rites of passage Archives • Britta Bushnell

Behind the Curtain…Recording My Audiobook

This blog is for those of you interested in the deeper truth and more personal sharing about my experience recording the audio version of my book. If that interests you, keep reading. I’m at the airport in Denver about to catch my flight home from an intense five days in Colorado. I came to record…

My Year in the Cocoon: Birth as a Teacher for Healing

Today marks one year since my skiing accident when I blew out my ACL, tore my MCL and strained my LCL. Of the soft tissue in my knee, only my meniscus was left relatively unscathed. I’ve had many people ask me if my knee is all “back to normal.” This is a difficult question as…

Childbirth, Hurricanes, and Faith: Taking Refuge in the Unknown

“Faith is taking refuge in the Unknown.” ~Adyashanti I listened to a podcast this morning and had to pause it when I heard this quote. Like many childbirth professionals, listening takes on a few different forms: personal and “how does this relate to childbirth.” It is as if I have different ears and processing centers…

On This Day…Sharing Birth Stories

My birth story. Fourteen years ago today I was precisely 40 weeks pregnant with our second child. Yep, it was my estimated due date. It was also the day after we had new sod go in our newly landscaped backyard. Frustrating the avid gardener in me, the landscapers did not “tamp down” the new grass,…

Mentoring works both ways

Last night was class #6. That’s the grand finale, filled with lots of great experiences to send the parents off ready for the adventure of childbirth and new parenthood. I’ve been doing this a long time, almost 13 years now, and you could say that for the most part I can push the play button…

Meaningful Ritual of Weddings and the Alchemical Heat of Marriage

Yesterday was my wedding anniversary, 16 years married to a great man. The Strange thing is we don’t really even acknowledge our wedding anniversary preferring instead to honor our first date as the special day of relationship celebration. So it wasn’t strange really when Brent’s annual men’s backpacking trip found itself scheduled in such a…

He’s Grown New Feathers Enabling Farther Flight

Our boy is off for the ISEE (the standardized test used by private schools the way the SAT is used by colleges and universities). We chose to have him attend a small alternative public school in part because he gets stressed out by tests and frankly the word “test” means something completely different when you…