I am the creator of The Other Side of the Glass, a poignant docu-series about men’s experience of becoming a father at the birth
“Janel is a woman of rare vision, a passionate filmmaker, and dauntless advocate for giving babies the best possible start in life. As this film clearly demonstrates, she knows how to fight for fathers as well.
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“Janel Mirendah has produced more than a film. It is a poignant love letter to fathers, babies and mothers, and also an imperative call to action for society: birth matters for each of our individual psyches, and for the future of our shared human family, so we better consider how we do it.
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“This is so needed. I watch over and over and over as fathers get swallowed in the fear of hospital birth practice. I am torn apart every time I see a father stand back and chew his knuckles while his wife is essentially assaulted or his baby is left to lie there screaming. ”
“To call it a film or even a documentary does not really represent the scope
of your offering. It is more a manifesto on the origins of, and influences on, parenting and family life from the very beginning.
In a way, it is a stand-alone early parenting course. It is the most inclusive and balanced mother/father/baby film I have seen. This is rare because few actually get the true significance and importance of father’s influence on the baby’s gestation, birth and breastfeeding experience, as well as on the mother.
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“We have two jobs, you know. The first thing is to stop the harming, and then the second is to heal those who have already been harmed. Do our best, best to heal, right? That’s what I see you doing.”
“The Other Side of the Glass is about a baby, a mama’s and family’s basic human right to labor and birth free of fear and intimidation. It is about protecting the emotional and physical connection between mom/dad/baby. It is about love and peace for every soul entering this world and every family accepting this soul.
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The Other Side of the Glass is based on my decade of study and practice of pre & perinatal psychology and attachment/birth healing. I traveled the country and listened to the stories of men’s experiences of becoming a father. I processed the information and issues into never before talked about insights and needs for babies, mothers, and fathers.
The man’s experience of becoming a father was mostly ignored prior to the film trailer above in fall of 2009. It was the ground-breaking work started the
conversation about a man’s experience at his baby’s birth and his needs to be seen as legitimate partner. Men across the US shared their experiences of birth as “like being in a war zone” and being powerless - on “the other side of the glass”, even if present.
The film features David Chamberlain, founder of pre and perinatal psychology and others in the field, as well as nurses, midwives, doctors (Michel Odent MD, Stuart Fischbein MD, Sarah Buckley MD, and others), doulas, and grandmothers.
Click the image above to enlarge.
The Soundcloud at left is 5 minute clip from radio show. Janel summarizes “The Other Side of the Glass” and how she came to do the docu-series.
The Other side of the Glass: A birth film for and about men at birth
The neural understanding of the mother-baby development and connection is introduced; and the film focuses on the needs of newborns at birth and the impact on family and society for not understanding this and for not meeting those needs.
The overall theme of the film is the foundation established by the mother-baby connection at birth being critical for creating a humanity that is in thriving (love) mode, rather than in survival (fear) mode.
The film implores caregivers (midwives, nurses, doctors) to be the ones to protect the mother-baby dyad in the hospital and home settings, and to be the ones to protect skin-to-skin at birth. And, the film asks to men to rise up and engage in legislation action to make them do it. Asks men protect to protect birth for all humans.
Visit original website The Other Side of the Glass here.
birth video, freelance videography & Editing
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, Washington DC. Private event
Charlotte Motor Speedway, Charlotte, NC. Private event
July 2019.
I am interviewing James W. Prescott, Ph.D. here - and in the header - for an upcoming documentary short about Prescott’s groundbreaking research on mother-baby attachment that was obstructed and cancelled by NICHD in 1979.
”Prescott was a health scientist administrator at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), one of the Institutes of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) from 1966 to 1980. He created and directed the Developmental Behavioral Biology Program at the NICHD where he initiated NICHD supported research programs that documented how the failure of "Mother Love" in infant monkeys adversely affected the biological development of their brains. These astonishing abnormal brain changes underlie the behaviors of depression, impulse dyscontrol and violence that result from mother-infant separations.” Read more here.
Birth Videography Package
Your baby’s birth is the most important day of his or her life and it deserves to be preserved on video as much as your wedding, and your baby’s birthdays, holidays, and graduations.
Package Includes:
Videoing of your baby’s birth and the first hour of life (discrete or explicit as you wish)
One unedited digital copy of the video (an edited version of the video is available for additional fee)
A family session to debrief the experience.
Silent Witness
I participate in your baby’s birth as a sacred, Silent Witness and as a support person for the father and grandmother.
As a Silent Witness I provide deep witnessing of your baby’s experience and the opportunity for post-natal healing. Whatever happened, can be integrated. The earlier, the better.
In a process called “His Moment of Awe,” I support the father and grandmother/other to “put on their oxygen mask first.”
The grandmother’s profound role in the baby and mother’s lives has been forgotten - usurped by medical model of birth and the profession of Doula that evolved to protect the mother in the system. But can’t. No one is more biologically and evolutionarily prepared to protect the mother and baby than the maternal grandmother.
I support the father and grandmother first to process THEIR experience of their wife/daughter/other’s giving birth to their family’s new baby. When they - the support system for the mother-baby - is resourced they can best support the mother-baby.
The process culminates in a sacred process of having the experience that they missed in the birth, regardless of the reasons. ie, cesarean, NICU, etc.
A Soul Portrait for the baby, and a series of portraits are included to use as tools for ongoing support. These are pieces of art so “easy” to use for busy young families. Mother and father and grandmother have option of creating a series of portraits that are that “parenting manual” they say we don’t have. The manual is within, within the mother who made and birthed the baby. The more undisturbed her body is, the more she trusts her body and instincts, the more she makes the most informed choices she can - for that baby. The Soul Portraits we do in the 9 week postpartum process create that manual to support mothers who live in a very unnatural, technological world.
The final postnatal attachment session includes viewing video in a therapeutic process based in Craniosacral Therapy (CST), traditional counseling, and neural development of baby, and pre- and birth psychology.
To speak to me about doing your birth video or collaborations for documentary filmmaking, or editing contact me here. Thank you.