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midwife syndrome
By audhill | January 19, 2008
Quick! a child wants something. Stop everything and help. Hurry! A parent feels the need to think about their child out loud. Clear your schedule.
I’m about halfway through my profession, and I realize (somewhat suddenly) that the choice to be a giver is NOT the same choice as the choice to be a creator… even though one thought so at the time, and even if it is “creative” profession.
I didn’t invent this term, and I don’t even remember where I heard it, but some days I have a little bit of Midwife Syndrome: that condition where a teacher (or anyone in a helping profession) feels the desire to stop being the one to assist at a birth and instead become the one to give birth (metaphorical or literal).
Midwife syndrome is a condition that can not remediated by professional development or golden opportunities to be a better midwife. It can not be rationalized away by love of children, interest in profession, willingness to work it out. It is a spiritual call to make a radical shift toward personal creativity, perhaps in the midst of teaching, parenting or giving. Perhaps not. But, it is an insistent call, not cured by any other activity than the selfish act of creation.
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