Merry Christmas/Jwaye Nowel

On Christmas Eve we distributed gifts to the staff at the Maternity Center. There was much joy and celebration, even when the gifts given were so very small. I love being here at Christmas time and having things that matter (friendship/relationships over gifts) put into perspective. For Christmas Eve dinner we went out with our Australian friends Bec and Baz, and a guy from Kentucky that we just met, Nick. We went to Servotel and had a lovely evening together.

Christmas day we spent a lot of time resting and reflecting. And then joined our friends in Village Theodat for the first ever "Village People Progressive Dinner". We went house to house sampling different foods and having lovely conversations, ending with caroling and desserts at our friends Ryan and Melissa.

Incarnation 12/24/12

If the incarnation teaches us anything, it's that God can be found everywhere: in a cattle trough, on a throne, among the poor, with the sick, on a donkey, in a fishing boat, with the junkie, with the prostitute, with the hypocrite, with the forgotten, in places of power, in places of oppression, in poverty, in wealth, where God's name is known, where it is unknown, with our friends, with our enemies, in our convictions, in our doubts, in life, in death, at the table, on the cross and in every kindergarten classroom from Sandy Hook to Shanghai. -Rachel Held Evans

Hear the Angels Sing Dec 24th, 2012

Oh ye beneath life's crushing load,
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow;
Look now for glad and golden hours
Come swiftly on the wing;
Oh rest beside the weary road
and hear the angel's sing.

Christmas Baby Arrives Early-- December 22nd, 2012

Today we labored with a sweet little teen mom, who was courageous and strong and delivered a sweet baby boy. She didn't come to prenatal class yesterday, and when one of the staff members here gave her a hard time about this Nehemie replied "Mde. John, you know I always come to class, but yesterday my sister borrowed my shoes and I couldn't come without shoes".

 

We made sure her little guy had shoes when we dressed him up (though he really wasn't a fan of his hat!). It is always sweet to be able to attend a birth with a teen mom around the time of Christmas--as it puts into perspective what Mary might have gone through and frames the Christmas story through a new lens. In fact, this mama named her baby Lense, and I'm sure that he will be a new lens through which she sees and experiences the world.

Jedi Pita (Thursday Later) December 19th, 2012

We ended the evening by singing Christmas carols around a bonfire...a new first in Haiti. 

Good News: Dec 19th, 2012

Melody and David have been a regular part of our Haiti life since the earthquake. They were the only kids from the Heartline Orphanage who didn't get out on Humanitarian Parole visas after the earthquake. You'll see other photos of them on this blog from previous Christmases we've spent together. But they found out today that they are going home on Saturday-just in time for Christmas!! This is such great news!!

We had a party and prayer time for them! We are so happy for you Melo and David. We will miss you in Haiti but are so happy for you to start your life in Vermont!

Settling in at Home- Dec 18th, 2012

As I write this note a small scared teenager attempts to sleep in the room below me, cradling her unnamed 4 lb baby boy. She was admitted at the women's program today to learn to breastfeed- as her baby has been losing weight since he was born last week.

 

At the guest house next door, across a 10 foot cinder block wall topped with barbed-wire, a group is singing worship songs (in English) that take me back to my days as a camp counselor. We still have city power, so they are sitting in a circle on folding chairs, two guitar players at the top, surrounded by blinking white Christmas lights. Someone in the neighborhood is burning their trash, so every once-in-a-while I catch of whiff of smoke and my eyes start to burn.

 

It's my first day in Haiti. I arrived around lunchtime today, after traveling all night, and I'm aware of how exhausted I am –both physically and emotionally. Sarah and I were greeted with hugs and dancing and lots of joy. As soon as we were inside the big metal gate, my friend Cherline demanded "pick me up". And it really was a "pick me up"--seeing her brings me so much joy! She's a small waif of a girl my age, who could easily pass for 14 or 15. She works here at the Maternity Center and is one of my dearest friends. So I did pick her up and swing her around and it was a silly happy moment that almost brought me to tears.

