Category: ON RELATIONSHIPS

Motherhood and Autism – Celebrating A Nurturing Woman

~ womeninlivingness

by Kate Greenaway, Australia

The names in this real life story are not real, but the events and sharing of the challenges and learning along the way are very real. Christina is a 44 year old woman, she is married to Tom who is 46 years old and her partner of some 19 years. They have a 15 year old son, Will. 

At 2 years old, Will was diagnosed by a team of Medical Specialists as having moderate Autism with a severe ‘Global Delay’. Global Delay means that Will is significantly delayed in all aspects of communication and development. This affects his behaviour and interaction with himself, his parents and all that come into contact with him. He requires constant supervision including self care, behaviour development, safety awareness and setting appropriate boundaries, including how to interact and communicate with people generally.

When Will was 18 months old, Christina was aware there was something ‘not right’ with him; when she was told of his condition she thought “Why me, why am I being punished in this way? Haven’t I already suffered enough?”. Amazingly, she let this go pretty quickly as she and Tom realised that Will was a blessing, not a burden or punishment. Continue reading “Motherhood and Autism – Celebrating A Nurturing Woman” →

The True Beauty of Women

~ womeninlivingness

by Raymond Karam, Goonellabah

A few weekends ago I was invited to an International Women’s Day function organised by Real Media Real Change (RMRC) in collaboration with Esoteric Women’s Health. I was under the impression that I was there to support them. I was wrong.

From the car trip there, to walking into the function, there was something bigger offered than what I had thought. There was something different about the women, something that I hadn’t chosen to see before… or possibly something that wasn’t there before. Continue reading “The True Beauty of Women” →

A Vulnerable Moment

~ womeninlivingness

by Kate Greenaway, BaAppSc (Physiotherapy), Goonellabah, Australia

The other week I had one of those Stop and Take Notice moments. I was walking around the local swimming pool to the women’s showers in my wet bathers, after having a lovely time in the pool. I was a bit cold and one of the males on staff was walking towards me. I had spoken to this man before and I knew him to be sensitive, sweet and completely harmless. I could feel he was going to look at me as we passed and all of a sudden I was feeling extremely vulnerable – my body went into an old pattern of pulling my shoulders inwards and caving my chest in – like I did when I was a teenager at the beach in my swimmers walking past men who stared at my breasts. You see, even though I have a petite frame, I had really large breasts as a teenager and I used to get awful, sexual comments from boys my age, AND older men. Being a curvaceous young woman was agony for me so I used to hide my body in large shirts. I thought I had moved through this and healed those self -conscious years, so I was shocked to feel this in my body now – in my late 40’s and feeling mostly content with my body. Continue reading “A Vulnerable Moment” →

Women Trusting Men

~ womeninlivingness

by Sally Scott, Perth, Australia

Imagine standing in front of a man with your back to him. He stands a metre from you. You do not know this man, but this man represents your relationships with men. This man is standing behind you, ready and waiting to catch you. You are playing the trust game which many of us would have played at school or on camp – having someone stand behind you, ready to catch you when you fall backwards.

This is an exercise in TRUST – about women being able to let themselves go, fall backwards without bracing the body and surrender it to be absolutely looked after, held, cared for, loved and supported by a man.

So, what if you were asked to let yourself go, and trust completely that the man behind you would be there to break your fall and catch you just before your body hits the ground? Continue reading “Women Trusting Men” →

Embracing True Devotion as a Woman and Mother

~ womeninlivingness

by Sharon, Australia

My life has been all about devotion, and many who know me would agree that I have been a devoted mother to my seven children. In addition, I have been devoted to my work both as a Birth Educator and also a Nurse, as well as being devoted to giving back to the community. In all this devotion there has been very little self-devotion and self-nurturing to myself as a woman. In fact, what I truly have been is another D word, which stands for ‘driven’, in which I have felt that I could never do enough to feel that I deserved any space in which to just be devoted to myself.

