Women are collectively experiencing Prairie Madness.

Here's how we recognize it and begin to heal the world.

Just 175 years ago in the mid 1800s, English settlers from the eastern part of what we now call the United States began to push colonization westward. Men set out, women and children in tow, to make a new life for themselves in the Great Plains.

Conditions were harsh. The Homestead Act of 1862 “gave” (gave is in quotations because it wasn’t our land to give away in the first place) men 160 acres each and 5 years in which to make a go of it and retain ownership of the land. That meant that in addition to the long and brutal winters, the sweltering summers and the high winds that came along with prairie life, families were nowhere near one another. They experienced extreme isolation - especially the women, who were always home alone with the children even as men travelled for days at a time to fetch supplies. This is when we first see Prairie Madness documented as a type of mental illness affecting primarily women settling across the Great Plains.

Symptoms included depression, withdrawal, changes in character and habits, and violence - especially when men were afflicted. More extreme cases meant psychotic breaks or even suicide.

You might think this sounds tragic but not unexpected due to the isolation, but I invite you to look deeper. Author Gabrielle Wynde Tateyuskanskan of the Native American Dakota Tribe explains Prairie Madness as a settler colonial phenomenon, contrasted with the Native American connection to the land. In her poem "Shadows of Voices" commemorating Dakota genocide victims, she writes: "The conquerer in its insolence cannot hear the ancient heartbeat of the prairie. / The plowed and plundered grassland has been sacrifice to a leader’s arrogance. / Damaged spirit is the prize for the powerful victor.” And then, “Shadows of voices sustain memory in the continuous prairie wind. / Okiya from sacred and wise relatives. / This same prairie wind that caused pioneer women to go mad." **

This wasn’t just about isolation in unfamiliar territory for women settlers, it was about the puritanical colonial mindset and subsequent disconnection from the Earth.

Even for Protestants settling out west, codes and legalities concerning women were puritanical. Their primary role was to raise children and create a moral and spiritual home. Women were taught to read specifically so they could read the Bible, and formal education beyond childhood was rare. Women couldn’t vote. Married women couldn’t own property or enter into legal contracts without the consent of their husband. In short, women’s authority and agency were severely limited. (In other words, what this regime would like to return us to.)

But before the rise of various forms of Christian religion in Europe, the concept of the feminine was viewed a bit differently. People celebrated holidays and events centered around nature and our connection with it, with prominent feminine overtones and symbolic goddesses. Imbolc was celebrated in February to mark the reawakening of the land after winter. Ostara celebrated the Spring Equinox and rebirth. Beltane on May 1st focused on fertility and abundance. Mabon in September celebrated gratitude and the end of the harvest season. Samhain at the end of October paid homage to loved ones who had passed on. On December 22, Yule commemorated the returning of the light.

All of these events focused on our relationship to the Earth, and paid homage to the feminine. But Roman Catholics weren’t happy having citizens who believed in Christ and participated in traditional events that had been celebrated for thousands of years. It became illegal to recognize those time-honored holidays, to the point where those who did were called witches. And over time they were replaced with what we now know as Groundhog’s Day, Easter, Mother’s Day, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas.

And there’s nothing wrong with celebrating those holidays. The problem is that we stopped celebrating our connection with, and dependence on, nature and natural cycles. Without that periodic reminder, we drifted further and further away from that deep knowledge and from the power of the feminine. We began looking at the Earth as something to mine, to cut down, to manipulate and whip into submission for our gain. We saw and killed the snake sunning itself on the trail without remembering the snakeroot plant meant to heal us from its non-venomous bite. We cut down the forest and then killed the displaced deer who wandered into our yards looking for food. We stopped noticing how the full moon brought magnolia buds to bloom and caused our monthly menstrual cycles to come to fruition.

And when we came across people who remembered these things and knew them well…when we came across Native Americans who put them into practice and lived in harmony with the Earth and its inhabitants, we called them crazy savages. We killed them, stole their children, and tried to force them to be like us. We took their beautiful mountains and carved our faces into them. We stuck them on “reservations” barren of any resources and, since then, have proceeded to systematically strip this beautiful country of its forests, its clean water and thousands upon thousands of animal species.

It’s no wonder that Native American women watched us going slowly mad and recognized right away that it was not only isolation from other women, but a disconnection from the Earth that was the root of the problem.

And although you didn’t hear much about Prairie Madness after the arrival of the 20th century brought more modes of transportation and more population centers, you still see the effects today. We are surrounded by people but fundamentally isolated from one another, and we have forsaken our relationship with the Earth and the ecosystems that sustain us. And societally, we suffer the same symptoms of Prairie Madness that plagued colonialists years ago: depression, confusion, feelings of emptiness, withdrawal, anger and even violence. Suicides are up 37%.

Did you know the Earth has a heartbeat, just as the above poem states? It pulsates with a rhythmic microseism, occurring every 26 seconds. Scientists can detect it but they have no idea where it comes from. Earth also has a geological heartbeat of clustered geological events every 27.5 million years, including volcanic eruptions, mass extinctions, plate reorganizations, and sea level changes. I imagine these like menstrual periods…a cleansing, if you will. So, a heartbeat and menstruation. Earth is alive. We’re not living on a rock, we’re living on a being. And we’ve deliberately ignored and then forgotten that to our peril.

Meditating on this has brought me to the daily mantra:

I invite and welcome life in all its forms.

I welcome the Cardinal and the Grackle and the Finch. I welcome the firefly and the spider. I welcome the wild garlic and the dandelion and the unruly vine. I welcome the opossum and the field mouse. I welcome the full moon and the thunderstorm.

I still don’t hold out any hope for our species. We’ve allowed and are still allowing the worst of us to destroy the rest of us. But while we’re still here, we have to fight for our connection to our Earth. And not only fight for it on a political scale, but cultivate it in our day to day lives and teach our children to do the same.

Today is about rebirth in many ways. Let your deep, inner remembrance of what it’s like to be part of Nature be one of them. For all of us, that’s the first step to healing.💚

“An ant crosses your carpet. A spider weaves a pattern older than mammals beneath your stairs. Just nod, breathe, and think, "Good. It's all still here. The forest, the mountains, the desert. At home in my home." The sterile white box is the stranger. Not the ant. Not the spider.”

**Read the entire poem here.

(Pic: The peach tree that somehow sprung from our compost bin here in NE Ohio after I adopted my mantra.)