 

As I was listening to the worship circle tonight, I remembered that in the confusing days after the earthquake, the field hospital staff (including myself) ate dinner together each night in that building. I could never have imagined that almost three years later I'd be staying in the apartment next door feeling like I was "home". And yet I am.

being human

"There's something about the desperation of life here (in Haiti) that resonates with how desperate life itself really actually, is. On the surface, an American suburb is a place where life is orderly, manicured, manageable. Here, the surface is raw and needy and clawing. There is some reassurance in living where the exterior life, with all its ragged desperation - and glimpses of beauty and faith and spontaneous dancing - resonates more with the interior experience of being human."
-Kent Annan

Running-For Life

Welcome to our Haiti Half-Marathon Informational Post!

The two Sarahs (also known as "O" and "D") are combining many of their favorite things (Running, Haiti, pregnant moms and babies) and putting together a team of runners from Los Angeles to raise money for a Maternity Center in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.  

Will you join us?  
There are multiple ways to get involved:
1) Run with us!! Sign up for the Huntington Beach Half Marathon on February 3rd, 2013 (Email us or comment if you need a training schedule)
2) Help us Fund-raise (more info below)
3) Donate now! Click on the widget in the upper right hand corner of this blog. It's safe and easy!! 

Did you know?

• Maternal mortality in the United States is 1 out of 2000. (One women out of 2000 dies in childbirth)
•  Maternal mortality in Haiti is 1 out of 93. This is the highest maternal mortality rate in the Western Hemisphere. (Not OK people!!)
• Heartline Maternity Center (where the Sarah's have volunteered since the 2010 Earthquake) provides free, quality prenatal care to any woman who joins their program. The woman is educated, well fed and provided with prenatal vitamins. The women give birth at the birth center (where Sarah and I volunteer when we are in Haiti) with trained midwives and are given education and access to health care, breastfeeding support and birth control options. The moms also participate in a Child Development Class weekly for 6 months after they give birth. Women are loved, educated, and supported for a full year by the Heartline programs.

D & O with the Heartline Maternity Center Staff

Learn more about the Heartline Maternity Center and the fund-raising efforts here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DOMvELQoys&feature=youtu.be&noredirect=1  (Look for Sarah O's cameo at 0:55)
and here: Other Run For Life Videos

A note from the midwife
On my last trip to Haiti (in September 2012) I (Sarah Obermeyer) understood the need for access to midwifery care in a whole new way. Wisline came in Monday morning after her water broke at home. This was to be her 6th baby. Her first child, a 16-year-old daughter, accompanied her in labor. She did a beautiful job of walking and laboring in the morning and mid-afternoon she was ready to deliver her baby into Tara's waiting hands.

O checking Wislene's BP

Dr. Jen and Beth had to use their resuscitation skills to help this baby start breathing. A few minutes later when the placenta delivered, Wisline started bleeding. Despite medications and all the tricks I knew to use, we could not find the source of the bleeding and we could not stop it. Minutes after she started bleeding, we determined that she needed to be transported to a local hospital 20 minutes away. 


I rode in the back of the ambulance with my hand trying desperately to compress the lower part of her uterus, watching blood continuing to seep onto the stretcher. When we got to the hospital we turned Wisline over to the staff there and they quickly determined that yes, she would need a hysterectomy. We all stood watching as they wheeled her out to surgery – all of us marked with her blood. The physician who would be doing the surgery turned and asked which of us could go and donate our blood so that Wisline could receive a blood transfusion. We all said yes.

Literally, they took our blood and exchanged it for her blood type and took it into the operating room for her. Crazy. It put a whole new spin on the idea of sacrificially serving the women of Haiti.

Wisline is alive. Her six children are not orphaned. Every once in a while I have a great sense that I am in the right place at the right time - this was one of those moments. I cannot doubt that I was supposed to be there. There were moments when I didn’t want to be there – when I wished that someone else could be in charge. But as we were riding in that ambulance I knew without any doubt that the presence of God was hovering right over my shoulder. I kept crying out to him to be near and found him to be as close as my breath. The Heartline team working to keep Wisline alive was not working on our own strength.

Wisline and her family, one week after surgery

While every birth is not like this one (thankfully) this is what the Heartline team does for every woman – they step into each birth with the possibility of needing to intervene in a way that is sacrificially giving of themselves for each woman and baby and family. Because of God's grace and the provision of a place like Heartline, six children have a mother. I am supporting the Heartline Maternity Center and their desire to grow and accommodate more women and more births because I believe that every woman should have a safe birth where she is respected, loved and has access to the medical that she may need.

