24. Ancestral Medicine for Modern Mothers: Rebozo, Ritual, and Cultural Respect with Andréa de Keijzer

How can we bring the beauty, wisdom, and deep healing of traditional practices into modern birthwork and motherhood, while honouring their roots?

In this moving conversation, Lauren sits down with Andréa de Keijzer, a doula, photographer, and kinesiologist born in Mexico, whose work is devoted to preserving and sharing the ancestral wisdom of Mexican midwifery. Together, they explore the rebozo—a woven Mexican textile often described as the hug of our grandmothers—and the Closing of the Bones ceremony, a postpartum ritual that invites mothers to be wrapped, witnessed, and restored after birth and other life transitions.

Andréa shares her story of loss, healing, and deep reconnection to her lineage, illuminating how these traditions offer profound nourishment for body, heart, and spirit. She also speaks candidly about what it means to honor cultural roots, practice reciprocity, and integrate ancestral care into our modern context with integrity.

In this episode, we explore:

• The meaning and magic of the rebozo and its role in postpartum and life transitions
• How movement, ritual, and being witnessed in community can restore the postpartum period as a time of true nourishment, not just recovery
• Andréa’s story of “little births,” grief, and how ceremony became a pathway to healing
• What cultural respect and reciprocity look like when engaging with ancestral practices
• Practical ways to find a ceremony guide, choose a fair-trade rebozo, and approach these traditions with intention 

If you’re a mother or birthworker seeking deeper, more embodied ways to support postpartum care—and to do so respectfully—this episode is an invitation to return to the wisdom that’s been woven through generations.

About Andréa de Keijzer:
Alongside Angie Yañez, Andréa is the co-founder of Collective Rebozo. They teach rebozo workshops, offer retreats and facilitate closing of the bones ceremonies, in postpartum and other life transitions. They are passionate about creating spaces of warmth, movement, creativity and ceremony. 

Learn more: collectiverebozo.com

Instagram: @rebozo.collective ENGLISH | @collective.rebozo FRENCH

LISTENER PERKS GENEROUSLY GIFTED BY COLLECTIVE REBOZO:
Use code REBOZO2025 for 10% off November 2025 Rebozo trainings in Toronto or Ottawa.
To purchase a fair-trade rebozo from Oaxaca, email [e-mail] with code REBOZOLOVE for $10 off.

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