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I have not been blogging here for a while,
yet have been very active on my website:
http://www.deannalam.com/
and on my Facebook page:
Red Tents In Every Neighborhood -
https://www.facebook.com/RedTentsInEveryNeighborhood

Please stop by to explore the many free resources and gifts on my website, where I also blog regularly,
and come join our lively Facebook community!

Here is to spreading consciousness,
reclaiming our cyclicity,
and raising a generation of inspired and empowered girls!

Moon Wisdom: Menstrual blood art

Moon Wisdom: Menstrual blood art

Our Stories, Ourselves

My own transition into womanhood was painfully lacking in warmth or empowerment. How was the day of your first period?

Was it an inspiring experience?

Or is there a knot at the pit of your stomach when you think about it?

Our Inner Maiden, the coming-of-age girl we once were, is left inside us hanging, often shamed, embarrasses, or afraid. Her story never told, her beauty never seen, she grew up considering her periods “nuisance,” “bother,” or “the curse.”

The story of Menarche, our first menstrual blood, is rarely told.

It is interesting to note that women, who tend to share everything with one another, (from first sexual encounters to stories of survival and recovery from abuse) are silent about this one… Adhering to the cultural taboo around menstruation, we silence not only the story of our first blood, but also all conversations around our relationship to our blood. Somehow we adopted the notion that “linear is good” and we often live our lives as if cyclicity is not at the heart of our beings. Yes, we reclaimed ourselves as strong women. We break through ‘glass ceilings’, we combine careers with motherhood, we choose not to become mothers, we can do it all… but do we honor our blood?

Breaking silence is only possible in the company of others.

The healing power of storytelling lies in being heard and witnessed…

Make time with one or more of your close women friends to tell the story of your first menstrual period. It is astounding to find the similarities we share. The details of our stories may differ, yet the feelings are almost identical. In a room full of women there is always a sense of being able to relate to every single story as if it were our own.

In conflicting regions, such as the Middle East, I was moved to tears when Palestinian and Jewish women transcended religious and political divide by telling their first blood stories. The bond this created among them far exceeded the rip they felt for years.

I traveled a long way from seeing my period as a nuisance, to reclaiming my Moon Flow as sacred, my Moon Time as a spiritual wellspring. Telling my first blood story, and holding space for women around the world to tell theirs, is an essential component in healing one of the last missing pieces of our inner puzzles.

We can tell blood stories in our living rooms, in cafes, on park benches, or anywhere women get together to support one other through conversation. Sharing our stories we embark on a long overdue journey: that of quenching our Inner Maiden’s thirst, and of integrating cyclicity as a conscious part of our womanhood. At the same time we create the necessary steppingstone to authentically welcome our daughters, or other girls in our lives, into womanhood.

Our Daughters, Ourselves...

How would our world be different if adolescent girls were witnessed, cherished, and celebrated as they transition into womanhood?

Most of us were never welcomed as teens. Our Inner Maiden is left inside hanging, often shamed, embarrasses, or afraid. As mothers we vow to create a different experience for our daughters only to find them rolling their eyes up and running away. What's wrong with this picture?

Reclaiming our Inner Maiden is a necessary stepping-stone to welcoming our daughters into womanhood.

Once our Inner Maiden is seen, validated, and embraced, our daughters, or other girls in our lives, respond to us with newfound receptivity and interest.

Below are a few events where you will:

• Learn about menstruation as a spiritual journey
• Find out about indigenous traditions that revered menstruation around the world
• Be invited to embrace your cyclicity to enhance physical, emotional and spiritual well-being
• Be inspired to welcome your daughter into womanhood with ease and authenticity.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

1) Red Tent training, Sebastopol, CA, starting April '09

2) Goddess is Alive! Series, Palo Alto, CA, Feb. 23

3) Summerfield Waldorf School talk, SAnta Rosa, CA, Feb. 24

4) Healing & Nurturing the Maiden Within workshop, Sacramento, CA, April 3-4

5) Waldorf Parenting Conference, Keynote address, Sacramento, CA, April 25-26

HERE ARE THE DETAILS:

1) Red Tent training

For women, who wish to develop a spiritual connection to their cycle, grow their ability to facilitate women & girls' circles, and spread the RED TENT vision.