Prenatal appointments happen every Thursday

Unnecessary Trash

I’ve thought a lot about how to write this post, and I still don’t know how to do it well… I don’t want to NOT do it, so I’m starting here, right in the middle of the mess:

(Photo of used underwear, bras, and *brand new shoulder pads* donated for women at the Heartline Maternity Center in Haiti)

First, confession time: I am guilty. I want to save some of you reading this post from this same guilt. And I want to honor and love the Haitian people, while educating us all on something that happens often but is just not ok…

Let me back up a little. The first four days of this New Year were very busy with births at the Heartline Maternity Center (This is the organization where I am now volunteering in post-earthquake Haiti). We slept very little and labored during several loooong hours with painful, beautiful, frightened, strong mamas. Each birth was different and lovely and had a happy ending with a healthy baby boy! (Here’s to 2012 being the year of the boys! Woohoo!)

Anyway, since I’m not medical and don’t know much about birth, I spent many hours- and by many, I mean easily over 100 hours- helping get things organized and sorting through donations: soft new baby blankets, packets of colorful matching onesies, and tiny baby socks. In some ways it was like a south of the border Babies R Us. I love tiny things, but tiny matching things for babies...love multiplied!

But, on a different note, many of the donations I sorted through were things that weren’t asked for and don’t really belong at a birth center. Donations which arrived on their doorstep, in a collage of random assorted medical & baby & clothes items. Donations that were not requested and consequently were put into a corner because the energy required to sort through them was not available to the person on the receiving end that day. Things like tracheotomy kits (not too many of trach’s happening at the birth center these days…um, or ever), used dirty underwear, baby clothes stained with spit up, and old scrubs embroidered with other people’s names. Some dear soul even took the time to organize her old rusty barrettes and put them in a used tic-tac container secured with a rubber band. I imagine her heart swelled at the thought of someone receiving this “gift”…

So let me pause here and say, I know people sending donations have good intentions. I know it makes them feel good. And at the risk of some of you deciding never again to give anything away, I want to say as politely as possible, Haiti doesn’t need your junk.

The missionaries I know who are living in Haiti don’t have the time to sort through your suitcase of random expired medications, partially used medical equipment, baby bottles (they teach exclusive breastfeeding there), and the like. And even if they DID have the time to sort through these regularly arriving suitcases, there are 1000 other things they could and should be doing with their time and energy and ability to speak Creole. That being said, there are things that are genuinely needed in Haiti. And if you truly want to give “stuff” when you come, I’d encourage you contact the organization you are going to serve with, and find out exactly what is needed to bring, and (here's the hard part when your friend offers you her bag of old baby clothes, or you pass by that tiny display of baby nylons and want to pick up a few pairs because they are soooo cute) stick to that list exclusively.

Doctor Jen, who routinely saves lives and has many gifts and skills to benefit people in Haiti, spent several days cleaning cabinets with me. She found some medication that expired in 1992. Not only is that scary, it is such a waste of storage space and time. And then we are faced with the decision about whether to a) throw it away in Haiti-- knowing someone will probably go through the trash and try to use it, possibly making themselves or someone else sick-- or b) pack it back up in our suitcase to throw away in the States. Does that seem like a crazy waste of time and energy and suitcase space to anyone else? Aside from making me crazy, I’ll admit it makes me angry (and it might get me arrested for 'drug trafficking' in customs some day!)

Heartline does an amazing job of loving the women in their program. One small way they show love and respect to these women, is to gift them with a birth pack once their baby has arrived. This pack has NEW items in it—probably the first, never-worn-by-other-people items that some of these families have ever owned.

Put yourself on the receiving end in either of these scenarios: First, imagine yourself as a Heartline staff member. Working hard day in and day out just to get the job done, to love the people around you, to be faithful to God as you make impossible decisions, and to take care of your family and life amidst the challenge of living in a city with very little infrastructure. Now imagine the number of times they encounter a short term team member who says “I brought something for you”. And since it is already there in Haiti, a suitcase filled with random, un-asked-for “donations”, they have graciously said “yes” to something they knowingly didn’t need, in order respect this visitor and then put it away in a corner for “some day” when they have the time to sort through the ziplocks full of randomly sized Band-Aids and assorted tubes of partially used creams. (I even found stuffed in a corner, an earthquake kit with a partially used tube of toothpaste. People, can we really not spend the $1.00 to buy a brand new tube for someone that just lost everything and survived a major catastrophe? Sheesh.)