For me, the experience of growing up in a large family with a father who chose alcohol and work over family, and a mother who was barely coping with her own life, created a belief in me that when I would have a family I would do it ‘better’. Continue reading “Embracing True Devotion as a Woman and Mother” →

A Life of Marriage and Motherhood? – The Celebration of Myself

~ womeninlivingness

by Cherise Holt, Nurse, Brisbane, Australia

As a little girl overjoyed to be a flower girl at a family wedding, I watched as a man and a woman proclaimed their love for each other: “I do – ‘til death do us part”. I believed I would grow up to marry a man whom I too would love forever. It appeared to me that is just what women did.

As a teenager I contended with low self-esteem, low self-worth, emotional issues, family loss and grief. I wanted a partner now more than ever, and I recall one day sharing tearfully to my mum, “I won’t ever have a boyfriend!”. And if I didn’t find one, would I be alone forever? Or perhaps worse still – who would I be in life?

When I was 16 I met a young man who told me he loved me… I thought “This was it! This must be true love!”. We shared a beautiful wedding ceremony when we were 21 and I eagerly discussed our future plans to have children as I knew I always wanted them. In fact, I believed I was pre-destined to be a mother. Continue reading “A Life of Marriage and Motherhood? – The Celebration of Myself” →

Mothering and Motherhood

~ womeninlivingness

by Anne Malatt, Australia

I have always been ‘good’ at anything I put effort into. If I wasn’t ‘good’ at it (riding a bicycle, for example) I would stop trying and refuse to do it any more. This way, I stayed good at everything I did!

I never thought I would be a ‘good’ mother. My own mother was a professional woman who worked hard all day, then came home and cooked all the meals and did all the household and garden chores. This was not a job I wanted for myself!

The only time I saw her sitting down was in the evenings, with a drink. I never saw her doing anything just for herself and remember her telling me that her own mother always called her ‘selfish’ if she tried to read a book or do anything just for her. Continue reading “Mothering and Motherhood” →

In The Company Of Women

~ womeninlivingness

by JK, UK

Whilst working recently I have been feeling just how lovely it is working with women, and how different my experiences are nowadays.

In my early days at work in the 1980’s, I worked in a number of different offices and environments with women. At that time I often observed bitchiness amongst one or two of the women, with one woman talking behind another’s back, for instance. Sometimes there were huddles of women gossiping about another woman, sometimes there were just silent facial expressions, door slamming and awkward moments amongst the women. In one particular group of women where I worked they even went so far as to ‘send one of the woman to Coventry’ – a phrase that described when all of the other women ganged up and totally ignored the one woman, not even speaking to her when she spoke – just a blank stony silence – a kind of ‘freezing out’ of that one woman. Continue reading “In The Company Of Women” →

From Sensitivity Lost – To Joy in Finding the Real Me

~ womeninlivingness

by Nicole Serafin, Tintenbar, Australia 

As a child I was very sensitive and could feel what was ‘going on’ with people; I sometimes found this quite overwhelming. I also found with lots of people that there was little honesty in how they were actually feeling (in regard to their situation, for example), as though they were withholding from expressing what they actually wanted to say; or even at times that there would be an ‘underlying message’ to words spoken / actions done. I didn’t understand why people just didn’t say what it was they were actually feeling… Continue reading “From Sensitivity Lost – To Joy in Finding the Real Me” →

Our Cycles – Period and Full Moon App brings ‘Rebel Without A Cause’ Home

~ womeninlivingness

by Lucy, Sydney

Four weeks after Sydney Esoteric Developers Women’s Group (EDWG) 3rd February 2013 and Our Cycles –Period and Full moon App Presentation

We had an Esoteric Developers Women’s group in Sydney recently where we were discussing the possibility that the pressure we felt to fit in at school was still with us even though we left school many years ago. It was a ‘tumbleweed’ moment and then a dawning realisation that there were many areas of our lives where we were still trying to fit in – around the school community, in the office, with our friends, with our families.

I found myself sitting with, what we decided, was a group of ‘rebels’. As we shared our stories of life with each other we found we had each rebelled against what we perceived to be society’s and our family’s expectations on us in one way or another. We had rejected what we were told life should be, only to make up our own picture of what life should be and then create ourselves into a group of rebels searching out other rebels! Continue reading “Our Cycles – Period and Full Moon App brings ‘Rebel Without A Cause’ Home” →