The following is an excerpt from another website that describes Cambodian customs. When I was working at the hospital, I noticed a distinct physical resemblance between some of the Mexicans and the Cambodian interpreters. Now here is a description of a similar custom found in Mexico---the string around a pregnant woman's waist. It is coming back to me somewhat--what that pregnant woman told me about wearing a string around her waist--I believe she said it was to ensure a good pregnancy.
Many Cambodian villagers believe that a pregnant mother and new born infant are vulnerable to the attentions of
mday daem, a spirit who is considered to be the mother of the child in a previous life.
The previous mother is thought to be still emotionally attached to the child.
If the original mother finds fault with the current mother, either during pregnancy or once the baby is born, the spirit mother will try to take the baby back, and this will result in
kralar pleung, an illness in the mother (eclampsia ?) or in
aarih, a usually fatal disease of infants.
The protection that the kru khmer [midwife] can provide against this threat is a string wound around the waist of the woman. Thin sheets of metal on which magic formulas have been written (kietha) are wrapped around the string at intervals, to provide a magical protective barrier surrounding the wearer.
[Woman, 50, medium, water zone] 180
My children died because of aarih, affected by the spirits of previous mother from earlier life. When we are pregnant we wear an amulet belt to prevent the baby’s spirit from being taken by previous mother. The kru khmer ties the belt. All pregnant women do this and get sprinkled with water in order to have a safe pregnancy. The kru writes magic letters and diagrams on metal and wraps them around the yarn. And offers prayers. I wore the belt until my baby was born, then I tied it around the baby’s neck to protect him from the previous mother. Some women already have an amulet belt before getting pregnant. But they get an additional one from the kru khmer when they get pregnant and wear both
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