Second, imagine yourself as a new mom. Your precious perfect baby has arrived. You don’t have much, but you are proud to take your baby out and show her off in the best clothes you have. (Haitians are incredibly clean and well dressed people—in spite of the many obstacles that they face.) Imagine, as you are leaving the birth center, the nursing staff gives you a bag of donated items to start your new life with your new baby. Imagine opening the bag and finding stained and holey baby clothes, a hat three sizes too big crocheted with black and red yarn that “needed to be used up”-for your baby. Would you put your baby in them? Would you use someone’s old nursing bra, stained and smelling of someone else’s milk? Maybe for some of you the answer is “Yes”. I come from a Dutch family that reuses ziplock bags…we know a little something about using every last thread of an item before buying something new. I get it.

But at the same time, when the Gospel tells us to “Love God with all our heart, and love our neighbor as ourselves”, I don’t think it’s telling us to give our ‘neighbors’ in Haiti the things we are ready to discard. Partially used medical equipment that would be discarded in the US, should be discarded in the US…not flown to Haiti in the name of “donations” to be thrown away there. Leftover prescription medications should never be sent (or brought) to Haiti, unless you have clear instructions to the contrary from the organization to which you are planning to donate the medication.

So please, before you -or anyone else you know- fills up your suitcase with items to "donate", make sure they are really truly needed. Make sure they are not taking away jobs or income for local Haitians (one example: http://apparentproject.blogspot.com/2011/08/peanut-butter-and-shelley.html). Make sure that you are not making MORE work for missionaries by bringing things they can’t use. And, whenever possible, bring items that are NEW!

(Don't you want the BEST for these ladies?!)

I am sure this is offensive to some people reading. Before you comment, please read “When Helping Hurts” by Steve Corbett or “Toxic Charity” by Steven Bush. I started off by saying I am guilty of this. Truth be told, as I bought new towels on Sunday, the thought crossed my mind to store my old towels in the garage to take down to Haiti next time. BUT, thankfully, God is still working on my heart. And the better gift I can give, is, first to confirm that towels are needed and bring my NEW ones down to donate (they will certainly last longer- and therefore be more useful- than my old towels) OR save that space in my suitcase and fill it with love. What I mean by that is keep the space in my suitcase AND in my heart open, so that I am not sorting through “stuff” down there--when I could be spending time with Haitian people, loving them and being loved in return.

So I want to end with this thought. People living in poverty don’t waste much. They are used to making the best of any situation or donation. But it’s the folks in the middle (usually the long term missionaries—who have the awkward and time consuming job of determining what can be saved/given out/thrown away). So lets do everyone a favor and band together to give people living in Haiti (or wherever you serve) the BEST that we have. New items, made well, that will be passed from family to family to family, and used over and over again. Lets honor them by loving them, as we would love ourselves. If we wouldn’t be excited to receive it as a gift, why should they? If it would be discarded here, lets do just that, and not pack it up to be thrown away in a country with no garbage system. I think together we can serve the missionaries and the people on the receiving end of our charity well, if we truly begin to practice “loving our neighbors in Haiti, as we love ourselves”.

And in the end, let’s remember that its relationships that change lives…not stuff. Even stuff that is useful. Especially at Christmas time, I am reminded that in the midst of all the gifts and ‘stuff’ of life, God came to us…as a person, a baby, to be in relationship…and since that time the world has never ever been the same. Lets follow THAT example!

For further education check out these posts by Heartline staff members:
http://ryanandmelissaalberts.com/1308/haitian-disaster-relief-conference/

http://livesayhaiti.blogspot.com/2012/01/reposting-from-summer-of-09.html

Or this one:
http://talesfromethehood.com/2010/05/29/american-culture-101-more-blessed/

Epiphany

We arrived home from Haiti on Epiphany, which marks the journey of the wise men to the Christ-child, and their finding God’s glory in such an unexpected place. The journey of these wise men, and their paying homage to him in the manger, is the culminating event of the Christmas season. It seemed like such a fitting ending to such a beautiful, rich time in Haiti…a place where we always experience God’s love and glory in unexpected ways. Our hearts are sad to be home.