Training includes:

• Spiritual, emotional and physical aspects of menstruation
• Healing the Maiden Within
• Elements of ceremony
• Planning and leading ceremonies
• Shamanic work
• Guiding women and girls
• Group facilitation
• Apprenticeship and mentoring

Trained women will be able to facilitate Red Tent events, plan and lead Coming of Age ceremonies

Duration- 13 lunar cycles: one Sunday per month, for 13 months

Starts: April 19, in Sebastopol, CA
TRAINING TAKES PLACE IN A RED TENT!

To receive a Registration Package:

please send an email to lam@sonic.net

2) Goddess is Alive! Series

February 23 - 7:00pm until 9:30pm
Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, Great Sophia Room

1069 E. Meadow Circle, Palo Alto, CA

650- 493-4430 ~ itpinfo@itp.edu

Most of us were not welcomed into womanhood. Our Inner Maiden, the coming-of-age girl we once were, is left inside hanging, often shamed, embarrasses, or afraid. As a result, many women consider their periods “nuisance,” “bother,” or “the curse.” It’s time to re-think and let go of such negative emotions trapped in our body! In this informative and experiential evening you will learn about menstruation as a spiritual journey, find out about indigenous traditions that revered menstruation around the world, and be invited to embrace your own cyclicity to enhance physical, emotional and spiritual well-being.

$20 general admission, $15 students and seniors. No one turned away for lack of funds.

3) Summerfield Waldorf School

Tuesday, February 24th, 7:00 PM, at Sophia Hall,

655 Willowside Rd, Santa Rosa ~ (707) 575-7194
info@summerfieldwaldorf.org

The talk will focus on welcoming our children into adulthood as a community, with a particular emphasis on girls' rites of passage. Especially pertinent to parents of 5th-8th grade students, though all parents are welcome! Suggested donation: $5-$10

4) Healing & Nurturing the Maiden Within

Friday, April 3, 7-9 PM & Saturday, April 4, 10am-4 PM

Sacramento, CA

An opportunity for women to come together to re-member and re-story their own coming of age years. Mothers of young girls will benefit immensely and be ready when their daughters come of age. Mothers of older girls will find an opening to new depths in their relationship to their daughters. All women will find solace in this work, which may contain the last missing pieces of their inner puzzles.

To register, please contact Katie Baptist at:

916-996-5851 or passageway@sbcglobal.net

5) Waldorf Parenting Conference

“Educating Our Children—Changing the Future” will be the theme of the regional parenting conference April 25-26 at Sacramento Waldorf School. In response to the tremendous changes and challenges facing us today, there will be more than three dozen workshops on social change, sustainability, parenting and Waldorf education, which was founded out of an impulse for social change and cultural renewal.

The conference will bring together keynote speakers from various social impulses. DeAnna L'am will focus on “How our world would be different if adolescent children were witnessed, cherished and celebrated as they transitioned into adulthood.”

Join more than 250 like-minded parents for a weekend of inspiration and renewal.

A complete brochure and secure online registration are available at www.waldorfinthehome.com or by calling (303) 546-0070.

The conference is organized by Rahima Baldwin Dancy at Informed Family Life.

Raising Adolescent Girls

It's never too early ~ or too late 
to prepare for your girl's adolescence! 

Raising Adolescent Girls ~ class starts Wednesday, Sept 17! 

We will meet: 
8 Wednesdays, 7:30 - 9:30 
(see all specifics below) 

* * * Bring a friend for 50% off your tuition fee! * * * 

This group is for: 
mothers, grandmothers, stepmothers, aunts, and all women/mentors with a special girl in their life (age 7 and up). 

We will explore: 

- What makes for a prepared mother/mentor 
- Making peace with your own adolescence 
- Laying the foundation for a life-long friendship with your girl 

We'll use: 

- Creative group exercises 
- Arts and crafts 
- Role play, and more 

STARTS: Wednesday 9/17 

TIME: 7:30 PM - 9:30 PM 

DURATION: 8 weeks 

WHERE: Sebastopol Dance/Art Space (50 miles north of SF) 
172 North Main St, Sebastopol 
(behind Cookie Co. ~ Downtown Sebastopol) 

Facilitator: DeAnna L’am 
Author of Becoming Peers – Mentoring Girls into Womanhood, 
founder of Red Moon - Cycles of Women's Wisdom™ (1994). 
DeAnna has been working in the US and internationally, since 1980, in the fields of conflict resolution, community building, peacemaking, women and girls' empowerment. 

Cost: 
$245 for 8 week class (payment plans are available upon request) 

REFERRAL BONUS: 
Bring a friend for 50% off your tuition fee! 

Groups size is limited. Early registration is recommended! 

