The Orange Feathered Tale of Belle

Photo Credit: Lucia Kiel

I am 15 weeks pregnant:

Staring at the yellowish orange walls at Yoga Soup, I felt like I was living in my own soup of emotions: for this was the first trimester, as a first-time mother. I somehow had made it off my burnt orange couch. This infamous orange couch made it through 2 NYC apartments to our home in Santa Barbara, California. Worn in and run down, like its current inhabitant, all meals and floods of tears were spent here the past three months. I was in a depression I couldn’t shake, and a fear about losing the baby that I didn’t want to move from the dirty orange couch.

But the time had come in my sadness that I had to go somewhere. We were finding remnants of food in the couch and tissues, and my th­­­en husband was rightfully concerned. I had heard about this prenatal yoga class with a woman named Siddhi Ellinghoven… “Siddhi?” I asked myself, “What kind of a name is that?” I drove myself with nausea and doubt over to this “soup” place. And walked towards the yellow orange walls: A step forward from that couch.

A beautiful white-haired woman was sitting peacefully in front of a group of women, who were in different stages in their pregnancies. She started “checking in.”

Each woman sharing where she was in that moment: How far along in her pregnancy. (How many weeks?) Did she have any pain? Backache, nausea, growing pains…JOY!? Each woman shared her experience. I was about four women in, and I started to feel the tears might be coming. “Oh nooo… don’t start, Belle, I told myself: Focus on the back ache and nausea, not how deeply depressed you are. What will these women think of you! You are so lucky you’re becoming a mother! Yes, this is what you’ve always dreamt of your entire life and here you are with this opportunity to become one (as long as the baby doesn’t fall out. I literally was walking around squeezing my legs together…) and somehow you don’t even want this! Oh my heavens, Belle, are you really thinking this?” I was in the middle of my internal and very judgmental pep talk…I was also looking at the other women in awe and a belief that they were going to nail this mother thing and I was already a failure for these racing thoughts when, “Oh no It’s my turn”:

The white-haired woman who had white light floating above her spoke: “And how are you my dear?” That was all I needed. Siddhi’s, “How are you?” turned into a downpour of tears. “Yes! My back hurts, my tummy aches, I can’t hold food down, everything makes me cry and I just lost my father. Oh, and my mother and I aren’t speaking…” I exploded these inner thoughts forward with big tears, secretly concerned I was already a failing as a mother.

She smiled lovingly. “Then just be with this today. Feel it and let yourself cry. Eyes open as the tears come.”

She said this with ease and acceptance. No rushing over to wipe my tears or rescue me-as so many had done before. Not “Don’t cry. You’re having a baby like you’ve always wanted. What’s wrong with you?” She simply allowed me to be.

The floodgates had opened. It was time for me to look at my life with open eyes and a cracked open heart. It was time to let myself cry and let myself feel and be awake to this flood of pain and beauty. I did not know it as beauty at the time. The tears and snot-filled tissues did not seem pretty. But the safety felt right.

I had gone from feeling alone on an orange couch, not feeling like anyone could ever understand what I was feeling, to being in a community of pregnant women who all showed up weekly for themselves, their babies, and one another.

I felt Acceptance.

I was in a very safe space, in the presence of Siddhi’s loving and truthful eyes. I opened mine to shed the shame of my fears and tears, and to just be in the Grace of Feeling.

It is Siddhi’s unconditional love and yet holding me accountable that has been a guidance for me to do that for myself. She showed me how strong I was through kundalini prenatal yoga (1,000 squats and endless breath work and chants.) I went from the feeling of “just open me up and get the baby out” to the honor of “I am cracking myself open for birthing this baby and really, for rebirthing myself.”

I not only had a wonderful birth experience, but I was also fully supported by my then husband and beautiful doula (who remains a dear friend). I began to understand that I wasn’t alone. Out of my own inner knowing and strength I COULD give birth to this baby and ultimately, rebirth myself at this moment in my life.

I was in a Community with tools and support: with yoga and awareness about birthing. We became mothers together (the power of female relationships and Community). There was something about being in a room with other women becoming mothers that gave me the safe space to come and cry. I did this twice a week throughout my pregnancy: it was my sacred space.

I learned how to feel. So I learned how to heal.

The Yellow Feathered Tale of Belle

Photo Credit: Lucia Kiel

I was almost born in a yellow taxicab. My mother ate “at least five ears of corn on the cobb. Not a good idea” the night before…and things were moving fast and furiously. “This one is a Powerhouse,” the doctor announced as I came out at 7:34 am: we had arrived out of that yellow taxi that ran every red light, arriving at the hospital at 7:14 am. I was three weeks past my due date and right on Divine Time.