I am always amazed by how loved I feel in Haiti. It’s not that I don’t feel loved here in the States, I do—and I have such a beautiful life here. But Haiti somehow puts everything under a magnifying glass and blows it up 100-fold. I know Haiti is not perfect, I do not have any illusions about what it would be like to live there day to day, but at the same time my heart fills with gratitude for the simple gracious gifts of love and friendship that are always extended to me there.

I am also aware that being in Haiti opens me up to God in a different way. Perhaps it’s because I am watching and waiting differently there; but it just seems easier to see and to know that God is at work in this world, that his kingdom is advancing. Maybe it’s because I get to hold so many babies-fresh from the arms of God, maybe it’s the simple graces extended: Grandma Rosemond making me rice and beans everyday, Andrema’s laughter and desire to help us in any way, with anything…community is not optional but essential there. But something in those moments breathes life and hope and faith into my tired soul, and rises like a star into the dark night sky. Even now, my eyes fill with tears remembering the goodbyes we said to so many dear friends…and it makes me long for the day when there will be no more goodbyes.

Ruth Haley Barton reflects on Epiphany with these words:
“The journey of the wise men speaks to us of those moments when we are not satisfied to hear other people’s reports of mysterious revelations. Yes, we have heard news that Christ has come into the world but hearsay is not enough: we want to see and experience him for ourselves! This desire can, if we let it, open up a new kind of journey—one that is alive with the possibility of encountering the mystery of Christ in the unlikely places of our own lives. We, too, can make choices to leave the familiar and follow the Light that is rising in our own hearts, leading us to that place of great joy.”

And I pray, that as this new year unfolds—so full of possibility and potential--that we will open up our hearts and our lives to this kind of journey, one that is open and alive…That we will look for and find God in the unlikely and unexpected places in our own lives.

"Beckoning God—
who called the rich to travel toward poverty,
the wise to embrace your folly,
and the powerful to know their own frailty;
who gave strangers
a sense of homecoming in an alien land
and to stargazers
true light and vision as they bowed to earth—
we lay ourselves open to your signs for us…
Rise within us, like a star,

And make us restless

Till we journey forth

To seek our rest in you."
Kate Compston, Bread of Tomorrow

1/1/12: bòn ané

Happy New Year! One of the ladies in the program had her baby this morning just after dawn. A big healthy baby boy (two of her babies died in their first few weeks of life and she has a 10 year old girl at home). It was a long night and we all were so happy to be together (Beth, Jen, Obermeyer and myself) that we weren’t smart and all stayed up past midnight catching up and ringing in the new year together. Fireworks went off in the neighborhood surrounding us, and we raised our glasses of limonade to toast the new year.

There is something significant about starting of a new year with a tiny new life. Because I was up all night, I never got to reading my journals today (a New Year’s tradition—to reflect on the year). It will have to happen later. It was so interesting being with this mama as she labored. There was a real battle with fear going on for her and she refused to push and fought the birth process—which really drew things out.

As I watched her labor I felt I could relate. Sometimes the things I most want to birth into the world, are the things I am most afraid of losing.

So as this new year dawns, I pray that it is full of new life. Messy, squawking, slippery, real life. There are things in me that want to be birthed this year. I don’t even fully know what they are, but I want to do the work of bringing them into this world, even in the face of my own fear.

12.31.11-A great way to spend the last day of the year

We were able to make it to see Augustine this morning. We found our way there on our own (with Josh from the Guesthouse)—which was awesome! And were recognized and welcomed and loved on by many of the workers whom we have known for over a decade now.

Augustine is a little eight year old girl that I fell in love with seven years ago. She had been admitted to Mama T’s the week we arrived with our first group from CA weighing 5 lbs at just over a year old. I was certain she would die and made it my goal to help that process be as comfortable as possible. Each day O and I would bathe her with this grape smelling soap and then lather her in scabies medications—she was itching constantly. And I left that trip so mad about her life, about how unjust things were for her and how it’s such a crap-shoot where any of us und up being born. I was certain she wouldn’t survive. Now here she is, in the middle of her third go-round of Kindergarten (she’s not the sharpest tool in the shed). And God has used this little one to teach me so many things about Him, about myself and about true life.

