What the Body Receives

Happy Mother’s Day to all who mother, even those who did not bear children of their own.

There are so many ways that role is lived. Through care, through presence, through the way someone holds space and shows up for those in their care.

This week feels meaningful for me as well. I’m joining a course called Receiving the Mother, centered around homeopathic remedies connected to the maternal field. I’m looking forward to seeing what it opens up in my understanding of myself, my lineage, and the body, and what it carries from the very beginning through energy and intuition.

As I sit here editing this, there is a days-old fawn resting in our front yard.

Thursday night there was a large doe lying in the yard, completely still. Even when we pulled in and stood there admiring her size, she didn’t move. I found myself wondering if she was soon to become a mother herself. She stayed calm and grounded in that space.

Saturday morning we noticed an unusual patch of brown in the bright green grass of spring and realized it was a newborn fawn. We watched over her for a while, but the day called us forward. By the time we came home later that day, she was gone, and I hoped she had moved on safely with her mother.

This morning, to my delight, she was back again, in that same place. Right in the middle of the yard, near a small linden tree that hasn’t quite woken up from winter.

There is something comforting in knowing that our space is one of safety, nurturing, and protection. We had a fawn here many years ago and didn’t know how to handle it at the time. Time and experience have changed that. Now, as stewards, I find myself wondering if the doe who rested in our yard was once that same fawn, returning in a different season in her life.

I sat on the porch for about an hour with my coffee, keeping my distance, watching over her while the mother was out foraging. There was something deeply grounding for me in that moment. The mother was not there, but the safety of the space remained. The fawn knew to stay still, to trust the environment it had been placed in, to receive what it needed without searching or reacting.

That kind of knowing is already there. It’s intuitive.

When we look back at the body, we tend to focus on what is happening now. The symptoms, the changes in real time, the things that feel off. But the body did not start in this moment. It started much earlier, by simply and intuitively receiving.

The body was taking in the mother’s rhythm before there was even an awareness. Before there was nourishment, stress, calm, or presence was understood in any conscious way. It was learning the environment it was being built inside of, and it organized itself around that experience.

That imprint does not go away, even energetically.

It shows up in ways that don’t always seem connected. It can show up in the mouth, in the hair, in digestion, in the hard and soft tissues, in how someone responds to pressure or change, in the patterns that repeat.

There is often a longer and more detailed story underneath it all. It doesn’t need to be overanalyzed. It simply needs to be acknowledged, supported, and guided.

When the body reacts in a way that feels confusing, it is responding based on what it already knows or has moved through, even if that began in the womb. What we are seeing is the body coming back to something it could not resolve before, something it learned to compensate for. Now there may be enough capacity for it to move through and allow for healing.

This can show up as aging, structural changes, weight shifts, sensitivity, or patterns that don’t seem to match present choices or lifestyle. It can feel overwhelming and confusing, like something is changing without a clear reason.

But there is a reason, there is always a divine reason. Start by noticing what your body tends to do, where it reacts, what feels familiar even if you cannot explain why. That is where the information is.

Sometimes the shift comes from recognizing what has been there all along and allowing the body to respond differently now. Stepping back and watching, supporting, and mothering the body as it expresses its needs, its choices, and its independence from control and force.

The body knows how to return to balance when it feels supported enough to do so.

Wishing a peaceful and supported Mother’s Day to all who nurture, guide, and hold space for others. Whether that care is given to children, to family, to clients, or to your own body, it matters more than you may realize.