Advertisment

General News

9 July, 2022

Sacred Childbirth “Women’s Business” Re-Owned By Yarrabah Community

YARRABAH is celebrating a major cultural milestone and strong spiritual and traditional connections are being restored between the community’s young families and female Elders, with a ceremony to welcome newly and recently born children held there for the first time.

By David Gardiner

(L-R) Tonya Ludwick and Ja’hkel, Ruby Ludwick and Norman, Ashleigh Schrieber & Lorna, Constance Richards a
(L-R) Tonya Ludwick and Ja’hkel, Ruby Ludwick and Norman, Ashleigh Schrieber & Lorna, Constance Richards a

Previously in Yarrabah’s past - as a mission where people from many areas and cultural backgrounds were forced to live together - traditional practices were forbidden, and women had no choice over where they could give birth other than in a hospital. 

But thanks partly to the recruitment by the local Gurriny Yealamucka Health Services of Tayla Smith, Yarrabah’s first Aboriginal midwife, future “sacred women’s business” of childbirth will now be taken into the community’s hands. 

Tayla described the smoking ceremony last week as “the beginning of a rebirth of culture,” saying it was great to see women across three generations sharing knowledge with each other towards a more holistic traditional support structure in the community. 

“For the first time mothers were able to sit down with Elders and share information about past practices of birthing,” Tayla said. 

Tayla said the smoking ceremony provided a platform for the Elders to share their information and experiences from traditional birth practices. The event was the first of many planned for the future, a positive step towards permanently restoring and preserving the sacred women’s business of birthing, with vital information shared over two to three generations. 

Lorna Garrett & Ja’hkel Ludwick
Lorna Garrett & Ja’hkel Ludwick

“Since the stolen generation, the moving of our people and colonisation, we haven’t been allowed to engage in our cultural practices, or fully anyway. It’s really exciting and beautiful to be able to revive some of that.” 

She said the ceremony and future ones like it give children an early sense of cultural belonging. 

“The ceremony gives babies the feeling of spiritual ancestors around them,” Tayla said. 

Tayla hopes to stay for quite a while and see the women’s birthing and care model become long-term. 

“I’m really committed to staying on board and seeing this model of care through because the women in the community want it and deserve it.” 

She also wants to encourage other indigenous women to take up midwifery. 

“For the first time in my career, I feel like I’m doing the job that I became a midwife to do,” Tayla said. 

“Working with my own people and hopefully improving the outcomes and the satisfaction of care for the women.” 

“It’s really beautiful to be able to work in both realms – in a medical realm as a midwife but also to care for and nurture the spiritual wellbeing of our children and our women.”

Advertisment

Most Popular