This “Powerhouse” concept did not always feel flattering for me. With so much abuse in early childhood, I felt my “power” was attracting an overload of pain and mistrust. “Having it all” felt like punishment: I was also told by girls in the 5th grade that they hated me because I was “pretty, rich, and nice” a trifecta of power that left me lonely hearted and depressed. I internalized these gifts as my flaws in the third chakra. Along with being diagnosed with depression at age eleven, I was prescribed Prozac and then a diagnosis of IBS (irritable bowel syndrome). I was irritated with these diagnoses and spent many months in fetal position in emotional and physical pain.

My sister bought me Dixie Carter’s Unworkout video and that was my first relationship with yoga: The union of the self. Learning that I could embrace my body, my power, and move through the fear of being a quadruple Leo whose place in the sun was not supposed to constantly burn me but was of service to enlighten and shine. I had been everyone’s “sunshine” and lived to please on the outside, yet inside I was left exhausted and depleted.

The power in the gut is also related to gut instincts which comes from the base of trusting yourself. Digesting my life was very challenging, and I am still learning how to balance the extremes (IBS was a perfect outward reflection of what was going on inside…whether I was all stuffed up and holding everything in or releasing so fast and powerfully that I often missed the toilet…) and later in life, I received a new diagnosis of Bi Polar, explaining the extremes of my journey, but also as another label of Self. My solar plexus was full of anger at another label and with many tools, I have integrated the beauty of this diagnosis and the IBS with tools that allow my power to shine within and hopefully on those around me.

The Green Feathered Tale of Belle

Photo Credit: Lucia Kiel

In the heartbreak of divorce, after two beautiful babies and a relationship I felt was my safety, I had to learn to love again. The first step, and the not so easy being green one, was loving me. As the song, The Heart of The Matter by Don Henley says, “I’ve been tryin’ to get down to the heart of the matter…. But I think it’s about forgiveness, forgiveness.” For me, Self-forgiveness is one of the most intense pains I have ever known.

A healer friend of mine…., says he sees the heart as one that “breathes in acceptance and exhales forgiveness.” Divorce is deeply painful and the fear of not loving again was very real for me: In the journey back home to my heart, there was a lot of solitude in Nature, children’s laughter, and sacred presence. I was very fortunate to have a group of wonderful women surrounding me. I could ask for space when I just needed to be and cry, and they would come hold me when I wanted to be held. I was, and am, so blessed to have these mermaids dancing with me through all of the waters of the heart.

Since the divorce, I fell in love again. I wrote about this dreamy man for my next chapter, and we both loved and played with all our might…as that chapter shifts, there is more pain and also I have learned more room in the garden of my heart: The break is always an opportunity to expand. It takes tears to water the garden, weeding to pull out what no longer served, and fertilizing your dreams to manifest.

In learning tools for “sacred space” in a relationship, you must learn what you need to keep your space sacred. Once you do and you learn to share your individual sacred space, one can learn harmony: I have found such joy in opening the depth of my heart to a continual new capacity to love. The learning for me is not if a relationship “lasts” but that the success is in the Loving. The process of trusting again: the process that even when a heart gets broken, the capacity for love expands. Our hearts break further open and there is even more opportunity to love one self and all others around you.

Self-love is still the most necessary part of the practice of my life. For without it, nothing else flows. I am learning the heart has the capacity to love that is so big and deep, but if you don’t put on that love mask first, it is not sustainable. In a process of continual healing, I know Kermit the frog is right, “someday we’ll find it, the rainbow connection the lovers, the dreamers and me.” And perhaps it is easier being green than we thought if we remain open and love consciously.

The Bright Blue Feathered Tale of Belle

Photo Credit: Lucia Kiel

At age six, I was molested for the second time. In a school for acting, which was my early childhood dream, a stranger on the street came into the room I was in with a dry erase board. I was playing by myself: playing school. Mid marker in my hand, he shut the door and asked for help. With an open heart and still a thread of childhood innocence, I wanted to help him. What I was asked to help with is a horrific, painful thing and I attempted to say, “no.” But, “No” was my Achilles heel. I tried to say it in kindergarten when my preschool teacher offered me sticks to eat. I tried to say it when this stranger danger man asked me, but then he forced me to “help” him. My, “No” was frozen. Caught in the vocal cords somewhere, I thought I better just do what I was told.

