How Birth is Like a Supernova

As I inch closer to my second delivery, I am aware of the slow turning inward that seems to happen during this third trimester. This pregnancy has been a harder one than the first in many ways. Physically, it's been a roller coaster. Emotionally, I've had heart-bursting excitement, but I've also struggled with a lot more fear and dread now that I know more about what's coming our way.

I've struggled with how to understand birth. I had hoped to find some sort of spiritual fulfillment in it, and I paid close attention to women who really do seem to have that experience. But to me, birth and the newborn period were primarily a blur of agony.

Is it like a trauma? I've mulled this over many times in my mind. In a way, yes--though I don't have nightmares or flashbacks, it was so totally overwhelming and disorienting that it tore me outside of my ability to cope and to integrate it into my consciousness.

And yet, the pieces of me fell back together, and there I was not a year later wanting to do it all over again. All I have to do is notice my daughter's brilliant blue eyes to be reminded of what beauty comes out of that fight. Life-giving, life-sustaining, sublime beauty...

...Which led me to the most appropriate analogy I have found so far: birth is like a supernova. I'm sure astrophysicists would laugh at my comparison, but I've been a bit obsessed with Cosmos and Neil deGrasse Tyson lately, so I've had supernovas on my mind a lot.

A supernova, as I understand it, is the brilliant explosion of a dying star. It creates an incomprehensible amount of energy and can outshine entire galaxies. It emits more energy than our sun will in its entire life. So, basically, it is a violent, extreme, catastrophic event. It's also completely natural--it happens perhaps once per minute somewhere in the universe. Violent, extreme, and catastrophic are words that often describe our universe, it seems to me.

And yet, supernovas are where the stuff of life come from. They often create new stars. They are the primary source of heavy metals in the universe, including the metals in our bodies and our food. Neil deGrasse Tyson likes to say, "We are made of starstuff." Plus, as you can see from the picture, supernovas look absolutely magical and breathtaking.

All of this comes as close to describing birth as I've ever heard. Violent. Extreme. Life-creating. Devastating. Magical. Awe-inspiring. And it's where these precious beings came from.

If that's what it takes for a life to happen, then that's what it takes. I'm going to stare it down again, and in the end, I'll probably end up even more grateful for it.