Frequently Asked Questions
1. Latvia’s geographical location:
Latvia is one of the three Baltic States, located in Northern Europe, at the coast of the Baltic Sea – opposite the Scandinavian ‘lion’ (Norway, Sweden and Finland), in direct neighborhood to Russia, White-Russia and Poland.
2. Latvia in brief:
(http://www.omf.lv/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=120&Itemid=120)
Latvia has a long history of wisdom, grief and a tradition of endurance. We, Latvians, have a rich heritage of joy and a love of live. It has helped us to overcome periods of oppression and abandonment. The Latvian territory has always been a strategic goal of many surrounding countries. For the last 900 years there were either German, Swedish, or Russian emperors reigning over the indigenous inhabitants. Latvia established its political independence for the first time after World War I. It lasted until World War II. In 1943, the Soviet Union occupation consisted of 60 years of destruction of basic human rights. Many hundreds of thousands of inhabitants lost their lives and the country lost about half of its ethnic population due to mass deportations to Siberia and the need to leave the country to save one’s life.
In 1991, Latvia renewed its independence and started to build a democratic society and state.
Since then, Latvians have struggled to reach an agreement on the goals and direction of the country as a whole. Most families having lost relatives, learned to fear in order to survive. Fear taught them how to keep their thoughts to themselves, to not trust anybody, to think one thing and to say another. Even today, evidence of this mistrust is seen when strangers call on the telephone give only their first name and never their last name unless asked. The damage done to the individual soul has left a split society: strong people who are able to take responsibility and care for others, and many weak and broken people who still expect to be led and cared for.
Basic facts
Official and national language: Latvian
Population: In 1991, Latvia was inhabited by 2,658,161 people. Natural resources are in abundance with little heavy industry. Farming is a way of life for many, but there are craftsmen, businessmen, scientists, artists and musicians as well.
In 2010, Latvia’s population had decreased to 2,248,374. Most of the 409.787 people who left in the past 10 years, have done so for economic reasons.
People of the Family Cradle community
3. Who are we? (About the community “The Family Cradle”)
We are a small, but continuously growing, group of people from different levels of education and social backgrounds. We are united by the same goal: to offer shelter, education and a place for natural birth.
Birth is our common starting point.
Every child who enters into the current situation of our world should be able to arrive, to be born peacefully, to be safe and to be loved. Every woman who gives birth in our country should have the choice to do so in a sheltered place undisturbed by other extenuating influences. Every father who welcomes a child should be connected with his child and its mother during pregnancy, birth and their future life together.
Most of our members are parents who have experienced natural home births and cherish the natural ways of life. We want to share what we have found to be true and working in order to improve the situation in our country. Latvia is behind more than 30 developed countries in Europe when comparing perinatal morbidity and mortality. Our home birth statistics over the past 10 years* prove that nothing is more safe than the natural way of the birthing process.
4. What have we accomplished and what are our current operations?
We offer education for new parents in both child raising and family life issues, theoretically in forms of seminars and courses and practically, by showing and teaching them. We support new mothers by teaching them how to develop their natural instincts and practical skills for raising their children.
Stressing the importance of being connected, we do a lot to bring service providers and clients together. The connection is reciprocal as midwives, in turn, learn from the women and the babies they care for. Women benefit immensely from the teachings of naturally oriented midwives.
The goal of improving mother and child health can be approached by helping already practising midwives and midwives-in-training to be fully educated on the latest medical developments, as well as training doulas about how natural birth can be trusted. We offer seminars and organize gatherings at the home of the Family Cradle.
5. The home of The Family Cradle
The Family Cradle is located in a newly refurbished log house in the country side in the north-eastern part of Latvia (see: location1). The original house and land was donated to our community by the kind Guntis Melbardis. He wanted to support a worthy project for children and chose The Family Cradle. His generous donation was the first big step in helping the goals of the Family Cradle community (see also Our goals) come to life.
The nearly one-hundred-year-old house called Jaunpalejas, has needed a considerable amount of work to make it into a suitable home for our project’s needs. We are gratefully proud of the numerous skilled hands and loving hearts that have already contributed to the necessary changes (see also The beginning2).
Still there is more work to be done. The second floor of the house needs to be completed in order for us to meet our third goal – to provide a Shelter home, an essential part of our project.
People around us yearn for a place of peace apart from the harsh words, floods of unwanted information and the plethora of disturbing images in our society. People are seeking and longing for real help instead of the cruel judgement from past choices. At “Jaunpalejas” we are creating a home to shelter pregnant, homeless, often teenage women (6 places) who are in dire need of support and shelter. We help these women see that abortion is not the only choice for an unplanned and possibly unwanted child. We seek to encourage them to accept this wondrous gift of life.
6. Practical help
Words alone cannot save the countless in need. We already have loving hearts and skilful hands. With the completion of our construction, we will be able to welcome these lost girls into a place of safety and warmth. It is possible to reach out to these young women and offer help that will be accepted as Irena (artist and teacher) and Rudite (certified midwife) know from their four years of experience working in a similar mother and baby home. If there is nobody in their lives who would want their child – we know that we can love it, because this child is being sent to us.
7. How do you combine together three different goals (shelter, education, natural birth)?
Good question! Here is the answer, which reflects also the way of living and thinking of our community:
First – our organization’s name was not chosen at random but with good reason. “The Family Cradle” integrates a much wider aspect of life than just giving medical or social support to others. Looking from a holistic point of view we see persons of different ages that need a “cradle” for a period during an important event in their life.
The people we offer support to are of every age and from every social and cultural background. Mainly we see specific situations which need specific understanding, solutions to problems, help and care around those three issues: shelter for neglected pregnant girls and young mothers; education for parents and grandparents, midwives, doctors and social workers alike; and a place to practice and teach natural birth.
One cannot separate elderly people from the young as one cannot separate life from death. We can call it the circle of life, which we learn and are willing to teach. This holistic view of life is integrated into our way of working, of educating, of giving a place of shelter, of helping a woman to give birth to a new life. Our practice means to simply be there, offering practical help when most needed.
8. What is it all about?
We believe that every life starts with a loving relationship between a man and a woman, with a hopefully happy pregnancy and giving birth without violence and needless intrusion. We believe that a safe, calm and gentle birth experience for both, the birthing mother and the baby, even the whole family, is the best start into life. This basic experience will affect a person for the rest of his or her life. We all carry emotions of our birth within us, hidden deeply, still forming our attitude towards ourselves, the way how we can or cannot love and accept ourselves, how we feel loved by our mothers (and fathers, too), how safe and grounded we can start our independent existence here.
By fulfilling the tasks of the Family Cradle we believe that we help restore a society broken by decades of oppression and violence.
By making possible a safe, calm, soothing, self-guided birth-experience for the new child, we will affect its future life in a strong and healthy way. A birthing woman is empowered to be a strong and happy mother to her family when she is allowed to give birth in her own individual way and on her own time. Men are fulfilled when they receive the needed support to be a true father.
We believe that every human being has the right of non-violence and free will from the beginning.
Through our work we support the growth of a truly democratic human fellowship, consisting of individuals who choose to be independent as well as act responsibly.
The project house of the Family Cradle is a place to find Home, Health and Healing.
