We somehow haven’t ended up in India for now, but India has come to us in the shape of 52 cm of perfection.

While I still felt somehow lost in space when I closed Happy Dancer’s sailing chapter by finishing and posting last week’s video about our sailing summer in Greece and Turkey, since the blissful birth of our beautiful baby daughter last Saturday it all fell into place. It was and is so obvious that she had to be born here at home in Sydney with the best midwife, doula and friends’ support I could dream of. My Divine sisters and my gorgeous boys have been nourishing me and her to the moon and back and those little dark eyes have been drawing me into hours and hours of baby-bliss.

Most new mums seem to see mostly the tough side of these early motherhood days which undoubtedly exist. But what I do, mainly, is compare what we have, to what this birth, including pre- and post-partum period, would have looked like on a boat. While it would have made for cuter blog pictures and a more adventurous story for sure, the reality of it is that it would have been a whole deal more exhausting, less supported and much, much harder on all levels. There’s many things I wouldn’t have wanted to miss like my fabulous doula and amazing midwife who’s been with me since pregnancy #1; my lovely post-partum Doula who’s just wrapped me up in a beautiful birth-sealing ceremony returning some of the qi which one loses at birth; and all the friends who shared food, baby stuff and blessings.

When giving birth, a woman and a family need a nourishing, supportive community around them and that’s one of the very things which boat-life compromises on as you constantly move from one place to another. We’ve had to promise the boys to sail the Pacific the day all three kids can swim and snorkel like little champions while they keep asking for their Happy Dancer pretty much every day. But in the meantime, I’m still treasuring all those beautiful things which land-life has to offer – especially now, bathed in oxytocin, the love-hormone which makes the world go round.

We have a secret in our culture. It’s not that birth is painful, but that women are strong.