Twice Alive: A Spiritual Guide to Mothering Through Pregnancy and the Child's First Year

By Beth Osnes

Twice Alive is a compassionate guide through the rich terrain of pregnancy and early motherhood. Each of the three trimesters get special treatment, as well as birth, being over-due, and the first... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0971938385
• ISBN13: 9780971938380
• Release Date: February 2005
• Publisher: WovenWord Press
• Length: 184 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.5" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

Best Mothering Book of the year

Subject: Twice Alive Book review/Boulder Daily Camera By Carlotta Mast, For the Camera April 10, 2005 Twice Alive: A Spiritual Guide to Mothering Through Pregnancy and the Child's First Year by Beth Osnes. WovenWord Press, 186 pp. $17.50. Since being greeted by that little blue line on a home pregnancy test 2 1/2 years ago, I've soaked up just about every book on motherhood I could get my hands on. I've spent the wee hours of the morning, which is when my son has the hardest time sleeping and usually wants to nurse, devouring everything from practical parenting tomes such as "The Baby Book" by Dr. William Sears to more political fare, including Ann Crittenden's "The Price of Motherhood" and, most recently, Judith Warner's "Perfect Madness: Motherhood While these books delve into important issues facing mothers ­ from whether to co-sleep and how long to breast feed to the guilt, anxiety and regret that can suffocate today's American mothers ­ each left me feeling like something was missing. But for me, "Twice Alive: A Spiritual Guide to Mothering Through Pregnancy and the Child's First Year" by Boulder mother and writer Beth Osnes filled this void. More than a practical pregnancy and parenting book, "Twice Alive" transcends the realities and complications of motherhood to focus on the personal, spiritual effects of creating, raising and loving another human being. In the spirit of "Operating Instructions," Anne Lamott's funny and honest account of mothering her infant son, Osnes uses the journal she kept during her pregnancy and first year with her daughter Melisande to give voice to the spiritual gifts of pregnancy and early parenthood. Like Lamott, Osnes doesn't sugarcoat the experience. From the ravages of morning sickness, which Osnes says can make a woman feel "like biting the head off of a dog," to her pleas with God to help her new baby fall asleep so she can get some shut-eye, Osnes makes room for the unpleasant and, at times, overwhelming, emotions and sensations that accompany creating and caring for a new baby. Yet, she does not dwell on the negative. Rather, Osnes peels back the layers of her own expectations and fears to reveal the spiritual essence of motherhood in its purest, rawest form. In one passage, Osnes describes the existential wonder that permeates her pregnancy: "Who is leading this child by its new budding hand," she writes, "drawing the human form out of a miracle of cells and life energy?" Later, as she prepares for birth, Osnes reflects on the more surreal realities of her situation: "I walk my walk and talk my talk and do my mundane, daily chores, all with another human being's head wedged upside-down in my pelvis." Along with Osnes's own experiences, "Twice Alive" provides tools to help women reap the greatest benefits from their own spiritual journey through pregnancy, birth and motherhood. The book, for instance, offers advice on how to design a baby shower. The focus is not on choosing the right par

A voice of passion and grace

This book is truly like no other. Part biography, part political manifesto but always provocative and sensitive. Even though Twice Alive's subtitle suggests something along the lines of a 'self-help' book, Beth Osnes writes viscerally and passionately of the human experience beyond that of motherhood. Her prose is thick with energy and frequently becomes lyrical on a huge variety of topics. The perspectives of this book gives counterpoint to the current American trend of self-absorbed competitive ("Baby Einstein"-style) parenting and focuses instead on the richness of the child parent relationship with all of its doubts, confusions and beauty. Much of Twice Alive reads like high comedy and will elicit knowing laughs from parents while it alleviates much of the stress from the shoulders of the parent to be.