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Matrescence is the profound, lifelong transformation a woman goes through when she becomes a mother. The word is modeled after “adolescence”: just as a teenager goes through a major transition from child to adult, a woman goes through a transition from not-mother to mother.
This transformation takes place on several levels at the same time:
- Physical: hormones, a changing body, sleep, recovery
- Emotional: new feelings of love, fear, responsibility, ambivalence, and grief for the old life
- Psychological: a shifting self-image and identity
- Social: changing relationships, roles, and priorities
How can I support you?
Maybe you want to learn how to regulate your nervous system and emotions.
Maybe you want to do things differently from your parents or break certain patterns, while sleep deprivation and stressful situations can make it harder to be the way you want to be.
Many women also run into challenges in their relationship(s), intimacy, beliefs about what “a mother should be,” or how they relate to their changing body and life. Sometimes certain aspects of pregnancy, birth, or the postpartum period have not yet been fully processed.
You are warmly welcome to come and explore your themes.
Body-oriented psychotherapy
In a series of 1:1 sessions, I create space and support so that you are abled to soften. From your body, an answer often emerges in the form of signals that I can help understand. You can begin to feel more compassion for the different protections you have built up over the years, let go of what is no longer helpful, and make your own new movement.
Mother circles
This takes place in a relaxed setting with a small group of women who recently became a mother. In these 3 hour group sessions, meditations and gentle exercises are interspersed with sharing about motherhood. The circles are always facilitated by Rinka de Jager and myself.