So yesterday, as I held her and she was talking up a storm, my heart was overflowing. It is not often that I get to hold faithfulness in my arms, it is not often that I can feel an answer to the deepest prayers of my heart. And the thing about Augustine, is that I don’t love her because she the smartest, cutest, most well behaved kid in all of Haiti. I love her because for whatever reason God planted those seeds in my heart so many years ago. I love her little voice, her crooked teeth, the way she points with her middle finger. I love that she’s so creative and naughty and always tries to sweet talk me into breaking the Sister’s rules. I love her because we both have a slightly obsessive attraction to all things shiny (Side tangent: she was LOVING the sparkly Christmas Decorations this year. Her enthusiasm for them really made me love Christmas more—they just made her so happy and were a constant source of conversation and joy. Something so small, so shiny, so full of delight!! Ahh I love this girl) And it’s not what Augustine does or will do that makes me love her, it’s who she is…and my little workaholic self needs to be reminded that God feels the same way about me. Augustine is a tangible reminder to me of what that love looks like-snaggle teeth and all!

We did a little drawing, just Augustine, Jonni (a sweet and tender little 6 year old boy) and myself. After we were invaded by the other older kids (escapees) we went down to the school with the older kids. I played basketball with a football (a new first for me) while holding “Ti Tine” (Augustine’s affectionate nickname). And I felt like my heart could possible burst open with all the love I felt. I don’t know why this happens, or what it is about being there, but really truly my heart overflows there.

The other inspiring thing was to see that the Sisters are rebuilding! The foundation and some of the walls to the new Children’s Home are up and it was ice to see that project started after almost two years of rubble…

As we were driving back from Mama T’s, we decided to go out for lunch at a restaurant we had never been to-also a first in Haiti. It was a process (parking, ordering, changing money-they wouldn’t accept my bill because it was torn, neither would the money changers in the store below). But there was something so satisfying about being there, speaking the language, figuring things out, and being successful, that was so incredibly gratifying and empowering.

You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy, at Your right hand there are pleasures forevermore. Ps 16:11

Baby Boy

“Bring Your peace into our violence
Bid our hungry souls be filled

Word now breaking Heaven's silence

Welcome to our world”

Advent Song

You keep us waiting.
You, the God of all time,
want us to wait
for the right time in which to discover
who we are, where we must go,
who will be with us, and what we must do.
So thank you...for the waiting time.

You keep us looking.
You, the God of all space,
want us to look in the right and wrong places
for signs of hope,
for people who are hopeless,
for visions of a better world that will appear
among the disappointments of the world we know.
So thank you...for the looking time.

You keep us loving.
You the God whose name is love,
want us to be like you--
to love the loveless and the unlovely and the unlovable;
to love without jealousy or design or threat;
and, most difficult of all,
to love ourselves.
So thank you...for the loving time.

And in all this,
you keep us.
Through hard questions with no easy answers;
through failing where we hoped to succeed
and making an impact when we felt we were useless;
through the patience and the dreams and the love of others;
and through Jesus Christ and his Spirit,
you keep us.
So thank you...for the keeping time,
and for now,
and for ever,
Amen.

-Ionia Commmunity Worship Book
Psalm 27, 40, 62, 63; Isaiah 25:1-9, 40:28-31

No Easy Decisions

Haiti is often a place where difficult choices have to be made—choices between dozens of good options, and choices between dozens of bad options, sometimes in the course of a single day. John McHoul often calls Haiti the land of "unlimited impossibility".

We spent some time with Olez today (the Friday before Christmas). We first met her after the earthquake when she brought her granddaughter Rose into the field hospital (our first night there). Rose had been stepped on in the family tent…she was just a few weeks old (her mother had died in the earthquake) and made a quick recovery. But our relationship with Olez continued, mostly because a Canadian nurse, Lise, took an interest in this family and always sends gifts down there with us for them…so we have seen her every visit since that time.

Olez also has two handicapped children of her own, as well as Rose and Rose’s older brother, to care for. Recently she made the heart wrenching decision to give the grandkids up for adoption. She told us about this through tears. We were going to visit the kids at the orphange, to give them the gifts that Lise had sent with us. We invited her to come with us and see them and she said no, it would be too hard. Later she changed her mind and decided to go, crying before and after the visit. Her heart clearly broken. Her heart clearly doing the most painful thing to her, in order to do the most loving thing for these grandkids. Not an easy decision.