This frozen, “No” was stuck, and I could not access it for many years later: perhaps not until I was eighteen and had been through more rounds of abuse, in high school, and even a therapist crossed the line, when I had trusted him with all my pain and shame. I blamed myself for this lack of ability to speak my truth. I shamed myself for not speaking up even though I couldn’t: I was out of my body, floating and could not ground in. With trauma, we are often living dissociated, as it’s not safe to be in our body. It seemed safer to suppress my voice than to speak and not be heard.

I was also playing the role of “the good girl” which I studied in the South. Even though my mother was a Southern rebel, who used her wings and voice to fly, I still observed a lot of “shoulds” and judgment of what was “appropriate” and “not appropriate.” “Be sweet. Be a good girl, now ya here?” I can hear the southern drawl now in aisle three at the grocery story. I played “good” for a long time until I defrosted a bit. Then I was deemed “crazy.”

I have been rebirthing and letting the ice melt for years and it is still a process. I had a huge awakening when I saw “Frozen” the Disney film. Like several little girls, I was drawn to Elsa’s ice blue gown and her independent spirit. Her call for the Unknown was something I could deeply relate to and “Frozen II”, “Show Yourself” called me into the recall of my vocal chords… “Ahhh..I can hear you” reminds me of what my friend and healer Derek Heikes shared with me, “our voice emerged from our wings.” The Pegasus wings flying Elsa home to herself, her mother’s calling. The home where she could finally embrace her magic, after so many lonely days of denying her truth. The voice calls her and she listens, leaning into the Unknown in faith: one’s truth being honored is a gift worth galloping towards.

When we hear our own voice, may we speak it, sing it and share it with others: We will harmonize and unify. Concealing and freezing over one’s emotions is a cold existence: take off the gloves. Sing out your Voice and be proud of its Beauty.

The Indigo Feathered Tale of Belle

Photo Credit: Lucia Kiel

Since I was little, I had a Knowing. I was a spiritual force as a child, as I sang to each flower in the garden. My mother did not have many rules, but one was to know the flowers’ names before we could pick them. I would pray over each one, in gratitude for their beauty and presence.

I made up songs and would also sit in silence writing poetry about the beauty of Nature. That was where the quiet lived. At age three, I remember receiving this poem that just flowed through me like a river, and I asked my mother to write it: Sitting in my grandmother’s bed, eyes closed, meditating before I knew what it was called.

I spoke what I heard:

“Silence is the sound of Peace.
Listen and be very still.
Listen to the birds singing.
Listen to the children playing.
Listen: Silence is the sound of peace.”

Later she had it engraved it on a rock for our meditation garden. My mother did not question me. She trusted me when I shared about the abuse: she got me into immediate therapy. She always had visions; she shared them with us as little girls: sometimes “TMI,” as she later asked forgiveness.

People said, “your mother is crazy.” At first, I thought it was a compliment; she was so amazing and wild in the way she “channeled” brilliant book titles and ideas of transforming our world. She spoke an unfiltered dialogue that she had with the Spirits. She was “different,” “another kind of mother,” with her raspy southern voice and her interesting beauty. She was a flower in my heart that shined like no other, and I knew most others did not understand her true essence…I took it personally.

I have had the same feelings about myself, as I spent much of my life trying to “fit in.” I tried hard, but it really did not work. I now embrace my visions with gratitude and watch them come through like magic. Some people think I’m still “crazy,” and maybe they will always feel that way; I am ok with that label now, as I am proud of my visions. However, labels have hurt my feelings; to be defined like a multiple-choice bubble never resonated with me. I feel that labels often enforce the divide instead of honoring the Divine connection of all beings.

I always loved that “Inner Knowing.” No one else had to know or approve of my inner truth. The Knowing is a collective place to breathe in awareness: deep knowing beyond what the world clouds over. I have been waking up more recently to the way we have treated our Earth and are still treating Her. I have been devastated over my own clouded perception…my use of plastic bottles, online orders with so much waste upon arrival, not knowing sooner to compost. I am forgiving myself for not knowing. I pick up trash every chance I get, compost with my children in gardening class (Luke Loggins) and am working towards a greater consciousness to honor the Divine Mother. I refuse to stop growing. I choose to keep the joy I have cultivated, and I yearn to learn greater growth and Mindfulness. Even if the wakeup call is painful, the truth makes the awakening beautiful. Consciousness: My third eye is ready.

