A couple of months ago, our friend and Matthew's colleague, Bia Labate, came to visit us. She's an amazing Brazilian anthropologist, working on various books and maintaining a blog. While washing dishes together, I spoke about my interest in ayahuasca and birth. I guess she was impressed and asked if I wanted to write a chapter in a book she was putting together tentatively titled, "Health and Ayahuasca". I was delighted and intimidated. She impressed on me that anything written up would be awesome since nothing has been formally written on the subject.

So I sat down at the computer and stared at the blank screen... some time later, I had the title~but as most projects go, write a little, scratch it out, write a lot and then rewrite that. Before I knew it I was deep into the writing process and it felt great! I felt like I had finally figured out how to blend my love for impulsive, creative writing with academic, often boring, writing.

This exercise in writing has been an awesome gift. Matthew and I spent hours talking and developing ideas. I decided to put Matthew as a co-author, since he was so brutal with the editing and so crucial in developing and translating (thank you!). Below is the text, hope you like it!