My name is Gina Catena. I’m a Certified Nurse-Midwife and mother of three young adults. My parents were devotees of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (The Beatles’ Guru). For years, friends and acquaintances encouraged me to tell stories about the effects of Maharishi’s Transcendental Meditation Movement on my family. Trying to be “normal,” I avoided such discussions. Time provides the perspective to address issues of “undue influence” “coercive persuasion” ..errr… “brainwashing” pure and simple.

My parents raised me in devotion to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s Transcendental Meditation Programs, seasoned with a myriad of other psychic healers, astrologers and mystical life directives while avoiding licensed medical providers and discrediting mainstream education. We believed powerful thoughts and meditation would overcome all. I dutifully married, twice, within Maharishi’s Organization before stumbling into mainstream life with three children to obtain higher education and a career. Those three cult-born “children” are now self-sufficient, and compassionate young adults. Whew! We came to life together.

Current: My career as a Certified Nurse Midwife working with the poor provides an intimate view to America’s marginalized families. At a tertiary care medical center, my coworkers are brilliant, humble, compassionate, dedicated and overworked – together we support all variations of birth.