TO RESERVE YOUR SPOT: 
Please send $50.00 (non-refundable deposit) to: 
P.O. Box 1251, 
Sebastopol, CA 95473 

Checks payable to DeAnna L'am. 

Please forward this to women with girls in their lives, living in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Menstrual Monday '08 ~ The Celebration!

Menstrual Monday 2008, Downtown Sebastopol, by DeAnna L'am ~ www.deannalam.com

It was a windy, blustery Monday in Sebastopol, Northern California. A few women and girls gathered early at the Downtown Plaza to set up a Red Tent in honor of Menstrual Monday: the Monday before Mother's Day (since you start menstruating before becoming a mother... and usually long afterwards, too...) The thin, metal, "E-Z Up" structure was simple enough to set up, then came the fun part...

Red cloths of every imaginable shade were displayed on the grass for us to pick and choose: what goes with what? It turned out everything went with everything! When you lay reds, burgundies, rubies, and scarlets next to each other, the tapestry is stunning no matter which way you compose it.

Bejeweled clothe-pins held the lengths of fabric together. Ellah, my 7-year-old daughter, and I, spend many fun hours at home, carefully painting the wooden pins red, then adorning them with gold, silver and rainbow sparkles. She knew we were preparing for a Red Tent in honor of women's Moon Flow.
"Why is everything red?" she asked.
"Because the Moon Flow is red"
"Ohh", she said, with a big smile of recognition, "Of course!"
It struck me again how natural the idea of Moon Flow is to her; how strained it was for me, growing up...

The roof of the tent, clothed in red, was ready to be raised. As we pushed the structure up, the wind was playing with us, releasing a clothe-pin here, loosening a piece of fabric there... We ran to patch the holes, pinning up a "wall" as another fell down. Eventually we stopped resisting the wind, accepted it as our guest, and enjoyed our newly opened "sky light" as well as the breeze ways in the walls.

The sweetness of altar-making came next. We each took out sacred objects that we brought from home, and placed them in the center of our tent: Goddess figurines from around the world, candles, sea shells, feathers, crystals, flowers, jewelry, and offerings of cranberries. We each lit a candle while speaking our intentions, which encompassed blessings of our ancestors and of Mother Earth, acknowledging the miracle of our Moon Flow, and weaving the vision of all of our children, girls and boys, growing up honoring themselves, and their bodies.



"Honk If You Are On Your Period!" was the Tent's final touch. The wind didn't allow the sign to stay up for long, but we heard honks as long as it was up, coming from cars circling the Downtown Plaza, where our tent stood. Women crossed the road and came to ask: "why should I honk if I am on my period?" This was why we were there, in the center of town: to answer this exact question. To speak about our own journeys from seeing our periods as a nuisance, to honoring them as the spiritual well springs that they are; To discuss the cultural taboos around menstruation and to question them; To make menstruation visible instead of hidden and shameful.It was exciting to know that women around the world were celebrating and honoring Menstrual Monday. We shared the information we had about big events in Brazil and the UK. Many more, probably, which we may not have known of.
In the tent, around the altar, we had heart-to-heart conversations with women who stopped by: about menopause; About using a Moon Cup to collect our menstrual blood; Or about feeding our house-plants water saturated with nutrients from our reusable menstrual cloth pads. A woman ran across the street to get food for her 5-year-old daughter who was part of our circle, and brought back a cranberry chocolate bar to share with us all; another brought some sweet, hot chai to drink. We not only shared our stories, but fed each other, physically, as well as emotionally, and spiritually. We all left knowing that we'll meet again, in a year's time, to celebrate Menstrual Monday '09.
Hope you can join us, or create your own celebration, wherever you are.

Menstrual blood source of stem cells

An amazing scientific discovery, shared by a friend today, is quoting recent research, which identified menstrual blood cells as possible source for stem cells!

I remember reading in Marlo Morgan's book: 'Mutant Message Down Under' of Australian Aboriginies' natural processing of menstrual blood into healing salve.

It is exciting to hear that current scientific research is catching up.

Below is an excerpt from the article and a link to it.

From article:

Menstrual blood tapped as source of stem cells.

Experiments in lab dishes showed that under the right conditions, the menstrual stem cells could turn into more different tissue types — including bone, blood vessel, fat, brain, lung, liver, pancreas and heart — than other adult stem cells. The new stem cells also grow readily and rapidly, which is an important advantage.

Scientists are pursuing a new type of stem cell found in menstrual blood:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21996417/