If you have been pregnant before or been around pregnant women, then you may know what a glucose tolerance test is, aka the diabetes test.
Pregnant women are prone to gestational diabetes, and often there is a screening test where you’d have to fast for 6 hours, draw blood, then drink a 300mL cup of warm sugar water, and draw blood after the first and second hour after drinking that sugar water to look at how your body processes glucose.
I can tell you now, that this was one test that I did not want to do, at all. The fact that my doctor said not everyone needed to do this 2-hour test, motivated me to keep my diet healthy enough (sort of) to stay away from it.
Another reason why I’d been avoiding this test was because of all the stories I heard from my family and friends. For example, if you gulp the sugar water down too quickly, or if you move around too much after drinking the sugar water, you may throw up and feel sick. And once you throw up, you cannot continue the test anymore and you’d have to start all over.
Nevertheless, at the beginning of this month when I went for my antenatal check up, my doctor asked me to go do the diabetes test due to my weight gain (I tried, I really did!) and history of diabetes in my family.
I was honestly devastated when I heard that. This was one thing I really tried to avoid. Somehow the idea that this test required a lot of time and that I’d like to avoid vomiting (well who doesn’t), did not make me feel better.
At the same time, I started taking hypnobirthing class. I’ve always thought that I’d learn breathing and relaxation techniques to help with natural birthing. Little did I know, hypnobirthing is more than just relaxation. It examines the fears and subconscious beliefs that we hold about pregnancy and birthing, and through hypnobirthing we learn to reframe our mindset and to release these subconscious fears.
I shared my fear about taking the diabetes test with my hypnobirthing instructor, and she suggested me to reframe the word “test” as “screening”.
That’s right. I asked myself why I was so upset about taking the diabetes “screening”. Then I realize that the fact that I had to take the diabetes test, is like I have already “failed” a test. And this “failure” reflected how I felt like I have already “failed” my new role as a mom and “failed” my baby.
Once I acknowledged this fear of failure as a new parent, I accepted my fate with the diabetes screening. I can tell you now that I was much more nervous about taking the test than about the results. Honestly I didn’t even worry if I had diabetes (and the end result is that I don’t). I was much more worried about throwing up and feeling ill during the test (again, worried about failing to complete the screening).
So this is when I find in situations like this, when my fear somehow holds so much power over me in my head, is where my spiritual practices can help me the most.
Usually we think that we can only be “spiritual” and calm and relaxed when we are surrounded by nature, in a secluded and serene environment, and in a safe and comfortable space.
Of course I believe that being in such a retreat-like environment (like Museflower) helps us to grow and learn tremendously. We learn new tools, we gain new insights and clarity, and we are open to receive healing and support from others.
Now, the challenge is how we can bring that back to our daily life – the reality. How can we continue to grow and learn, to gain insight and clarity when we are back home, busy working and managing all the daily tasks and curveballs that life throws at us?
1 – Listen to Your Intuition / Gut Feeling
You have heard me saying about this over and over – Listen to Your Intuition.
Now, this is definitely something that takes practice, and meditation is one way to help with this. Because when all the chattering voices in our mind start to quiet down, we can learn to distill which voice belongs to our intuition, and this is when our intuition will give us helpful guidance on what to do.
The more you practice, the more in tune you are with your intuition. Sometimes in situations where you need to make a prompt response, instead of getting into our heads and feeling pressured by society or peers, we can respond quickly with our gut feeling.
In my diabetes test situation, my intuition helped me tremendously to guide me through my journey which I’ll explain more below.
2 – Reflect & Observe
My personal belief is that everything outside of us is just a reflection of what’s going on inside. When we can observe situations happening to us, or happening around us, we can use that to reflect on what’s really going inside. This also helps us to take responsibility in our life, as I believe that each person is the co-creator of his/her life.
In my case, I asked myself why I was making such a big deal of this diabetes test. Of course, I could tell myself, well I’d hate to throw up, and that it’s such a long test and if you can’t make it the first time, you’d have to redo it and it’s such a waste of time.
But deep down if I am being honest with myself on what’s going on emotionally, I find that I have this fear of failure and if I fail, it reflects poorly on me as a parent, a new identity that I’m taking on and now I can see how much emotional attachment I have with this new identity. Only when I realize this can I then work on it.
3 – Ask for Support – Physical and Energetic
Having a support network is essential to anyone living in a community (or basically on Earth), whether this support network is our family, friends, mentors, colleagues or others.
In times when we feel like we need someone to talk to or to hold our hands (or our heavy belongings because pregnant women cannot carry heavy stuff), we need to know who to ask for help and support.
In the energy world, it works the same. We have a team of energetic beings who are here to assist our spiritual journey on Earth, such as our guardian angels, spirit guides, power animals, ancestors, spiritual masters and teachers, and the Universe.
Of course I understand that this may seem to be a stretch for some people. So call on whatever energetic support that you resonate with. Yes, it does still require some degree of faith and trust, as we cannot see the energetic support with our physical eyes.
