In ancient India, children were conceived very differently than they generally are today. They were anticipated by both partners in the relationship, long before the woman became pregnant. They were talked about, prayed over and often times a Vedic astrologer was consulted to determine optimal conception windows that would assure a child to be endowed with health, strength, intelligence, good looks and a disposition towards knowing the Divine.
Such practices were quite common and an entire branch of Ayurvedic medicine known as Vajikarana chikitsa was devoted entirely toward securing the outcome of good progeny through specific herbal medicines, practices and treatments to improve the virility and the sexual prowess of an individual while ensuring that both the egg and sperm contributed to the magnificent process of conception were of the highest caliber.
My belly several days before our daughter was born.
This is a far cry from unfortunately many circumstances in modern times where women end up pregnant unexpectedly, sometimes as a result of a brief encounter with someone she had no intentions of sharing such a long term, significant and intimate relationship with, sometimes while under the influence of mind altering substances or alcohol and sometimes while not in the best emotional or mental state of being.
This is not to say that children born under such circumstances are in any way at a disadvantage for life, but with the rise in chronic childhood health problems such as obesity, allergies, asthma, ADHD, ADD, autism as well as a range of emotional and behavioral disturbances, I think preconception care warrants another look.
My experience conceiving our daughter
I’ve been immersed in the sciences of Ayurveda and yoga for 20 years as an ardent student, practitioner and currently as a teacher and writer. I am also an avid researcher and spend a great deal of time reading many kinds of materials on a vast gamut of topics relating to alternative health care, ranging from the ancient Vedic texts to the latest medical journals.
Offering at Chucuito, a Pre-Incan Fertility Temple near Puno, Peru.
My husband and I spent a great deal of time talking about and preparing to become parents. Starting about 18 months before we actually conceived, we each underwent an 8 week Pancha Karma treatment as well as several other cleanses to prepare our bodies. I had been practicing cleansing regularly since my early twenties and as a nutritionist have been on a path to understanding optimal sustenance through exploring various dietary philosophies for the past 15 years, yet intuitively felt that I needed to up my game for pregnancy. I wanted my body and tissues to be as purified and renewed as they could possibly be before becoming pregnant.
Grow your own food whenever you can! Papaya from my garden.
My husband and I, on a 10 day jungle trek through the upper Peruvian Amazon when I was 7 weeks pregnant.
Truly, I wish young girls were educated to understand that they are born carrying all the eggs they will ever produce in their lifetime and all dietary and lifestyle choices impact and influence the health and viability of these precious eggs. Perhaps knowing this, I would have made more responsible choices early on. I intend to teach my daughter and the younger generations in this approach.
In addition to fine-tuning our diet, we also practiced a great deal of yoga and meditation, both together and on our own. We did a teacher training in the Iyengar method of asana practice not so much because we intended to teach but because we felt this was the time to take our practice to the next level in preparation of what was to come. We both felt an affinity to the precision of alignment that Iyengar yoga emphasizes and after many years of wear and tear on the joints and skeletal system, I knew that I wanted my bones to be strong and joints to be supple in preparation for carrying a child for 9 months.
During our yoga teacher training in India.
I intended to birth naturally at home and even though this would be my first, I felt that developing presence, flexibility of mind and body as well as breath work- all important aspects of any yoga practice, would be extremely valuable during the birthing process. I wanted to deepen into and expand that practice. I also undertook a serious daily mantra practice, awaking before sunrise to chant the 1008 names of the Divine Mother because I have a strong affinity to the feminine aspect of the divine and I wanted my child to be imbued within that energetic force field.
Ayurveda considers the hours between 4 am and 6 am to have the most harmonizing and spiritually attuned frequencies. Besides practicing meditation, mantra, pranayama and asana, I also did a lot of sun gazing at that hour, usually with my bare feet planted firmly on the earth and hands raised to catch the golden morning rays on my palms. There are important marma points on the hands and soles of the feet that connect to the cardiovascular and respiratory channels. Taking in the solar energy through those points is both energizing and enhances radiance.
Sun gazing on the Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica, 6 months pregnant.
Over a year before we actually conceived, we consulted with a jyotishi, someone who practices the science of Vedic astrology. At that point, I had already been working with this person for many years so we had a close rapport. Six years later and two years postpartum as I look back over my notes of the readings, I wish I had paid closer attention as some of what she told me! I remember during the readings some recommendations initially seemed strange, inaccurate or didn’t ring true but from my current perspective it’s quite unbelievable that someone can deduce such precise extrapolations about my future mental and physical state simply from consulting the alignment of the planets during my birth.
At first, we followed her very specific recommendations to a tee. At her behest, I began to integrate more animal protein during conception and pregnancy and work on building muscle tissue through the consumption of bone broths, grass-fed and wild, lean meats. We made our home environment into a temple space, burning aromatic resins, playing ragas and I sang a lot, which brings me great joy. We made love on the indicated days for optimal conception and avoided those that were ill recommended. After a while, it felt a bit overwhelming and automated, like we were adhering to a schedule rather than flowing with our own rhythm. Sometimes we found we wanted to make love on a day or time that was not indicated and by abstaining, were going against our own inner impulses. Other times, we didn’t feel to have sex on days that were considered optimal.
Teaching at an ethnobotanical conference in Costa Rica, 6 months pregnant.
With time and lots of dialogue, we relaxed and found our own way while still placing importance on our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual self-care. We began to have more fun with it and in time, our daughter was conceived on September 27, 2013. The birthday of Mata Amritanandamayi, the Hugging Saint who had married us in India and blessed our union.
In our garden, 1 day after Nahal Devi was born.
Make Ayurvedic preconception care your own
Ayurveda is a vast and ancient system full of valuable information for conception and fertility. For those that wish to utilize the “science of life” and its myriad of practical keys on how to conceive, gestate and give birth to a being of excellent health, vitality, good disposition and even latent spiritual pursuits; we present Conscious Conception: a complete, concise and user friendly course for the holistic minded mother-to-be, which dives deeply into the areas of nutrition, herbalism and natural remedies, lifestyle practices, relationship dynamics as well as spiritual practices, rituals and ceremonies.
Within the course, I will be sharing many personal tips and unpacking tried and true information on how to achieve a healthy and balanced menstrual cycle, which is a vital point to a successful conception. We will observe individual doshic tendencies and learn to remedy them through nutrition, herbal remedies and lifestyle practices that can assist one to enjoy their moon time rather than suffer through it.
A few of the many topics we’ll cover in depth are:
Conception diet for men: how your partner can contribute to the equation of conscious conception by eating to create the strongest, most potent sperm.
· Uterine health: how to cleanse, tonify, strengthen and honor the womb space as the life giving vessel it is.
· Balance estrogen levels: learn how the environment and our modern lifestyle may contribute to hormonal imbalance and what to do about it.
· Develop a personalized self care routine that is fun, enjoyable and will yield many long-term health benefits to nurture your body, mind and soul as well as that of your loved ones.
· Work to generate high quality bodily tissues and build up a reserve of nutrition that both you and your baby-to-be can reap from.
· Know the optimal time for you and your partner to embark on conception festivities.
· Liberate the juicy, sexy mama within you and learn how cultivating this is the key to creating healthy offspring.
By signing up to our mailing list, you will automatically be notified when registration opens. You will also receive newsletters on the full and new moons with links to more blog articles on a variety of interesting topics pertaining to holistic motherhood.
Together, we will paint a picture of how Ayurveda can be utilized to achieve conception consciously, gracefully and healthfully.
Hiking the rim of Kilauea Caldera on the Big Island of Hawaii with Nahal Devi, 16 months.