This is happening to a dear friend of ours sister:
http://livesayhaiti.blogspot.com/2011/08/imagine-if-you-will.html

We have cried a lot of tears with these people this week…and there is no quick fix to any of these situations. Please pray for Olez and “K” and those who love them and the "impossible" choices they are faced with.

Vulnerability

First…a bit of a disclaimer (from Sarah O). The midwife in me is coming out in this post and I will give you a warning that I am going to use a few body words. So consider yourself warned… :)

Yesterday I spent the whole day seeing newly pregnant ladies with Beth, doing physicals on each of them. Beth is a wonderful learner and soaks up information so as we did each visit, I threw in a few learning points about different things we saw. With one woman, Beth noticed that her cervix (the part if the uterus that dilates to let a baby through at birth) looked different than the others we had seen – the transformation zone was showing, which often happens in pregnant woman.

The transformation zone is the part of the cervix where the cells are changing…transforming…from one type of textured cell to a flatter cell. Pregnant women and teenagers tend to have this part of the cervix visible. The thing that is important about the transformation zone is that this spot where change is happening is a place that is extremely vulnerable to infection.

Change creates vulnerability.

Isn’t that the truth – it is when change happens that we are most vulnerable. Difficult changes like loss and exciting changes of growth put us in the same place of vulnerability.

Today we talked to 30 pregnant mamas about labor and preparation for the great changes that will happen for them. We reminded them that the midwives here will be with them and help them know what to do in labor. They will not be alone.

Tonight we have one of the teen moms visiting us. Her sister is very ill and took a turn for the worse this evening. As she wept and D prayed for her, we are grateful that she is not alone in this place of vulnerability. And as she cried, her little boy sat on the couch completely unaware bubbling with laughter. Sadness and joy – both in the same room.

For the darkness of hoping
In a world which longs for you,
For the wrestling and laboring of all creation
For wholeness and justice and freedom,
We praise you O God:
For the darkness and the light
Are both alike to you.

-Janet Morely

Breath

posted by Sarah O

This morning we woke to one of the maternity staff members knocking on the door saying she had a very sick baby downstairs. I dressed quickly and went down to see who was there and found a truly ill little 3-month-old girl. Her mama had brought her in yesterday with cold symptoms and a fever and we treated her with antibiotics. Sometime in the night things went downhill and she worsened…stopped eating, started breathing with more effort, fever rising. I am in no way a Peds person, and this was a sick baby. Without extra oxygen, her little body was not doing well staying oxygenated…for those of you who are medical, her pulse ox hung between 67-82%. With the oxygen support, her breathing eased a bit and she made it up into the high 90s.

I was reminded that breath is truly life.

As we loaded her up into the ambulance to transport her, we realized that none of us knew how to attach the particular regulator to the oxygen tank…and the ambulance siren wasn’t working. This was a baby who needed that oxygen and we needed the siren to get us through traffic and to the hospital quickly. It is in those moments of need that I so desire to have what it takes to meet the needs myself – instead we prayed…for someone to figure out the oxygen and for the siren to start working. In the next few moments, Winnie (a beautifully gifted Haitian nurse) connected the oxygen regulator and Dornbos worked her magic and got the siren to start.

Sometimes prayers are answered quickly…I wish they all worked that way! :)

So tonight we are praying for this little one who is in a local hospital with oxygen and IV antibiotics…praying that she is breathing easily and that her body will heal tonight. Praying that this wonderfully attentive mama will rest peacefully this evening…

Spirit of God,
You are the breath of creation,
The wind of change that blows through our lives,
Opening us up to new dreams and new hopes,
New life…

(Christopher Ellis)

Advent Prayer

(the view from the front door of our apartment here)


Come God
Come with the frightened
Come with the poor
Come with the children
Come with those who have always been your friends
Come and lead us where you are living
and show us what you want us to do.

A Child is Born

Witnessing Revia’s stretch marks and pain this evening, I thought of how stretching it is, for all of us, to carry God inside us. How it always pushes us beyond what we think we can bear.

I just wish that there was always something so beautiful and perfect that resulted from our labors.

Meet Revia’s little girl, 6lbs 13 oz of perfection, born at 11:18pm Dec 22nd. Welcome to our world little one.