I guess fundamentally if you do believe that there is a bigger presence at work, whether you’d like to call it the Universe, Creator, God, Divine, Source or Nature, this is where you can start.
Believe me, I called upon my whole energetic support team before I was going to do the diabetes test. I also do this every time when I facilitate a class or private session, and when I do my daily meditation practice.
4 – Use What You’ve Learned
All the tools you have learned in classes, workshops, and retreats can only be useful if you apply them in your daily life. Use these tools to help you resolve problems, challenges and fears.
Obviously some tools work for some and not others. I believe it’s more like what kind of tools we resonate and are attracted to, and it doesn’t necessarily mean that when something works for me will work for other people.
Below is my journey on how I have used healing tools that work for me to help me go through the whole diabetes test ordeal.
Before the test, I was nervous and I couldn’t sleep well. I kept on repeating affirmations in my head, that everything was okay and I could do it. I visualized in my mind’s eye that I could complete the entire test safely, effortlessly and comfortably. I was still feeling nervous but the affirmations and visualization did help me to stay positive and open to what would happen next.
My intuition guided me to bring a few things with me for the test. I brought my essential oils, an emergency flower essence spray, headphones and a book.
When I had to drink the 300mL sugar water, I took my sister’s advice to drink it slowly. But the medical practitioner who was administering the test said that I had to drink it faster, as the timing of the blood tests could not be too far off (they should be exactly one hour apart).
Anyway so I did my best to drink the sugar water at a steady pace. After that, I had to wait one hour by the waiting area in the clinic. I could start to feel the sugar buzz spreading all over my body. So I applied a drop of peppermint essential oil by my nose, sprayed my face with my flower essence spray, put on headphones and played my favorite meditative music by Niall.
I closed my eyes and followed the music like in a meditation. I focused on my breathing and allowed the music to bring me on a journey where images flowed to my mind. I could feel cold sweat breaking out from my forehead. But I stayed focus on my breathing and the music.
In my mind’s eye, I saw my dad sitting next to me, supporting me and telling me everything was okay (my dad is one of my biggest energetic supporter).
Following my intuition, I had a feeling to repeat Ho’oponopono, the Hawaiian forgiveness mantra with four phrases – “I’m sorry”, “Please forgive me”, “Thank you” and “I love you”. Specifically I wanted to say it to my pancreas, which was working very hard to process all this glucose in my body.
I said it to my body, to my brain, to all my internal organs, and I mainly focused on my pancreas and even my insulin. As I continued to repeat these four phrases, I could feel my energy expanding and transported me to another space like I was no longer sitting by the waiting area in the clinic.
Mind you, I was sitting very close to the door, so when people opened and closed the door, I would know. But that was not my focus. I was definitely in a trance state. And after saying the Ho’oponopono over and over, I could feel the buzz, the cold sweat, and that uncomfortable feeling started to subside. Then my name was called (yes I was still aware of what’s going on around). It was time for my second blood test.
After the second blood test, I had to wait for another hour for the third blood test. My friend advised me to stay put, as she threw up the half hour before her third blood test and had to redo it. I was feeling much better already but I was cautious and kept my focus on relaxation. But since I was feeling more awake, I decided to read my book on hypnobirthing to pass time. I did continue to use the peppermint essential oil and my flower essence spray.
Sometimes, I would take a break from reading the book and just closed my eyes to relax and focus on my breathing again. Very soon, the hour passed and after my third blood test, the whole testing process was complete. Finally!
I was so surprised of what happened in the clinic. I did not intend to “do” meditation, yet perhaps because that was not planned, I went with the flow and was open to what came to my mind. And I had all the tools I needed already because I listened to my intuition.
I could not have ever imagined that I could feel my energy expanding in a waiting area of a busy clinic. It’s not even something I get to feel often during my own meditation practice.
This is what I mean by using these healing tools in our daily life. Sometimes when we are panicking or in fear, it is easy to default back to what society or others say.
For example, when we are sick, even though we know of many natural remedies but because we are in pain, we go back to taking painkillers (though that is nothing wrong when we use it consciously).
We think that we are “victims” of this certain germ or bacteria or virus – something external of us, and we ignore or forget to reflect on the emotional and mental reasons of why we fall ill at the first place.
It is easy to go back into “blame” mode, pointing the finger to anything outside of us instead of taking responsibility that we have co-created this dis-ease or this situation.
This goes the same with other types of problems or challenges we face, not just sickness, for example a fight with another person, money problems, challenges at work, and yes pregnancy, birthing and parenting challenges.
We don’t need to be in a “spiritual” place to be spiritual. It’s time to integrate the two – our spiritual life and our daily life. It’s no longer something separate.
This is what I believe the true essence of being spiritual is – we can be spiritual and mindful whether we are in nature or in city, whether we are meditating or working, or even waiting in a clinic.
It is time to integrate all parts of our lives, so our mind, body and soul can be truly aligned.
Do you have any stories to share about applying your spiritual practices into your daily life? How has your intuition helped or guided you in your daily life?
Feel free to share your feedback in our blog comments below or email Tania here.
