We are temporally short staffed at the clinic this month
because midwife Normi is not working here anymore, she is in the process of moving abroad to Taiwan to work as a caretaker, and midwife
Eva went to America to write her exam to become officially certified as a
midwife...so that leaves me and my preceptor Gerlene for most of the week. But we do have Grace (a nurse) who comes and stays in the clinic with me Thursday, Friday, and
leaves Saturday morning. Despite
the fact that I ended up delivering a baby on my own, we have been able to keep the clinic running well with it just being us. And ironically, it has
been busier than ever before with 7 babies born just since the beginning of this month, and not all of them have been complication free. I want to say that even I am amazed at how much I have
learned and how far I have come throughout this journey in Asia as a midwife. The things I know and am confident doing now is so awesome!
I
just got back from visiting the baby twins again, and I am sad to say that they
are not looking much better; also the mother still seems sick...
It was after
dinner and almost dark when we walked into their home, the only light was from
the fire cooking the kettle of rice. I grabbed my handydandy cellphone which
has a built in flashlight on the top so that I could see the babies. It is hard
for one to comprehend the living conditions of this family without actually
seeing for oneself, but I am almost in tears while I type this. Despite the
help/medicine/formula we have given this family, the unbathed barely clothed
babies are well over a month old now, and still look like they were just born
yesterday. They don’t have the infections in their lungs anymore, but James(the boy) has dark
green goopy stuff in both his eyes and has a major rash on the inside of his
thighs, back, stomach and bum. Jasmine even though born bigger than James is
smaller now, this could be the outcome of her twin brother being fed all the
milk because he is a boy, and boys are prized here, just like in any other 3rd world country. Someone had put a filthy teddy
bear over Jasmine to act as a diaper of sorts, and James had a cloth wrapped
around him that was already soaked with urine. All James and Jasmine do is
sleep. They don’t smile, they don’t move their heads or eyes towards me or anyone
else for that matter, they are not thriving. Dear God, will these twins even
make it to the age of one? Here there is no help from the government. Social
services would definitely be involved if this was a family in America, but I am
not in America, I am in a country where dying from
starvation is just as real as dying from old age. If the wealth here in the
Philippines could somehow be equally divided, everyone would have enough; no
more, no less, just enough. .. All I can say is that we will do our best to
help this family in every way we can...when walking back to the clinic from the twins house and on the way passing and having to leave behind an abandoned crying kitten in the middle of a garbage heap, I realized I cant save the world, God is going to have to do that.
For those who are unaware, I am due to go back to Olongapo
at the end of this month with Mercy In Action again. During the time I have
been here in Manila, Mercy In Action’s birth center has been opened, is up and
running, and very busy with sometimes even 3 women coming in 1 night. I have
made many friends here in Manila interning at Gerlene’s clinic for these past
almost 3 months, and will miss them dearly, though I can’t say I will miss the
cockroaches as much, hehe! but, I have gotten used to living here in Manila.
The grocery boys at the local store all know my name, and are going to miss
seeing me there every week ;-) and I am sure the tricy drivers will miss
driving me around and getting lost because I, the foreign girl, has no clue
where she is going. In Olongapo, I will be living in the birth center just like
I am here, but with 2 other midwives (the same midwives I was working with before) whereas here I have been living alone. The plan is to stay in Olongapo for the rest of my time being in Asia.(4 more months to go!)
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