About

Nurse Log

n.

a fallen tree providing nutrients, water, and protection for the saplings that will make up the next generation of the forest

Who we are:

Support & Nurture For Growing Humans

Scattered on the slopes of mountains whose knees rest in the sea lie the fallen giants of past centuries: the Nurse Logs. In life they tower to the sky, standing in ranks, home to birds and bugs, photosynthesizing almost every bit of sunlight that hits their massed, evergreen needles. In death they crash to the ground, supporting five times as much life as they did when they were upright. First the fungi, microbes, and insects move in, transforming the mighty trunks into soft, moisture-retaining humus. Moss and baby ferns sprout. Then, one little shoot at a time, the little seedlings appear. The grandmother trees become the nursery upon which the next generation of the forest will take root. Over the centuries the Nurse Logs continue to soften, settling, disintegrating, virtually dissolving into the ground from which they grew. But above them and around them the new trees take shape, roots encompassing, trunks reaching towards the sky. Centuries later there is no sign the great trees were ever there except for the bizarrely arching root formations of their descendants.

Life Circle Birth was born in the temperate rainforests of the Pacific Northwest region of the lands we know as the United States. Drawing inspiration and strength from the trees, we are building a community of birth keepers, educators, artists, writers, Earth protectors, scientists, children, parents, elders, and more who span the globe with love and care for each other and our world.

We are like the nurse logs of the forest. Our experience is like the humus supporting, protecting, and nurturing the families we work with. Is society all that different from a forest? Maybe when we walk among the trees we will find that we are standing in the company of our brothers and sisters.

Sometimes I wish I could photosynthesize so that just by being, just by shimmering at the meadow’s edge or floating lazily on a pond, I could be doing the work of the world while standing silent in the sun.

Robin Wall Kimmerer

For the sake of both mothers and children, we need to begin detaching the myth of motherhood from the reality. It’s unfair of any society to expect women to be the best mothers they can be without economic or emotional support, just because they should love their children…. Many mothers will know that birth doesn’t always signal a rush of immediate love. The maternal bond may build slowly over time. For a small few, it may never appear. And some never experience the urge to have children. We think of all these as unnatural exceptions, bucking the normal trend of how a woman is supposed to feel. But the scientific and historical evidence shows that none of it is strange at all.

Angela Saini