The Pink Feathered Tale of Belle

Photo Credit: Lucia Kiel

Much was moving into my crown chakra right before my “breakdown.” The buildup had been building in me with the increasing desire to wean my anti-represent and escalated into action over two years ago. I had always had visions and even undiagnosed psychic abilities, but I had a new diagnosis on the way. I had stopped taking my Prozac in hopes that I could rely on plant medicine and all my healing tools to heal. I wanted to feel everything and not numb any pain. I was getting “downloads” so rapidly it was difficult to hear all the messages. In addition, my most loved ones, including the four women I met that grounding day, were with me and worried. “What are your medicines right now, Belle?” They asked while I lay in the bathtub on Wonderland Avenue. “I am fine,” I said as I shivered and shook: my body was in shock. I kept telling my soul friends and my sister this “fine story.” They all showed up for me, like Anna going to get her Elsa from isolation in the snow: I said I was ok and, I just needed to be left with my racing thoughts. They did not leave me with that. They did not leave me with that untruth.

I confessed that I had weaned my medicine and admitted to other plant medicines I was taking: I was brought home: to a land not so wonderful where I sat in a doctor’s chair under emergency “we need help” guidelines. I was furious for not feeling understood in all the downloads coming through…I felt judged and controlled. And then the diagnoses arrived like bricks falling on top of my head: “You have Bi-Polar, Belle.”

“I HAVE BY WHAT?!” I cried.

“You are having a manic episode.” This new doctor declared. Another brick: “WHAT?” I think I may have screamed. I was even more furious… a new label when I was getting off Prozac because I was FINALLY not depressed and feeling free enough to channel all my fast as lightning visions. She wanted to give me a new medicine! I refused. About three weeks later, I called for help. “I think I need help,” I cried on the phone. One of my best friends, Taylor, happened to be in town just in time. With my women, my partner, my sister and mother, my tribe helped me find “Avalon.” I liked the sound of it because it sounded like a mythical castle over the ocean, and I could be Lady Guinevere, or finally Elsa and let my powers loose…gloves indeed were off, and the freeze throughout the land was scary. I was scared and I was hurt that I felt people feared me and my “condition.”

Taylor and Lily put on “Islands in the Stream” in the dining room. “Hello, Dolly…Parton,” I thought - Juicy southern roots reminded me of my mother’s “Crazy” so many now deem as “genius.” “Islands in the Stream…that is what we are …nowhere in between…Sail away with me…to another land…where we rely on each other…from another to another…uh huh” …. Off I went to another land..

Every time I started crying in Avalon, I would hummm this… vibrate the sound that I was not alone. These angels around me were answered prayers.

I will never forget the tears I shed there; The deep trauma I faced, and the therapist that changed my life. After a few days, I started my treatments at Avalon. I walked into my first meeting with multiple huge bags which contained an altar of my things: A manifesting mist, multiple journals, crystals, stones, books, costume changes, my stuffed “Miss Pig,” and of course, my red lipstick. All items had deep meaning for me and were my touchstones at the moment; I needed them with me.

I saw on the dry erase board the word “Victim” (chakra 5 healing:), my beautiful therapist Jen in front of it, marker in hand. Very soon to follow, the word “Creator.”

“How do we turn our Victim to Creator?” She asked. My jaw dropped. I had been associating myself as a victim. With all my “me too” moments coming to a head, I sat in this question, “How do we move from our “me too,” to our, “now what?” How can all this pain that I have processed and re-processed and faced, trying new medicines, and still being rooted to all my spiritual practices… how can I integrate these learnings and move forward in grace and light? And ultimately share my experiences to hopefully support others along their journeys?

I got on my knees that night and prayed. I had been on the floor in both physical and emotional pain from the weaning and the trauma reignited.

“Please let this serve someone. Please let this time away from my babes and loves and all these tears be for some purpose. Please let me serve when I get through this.”

I still have this prayer and hope. I learned a lot at Avalon. One of the things was accepting the duality of being both diagnosed as “Bipolar” and not being defined by it. I also understood that just taking medicine was not enough for me. I not only needed the massage, the acupuncture, and brilliant talk therapy provided; I very much needed my spiritual practice. I needed all the things that would keep me as my Creator.

Even at this “high level standard” of mental support I still found many components missing…. I am not manic now, two years of Lithium/Prozac and acceptance of this “Bipolar” title and “never more grounded” according to my therapist and healers. I still do much spiritual work, and I am still not content with how the mental health system is Not working.

To ask for help is noble and brave. I hope these shared stories that are raw and real are also seen as beautiful for they created the beautiful imagery that I can now share. And the healers and tools that came with the process are gifts beyond words. My crown needed to be grounded which the Lithium supports, but I still get the Divine messaging and feel connected to Source. Taking medicine is not wrong: it is a gift. The spiritual world is not wrong: it is a gift; I am for sure bipolar in this way. I love being in my body now and don’t resist the “balance” but embrace the harmony of these healing, dualistic worlds.