learning how to create this stillness will allow the couple to tune into each other and access their intuitive knowledge. Learning how to breathe and move together in new and playful ways deeply connects partners to each other and their baby, fostering nonverbal modes of communication, which comes in handy at the height of labor.

Through lively discussion, movement, partner breathing and meditation, the Couple’s Prenatal Yoga Workshop will empower you with the confidence needed to birth your baby with love and awareness.

What you can expect at Shelley’s Couple’s Prenatal Yoga Workshop:

• Lively discussion and education
• Postures and breathing techniques for birth and optimal fetal positioning
• Hands on skills for partners to assist birthing mother
• Vocal toning and co-chanting
• Relaxation skills
• Partner meditation and tantric breathing
• A really FUN time connecting with each other and baby!!

“In the Hindu Holy Book, The Vedas, it says, ‘The husband must be with the birthing woman to double her strength.’ The father’s love stimulates the perfect process of birth. Without the father’s love, birth is more mechanical. His love spins mother’s creative juices, opening her heart and allowing her to sink into her womb, allowing her to do the work of woman.”
~ Sunni Karll (Sacred Birthing)

Giving birth is one of the last primal things we still do as human beings. The way babies emerge in modern times, is essentially, the same as it was for our ancient sisters millions of years ago. Our birth preparation should also connect us to that primal and intuitive knowing that our ancestors once drew upon while birthing their babies.

Dance is also one of the most ancient and archaic forms of expression and release. Dancing allows the cells that hold the birth wisdom to awaken….and when the body begins to open, the mind will follow its lead.

Shelley respectfully bows to Bellydance Birth ® founder, Maha Al Musa, for creating and passing down this beautiful lineage of ancient bellydance moves that she has masterfully tailored for birthing mothers. Maha is truly one of the great birth keepers of our time.

In this six week course, you will become comfortable with freeform dance as a practice of getting out of your head, letting go and learning how to listen to your body.

You’ll also learn the four main movements of ancient bellydance moves:

• The Circle
• The Spiral
• The Figure 8
• The Cervix Dance
• AND ecstatic/freeform dance!

We will put it all together and celebrate in our final class with live drumming! This class will encompass all the learned movements while we immerse ourselves in the vibration of live drum beats…..we will dance in our most free and primal state, just the way our ancestors danced long ago!

“Everything in the Universe has a rhythm. Everything dances.” ~ Maya Angelou

Three kinds of knowing are required to Birth From Within™. The first and most basic is the primal, intuitive knowing in your bones. The second kind of knowing is modern knowledge—being savvy about the birth culture and the wide range of birth choices. The third is to know thyself. Shelley’s classes cultivate all three kinds of knowing, preparing couples to birth-in-awareness, and with love, whether you are birthing at home, a birth center or hospital.

Each five-week series (20 hours of instructions) includes:

• Pain-coping techniques that cultivate mindfulness, courage and internal power
• Understanding stages of labor and how labor works
• Practicing labor positions, relaxation techniques comfort measures
• Exploring vocal toning as a labor tool
• Exploring how to embrace the unknown and let go of control
• Optimal fetal positioning for labor and birth
• Creative learning processes such as role plays, storytelling, and birth art
• Working through fears
• Exploring the wise and compassionate use of pain medication
• Preparation for life with baby, including caring for the mother and baby post-birth
• Partner breathing exercises to foster a deep interconnection
• Postpartum preparation
• Postpartum nourishment
• Cultivating intuitive intelligence and awakening body wisdom
  and much more!

Each class is tailored to your unique needs.

Click here to view a video about the benefits of this 5 week series.

“Birth is a woman’s spiritual vision quest. When this idea is ritualized beforehand, the deeper meanings of childbirth can more readily be accessed. Birth is also beyond any one woman’s personal desires and will, binding her in the community of all women. Like the birthing beads, her experiences is one more bead on a very long strand connecting all mothers. Rituals for birth hone these birthing beads, bringing to light each facet of the journey of birth…” ~ Jeannine Parvati Baker

At a Mother Blessing, the expecting mother’s closest women friends (and sometimes family members) come together to nurture, honor, and celebrate her sacred journey into Motherhood. Mother Blessings provide expecting mothers with the emotional, spiritual and mental support needed to give birth with confidence and love. Mother Blessings are tailored to each Mama, and include rituals that uplift and support her journey. The love and strength we generate during this sacred time will carry the mother across difficult thresholds of her birthing experiences.

This ceremony can include any and all of the following:

• Drumming and dancing
• Henna or body paint on belly
• Labyrinth walk
• Pampering mama with massage, aromatherapy footbaths, hair treatment, head garland…
• Making her a labor necklace or other talisman
• Sacred altar
• Art
• Yarn tying rituals
• Poetry, yoga, meditation
• Anything that moves and shakes Mama’s soul!

“With [Wild Woman] as ally, as leader, model, teacher, we see, not through two eyes, but through the eyes of intuition which is many-eyed. When we assert intuition, we are therefore like the starry night: we gaze at the world through a thousand eyes.” ~ Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes