I have been told by the hospital not to post pictures on a
website of any babies or mothers. This for legal purposes so I am sorry to say
that I cannot show you pictures. These pictures I am posting are of the teams
that I took into the hospital. I very
much enjoyed bringing these ladies to the hospital. They took the time to hold
the babies and the mothers were very receptive. I have had some good conversations
with many of the women. I have met women
that have come in from 2 hours away close to the Nicaraguan border. So far there have been two sets of adorable
twins. We were able to pray with one mother whose baby had been born with their
liver outside of their body and they were at another hospital but the mom had
to stay till her time was up. I can’t imagine being surrounded by other babies
while my own baby’s life was in jeopardy. Each time we have given the nurses
packets for the babies in neonatal care. One time there were as many as 12
there. I have been made aware that if a
mother loses her child she too will remain with the other mothers till her
recovery time. I have not encountered any such mother but with this new
information I plan on making up and having on a hand a packet that would be
designed specifically for mom with a different message to help her with the
grief. As I stated in my earlier post I am allowed to enter into the area where
moms are in active labor and into the recovery room where they stay for an hour
before they are moved to the main hall.
I admit that this brought up some traumatic memories for me, as I had a
very difficult time during my daughter’s birth, but it also helps me to
remember so that I can be sensitive to what is going on. There is no pain medication
and you are together in common rooms. I try to be quick and just give a smile a
quick explanation to the mom or to the person with her if she has someone with
her, a reassuring word that It will be over soon, and God bless them. I will
tell you about one mom that had multiple staff around her, the curtains had
been drawn and it was evident that she was moments from giving birth. I told
the staff behind the desk if I could just leave the kit there with them for of
course obvious reasons… I had to laugh later when I thought of how the head nurse
so sweet and enthusiastically said oh no go give it to her, it will cheer her
up. So I ventured through the curtains
praying to God that I wouldn’t faint from “sympathy pains” and with the
knowledge that there wasn’t anything I could hand her that would “cheer her up”. Thankfully I got out of there in one piece
and without seeing a birth which if you know me; you would know that would not
be the best situation as I freak out at even the sight of any blood. It was hard enough being shown my own placenta
and educated about it much less someone else’s. I get off track. Back to babies,
I have seen a couple of chubby big babies but for the most part they are so
little and every one of them with a head full of dark hair. I was reminded of watching
the mom across from me brushing her babies hair for the longest time as I sat
holding my bald baby girl. A year later
and my baby girl does not have much more hair than some of these babies are
born with. I am pleased to say that the
hospital now allows for the women to have someone with them at all times if
they choose. I have been very pleased with how receptive and appreciative the
men that are there have been. I have had some good conversations with
them. This being said, even with this
change the majority of mothers are still alone. I realize this is due to many
reasons, one being that there just isn’t someone available to accompany them,
another that they came from afar. Whatever the reason it is still a very
difficult time of recovery to be there taking full charge of your baby. It is also very common to have surgery to tie
your tubes before leaving the hospital.
For those that are having this done, they must not eat or drink till the
procedure which is usually the next day. I remember one mom looking longingly towards
the water bottles telling me how thirsty she was. I said we will leave it here so that you can
have it as soon as you are done. I have
had some conversations about why these moms choose to have a surgery right
after birth and as suspected the reasons being that there is not a “recovery”
time for these moms after leaving the hospital and it is very likely they will
be pregnant again very soon. For this reason they opt to go ahead and have it
done before even leaving if their intent is to not have any more children. One
of the mothers in my room who was having it done was only 19 and had given
birth to her second child. So far each trip has been very good. I have made
good contacts with the staff and volunteers ladies. One thing about Latin
culture is that things are run very much on a relationship basis so you must
take the time to cultivate those to be able to accomplish what you are trying
to do. The gruff guard now smiles at me when we pass by, the head nurse has asked
me to leave her kits to have on hand so she can give them to the most needy
when necessary, the guy who comes in to register the babies has been all smiles
when we have been there, the leader of the volunteer ladies asked me to give
them a course one day on soap making. One of the things they do is take care of
giving toiletries to the patients that need it. They also rely on donations so
to help stretch that and also due to the benefits of homemade soap they would
like to start making it and giving that out instead of buying it. I would never have foreseen that in my future,
but life is full of unexpected adventures. I am grateful. I realize this post
has been a hodgepodge of information all at once. I have never been good at keeping
with just one specific topic. But I hope you have seen some of this through my
eyes and will continue to pray as this journey continues.
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