I strive to heal, diminish fear;
making real, priceless promises
of life each day, each year;
and I yearn . . ."
Welcome to Maternl©, my personal website and blog. The image above represents the mythological Greek goddess of health, Hygeia, the logo of my initial program, hygeia.org, and now the symbol of Maternl©.
Maternl addresses human dimensions of caring in an age of advancing medical technologies.
Maternl is enabled by the agents of our humanity, empowered by our words, our language and ancestral songs of promise to heal when we cannot cure; the ultimate challenge to the bond between patient and doctor.
Maternl recognizes and offers the attention and empathies required when parents experience the loss of a child through miscarriage, stillbirth or neonatal deaths.
Maternl reflects my career as a physician, an obstetrician, and introduces my personal philosophy and original poetry which above all enables me to ask why even when we already understand how. Poetry permits me as a doctor of medicine, witness to the frailties of our humanity, to abet healing through the very core of what makes us human; our language and our personal emotions.
I believe that we who have taken the "Oath" to practice our sacred profession of medicine and we who have committed ourselves to the healing arts must do so with the imperative to respect the sanctity of health for all those we treat - with a sense of high privilege-for they are the flesh and blood and souls of our humanity - past, present and future - and we, by our choice, their guardians. Here at Maternl, I, through my writings, poems, personal thoughts and unique programs strive to promote these tenets.
Michael R Berman MD MBI FACOG
February 03, 2026
"The body, impotent to maladies; thirsts for
harmonies of cure by gentle ways and artful
skills to dignify countless souls' infirmed and helpless wills . . . "