A Two-Part Series
Editor’s Note: This piece is published in two parts for Black Maternal Health Week, observed April 11–17, under this year’s theme: Rooted in Justice and Joy. Part One is personal — five births, five lessons, one through-line of faith, and the navigation of a system not always built for us. Part Two moves outward, drawing on that testimony to address the theological and communal questions that Black maternal health raises for Muslim communities. Each part stands on its own, but they are designed to be read together: the personal opens the door, and the prophetic holds it open.
Part One: What My Births Taught Me
I gave birth in a hotel—not for the sake of a story, but for the sake of safety.
Dominant narratives of birth locate safety in proximity to technology: monitors, medical teams, and immediate intervention. For many Black women, however, safety is not reducible to equipment or setting. It is experienced through presence—being heard, believed, and treated with dignity during one of the most vulnerable moments of our lives.
The Qur’an names the labor of mothers with striking clarity: “His mother carried him with hardship and gave birth to him with hardship” (Al-Ahqaf 46:15). The verse does not romanticize birth; it honors its weight. For Black Muslim mothers, this is not abstract theology—it is lived knowledge.
Each of my five births taught me something different about my body, my choices, and the systems surrounding care. Together, they form a nearly thirteen-year journey.
The Qur’an names the labor of mothers with striking clarity: “His mother carried him with hardship and gave birth to him with hardship” (Al-Ahqaf 46:15).
My first birth began as a home birth. I had prepared for a calm, supported experience, but my son Haqq—named for Truth, one of the Beautiful Names of Allah—presented face-first instead of head-first. We transferred to the hospital for an emergency C-section. The outcome was healthy, but the lesson was immediate: flexibility is part of birth. Success is not determined by method, but by the well-being of mother and baby.
My second birth, also at home, unfolded without complication—steady, grounded, affirming. That experience deepened my trust in my body and in the One who created it. By my third birth, I made an intentional decision to work with a Black midwife—not because prior care had failed me, but because recognition matters. Being seen beyond the clinical is part of what makes care safe. The history of women attending women in labor is long, including within early Muslim communities, where midwives were respected for their knowledge and skill. That inheritance remains.
During my fourth pregnancy, structural constraints intervened. The midwife I trusted supported vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC) but lacked the credentials required to legally attend births in Maryland. Remaining in her care meant crossing state lines. I gave birth in a hotel in Virginia. My fifth baby was born the same way, with the same midwife. That labor lasted two hours—focused, calm, and centered. Unconventional in location, but aligned in every other sense: intentional, supported, and mine.
These experiences reshaped my understanding of safety. We are taught to locate safety within systems, yet systems do not consistently protect Black women. In the United States, Black women are three to four times more likely to die from pregnancy-related causes than white women—not because of biology, but because of structural bias, dismissal, and uneven care.
Safety is also spiritual. Each birth returned me to tawakkul—active trust in Allah as the ultimate source of protection: “Whoever puts their trust in Allah, He is sufficient for them” (At-Talaq 65:3).
Across all five births, I came to understand safety as relational. It depends on who is present and whether they listen. It requires knowledge, not fear. Each decision I made was grounded in research and intention. In Islam, seeking knowledge is an obligation—fard—and that obligation does not end in medical spaces.
Safety is also spiritual. Each birth returned me to tawakkul—active trust in Allah as the ultimate source of protection: “Whoever puts their trust in Allah, He is sufficient for them” (At-Talaq 65:3). That trust remained constant—whether at home, in transit, or in a hotel room preparing to welcome new life.
For those who read this as mothers, caregivers, or community members: questions are permitted. Changing providers is permitted. Seeking care aligned with one’s values is permitted. Before formal systems existed, birth was guided by embodied knowledge, communal support, and a relationship with the Divine. That knowledge has not disappeared. It still lives within us.
Part Two publishes later this week — moving from one mother’s story to the larger questions of justice, joy, and what our faith demands of us in the face of Black maternal mortality.
Majidah Muhammad is a childhood education expert and mompreneur who founded The Learning Cove, creating innovative learning tools like the Elevated Learning Binder and Color Chemistry with her oldest children, Haqq and Mali. She is now the mother of five and an advocate for Black Maternal Health.
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