The Luna Mayas of Mexico
By: Julie Morel
Tags: Birth, Midwifery, Traditions Around World, Mexico, Pregnancy

By the time I traveled to Mexico City to learn from the Luna Maya chapter there, I felt prepared to learn similar things I had learned in Chiapas. And though there was a bit of overlap organizationally, my experiences were actually quite different — especially because I had two weeks here this time around, instead of one.

It was quite fitting that there happened to be a free informational session for prospective parents on the day I arrived, because it was the perfect way to be introduced to logistics. Families can choose to birth at the center or at home (though it’s more expensive at home because it isn’t covered by insurance). Over the course of the pregnancy there are several prenatal classes (partners are strongly encouraged to come to all classes and appointments), as well as 5 sessions of terapia corporale which include one massage and four breathing technique sessions, two of which are attended with your husband, and two alone. After birth, you receive postpartum visits at your home on day 1, 3, and 7. If a transfer is needed during birth (though this only happens 15% of the time, with 13.5% simply being due to exhaustion or pain), an OB/GYN who supports the midwifery model of care accept clients at the nearby hospital, even letting the midwives accompany! There is an emphasis that synthetic oxytocin and epidurals can negatively affect the mother and baby, that one third of babies are born with the cord around their neck and that it’s not a cause for alarm, and that their center typically has only 3 hemorrhages per year, all of which can be easily managed. Similar to Luna Maya Chiapas, they also provide postpartum baths (with arnica, consuelda, ortiga, calendula, chamomile, santa maria, aloe, and rosemary — herbs which are anti-inflammatory and antibiotic), massages, and body-closing ceremonies with rebozos. Lastly, they also make their own placenta prints, capsules, as well as tinctures which are good for any difficult stage in life — the death of grandparents, a sickness, depression, etc.

Hannah, the head midwife at Luna Maya CDMX, currently has three apprentices under her, all of whom are following her skills and preparing for their upcoming exams. Because Mexico doesn’t view midwifery to be a legitimate profession, there are only four schools in the entire country, all with different certification procedures. As a result, both Luna Mayas have chosen to follow the North American Registry of Midwives (NARM) model — training through apprenticeship, along with a series of exams. This model also lets students go at their own pace; one of the apprentices, for example, is simultaneously writing her thesis about birth in hospitals and is therefore working at a different pace than the other two apprentices.

As an apprentice, the education is continuous. Every two weeks one of the students is responsible for teaching a class about various conditions or matters during pregnancy, alternating every other two weeks with a practical hands-on educational portion. And every Friday is a revision of cases, where the four of them sit together around their files and computers to tell the stories of the births they’ve been to and the clients they’ve seen over the week. For each case, Hannah asks: so what did you learn? Even if Hannah was there or knows exactly what happened, they go over each detail so that one person’s story can be another person’s lesson.

Even besides providing care directly related to pregnancy, Luna Maya does incredible work helping parents prepare for parenthood. For example, during the second week I attended a prenatal class exploring how trauma therapy can help during birth. The teacher, a licensed psychologist, spoke of different methods of confrontation and asked us to imagine a character that represents ourselves when we confront the people we love in our lives. Then he asked us to imagine ourselves coming across this dangerous character and reacting to it — at what moment was this character born? He then encouraged us to go back to our childhood selves and have our adult selves intervene at the moment this dangerous character was born. He told us to ask our adult selves to protect our childhood selves, and lastly, to meet our child-to-be, together, and tell them that we will protect them, too. Let’s just say that everyone was crying.

Even post early-parenthood, Luna Maya holds sessions for parents. On my last day, I was observing a freeplay session where parents came with their babies to play and talk about common parent problems. All the kids were less than one year old, except for one boy, who was eight. He quickly became the center of attention as he took the stage talking and talking and talking, about what he likes to do and the books he’s reading and the food he enjoys, until the monologue took a turn and he began telling everyone about how his parents are getting a divorce. His mom kept quiet the whole time, letting him continue as he told us about how hard it’s been to adjust to all these new changes. At first it just seemed like he was talking to talk, but it became clear that as he was unloading all of this, he began to process his emotions, and all of a sudden broke down crying. We let him continue telling his story through tears, and then all went over to give him a hug. Everyone thanked him for sharing his story and told him how strong and thoughtful he was to reflect on all this openly, because he was teaching all the adults in the room the importance of verbalizing our feelings. What was a simple play time had turned into a loving moment for everyone.

But what felt most special for me were the two postpartum visits I was lucky enough to attend throughout my two weeks there. To be warmly invited into a complete stranger’s house during her most intimately vulnerable moments post-delivery is not a feeling that can be compared. At the first visit, just 3 days after birth, we prepared a sitz bath with all the postpartum herbs, which she sat in for 20 minutes while we watched over her teeny adorable baby. We applied strips of dried seaweed on her small perineal tears and advised her to put some layers of the dried placenta membrane on her sore nipple she was complaining about. As we handed the frozen placenta to her husband, he quickly ran down to the garden, excited to bury it under a dying plant that needed some love. As soon as he returned, we handed the couple a small gift bag — the placenta print and capsules. Though I had prepared these numerous times before, this was the first time I got to witness the joy on the receiving end, and boy — it almost made me cry to watch this mama marvel at the tree of life which shared the energy between her uterus and her baby. Oh, the emotion. After two hours of checking in with mama and making sure all was well, we assured her we’d be back in 4 more days for her final visit, and off we went.