Saturday, 15 November 2008

• Currently Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel By Lisa See see related

  One of those days...

  Well, Kara and I had one of those crazy nights last night that will be forever burned into my memory; filled with those all too familiar moments thinking - "would I EVER get to experience this had I lived in America for an entire lifetime?" Answer: probably not.
  
  So, what happened was this:
  
  It all began a couple of months ago when I started having a desire to get involved with the plight of babies in Nepal. I kept running into incidents of babies being abandoned, or children being neglected, and realized that in Nepal there just isn't anything within the "system" set up to protect or care for these children. I mentioned this stuff in a recent post, so if you haven't read that one... look below for a more descriptive version of that story.
  
  Shortly after that post was written Kara and I began volunteering at a government run orphanage here in Kathmandu. It is the only one that was started through the government so anytime babies are abandoned at local hospitals, or found by the police abandoned outside they are sent to this orphanage.  We have been going every Friday and mainly work in the infant room holding babies, feeding them and changing diapers. Honestly, I have been LOVING spending time there.  Although it's hard to once again be in an institution where you really have no say in the every day administration of the place - it is fun to simply sit and hold newborns for a few hours each week. They are beautiful. The other bizarre thing about the place is that it is located in an old king's palace; an ENORMOUS building with huge courtyards and hundreds of rooms. And yet when you get past the exterior and actually enter you discover children living in really bad conditions with an obvious lack of physical contact, love and individual attention. Major RAD (reactive attachment disorder) cases all over the place.  But even with all of that going on the kids are still as gorgeous as can be.
  
  So that brings me a little closer to last night's story.  A few weeks after we started working there Kara and I ran into a Christian friend of ours in Thamel, "Sarah". A tiny lady that is very poor and sells small purses to tourists for a living. We've known her for quite a while, so it was pretty obvious when she walked up to us one night with her belly bulging out from underneath her shawl that she was pregnant (with her fourth child). She pulled us aside and starting weeping right there in the street. She told us that she wasn't planning to tell anyone this but that she had become pregnant unexpectedly and could not possibly handle having another mouth to feed. She had already made up her mind that she was going to simply give birth and then leave the baby at the hospital. (Meaning that it would end up in the exact same room that Kara and I had just started volunteering at weeks before.) We were shocked and told her not to worry and that we would find a way to support or help her... but begged her to reconsider keeping the baby. A week later I took Rekha - one of our wonderful WMF staff ladies - to meet her. Rekha counseled her for about an hour and by the end, Sarah had decided that this baby WAS in fact a gift from God and that her heart had changed. We were all really excited, feeling like even if it was just one life - we had kept someone away from having to grow up in that orphanage.  Thank God.
  
  Well then last night we got the call - Sarah had gone into labor. Kara got to the hospital around 3pm and when I arrived at 6 they had just taken her into the delivery room.  I saw the husband outside and asked him how things were going. He replied with, "I don't know... why don't you go in and see?" I was a bit surprised by that because although I had been with many women in that hospital before - even up to the point where they were ready to push - I had never actually been allowed to go into the delivery room. I didn't think they let anyone in there! But when I asked him where Kara was he said she was inside as well. So I just put on the hospital slippers and walked right in. No one seemed to notice or even care. In fact I think they were kind of getting a kick out of seeing two white girls inside. The room has 6 beds all out in the open and there were about 3 nurses wondering around checking on the women. 
  
  Now - just to give a nice clear perspective for anyone who has NOT been in a hospital in the third-world and is picturing some sort of sterile environment with bright lights, lots of doctors in crisp white lab coats and monitors beeping intermittently... maybe even a tv mounted on the wall... this is not that kind of place.  When I say delivery room I mean 6 beds. Plastic covered mattresses without sheets. A single pillow and a blanket folded on the end of each one. Blood and "junk" stained walls and floors with a faint smell of urine and dettol soap lingering in the air. (If you've ever volunteered at any of the missionaries of charity homes in India this description of the scent will be very familiar to you... if you haven't just believe me when I say that it's bad. Unforgetable really.) A trash can sitting at the end of each bed sitting up on a stool in order to catch whatever happens to come out of the women during the birthing process - aside from the baby of course :) Lovely, I know. But I'm trying to be descriptive here.  A metal bed-pan on the floor under the bed. A bathroom attached to the room with no doors - and trails of blood strown around the room.  The sound: lots of screaming. Voices that are saying (in Nepali of course) I'm dying... I'm already dead... I can't do this, and OOOOOOOOUCH that hurts. And variations of those things. No monitors. One IV stand that isn't being used. No instruments around really, just a bed and a floor.  And a desk where the nurses are now sitting drinking tea.  It is also very cold. Mid-November with no heat and cement floors sort of cold.
  
  Sarah is screaming when I get inside, and Kara is standing beside her massaging her back with this look on her face that describes my thoughts exactly (no one cares that we're in HERE! amaaaazing!).  We stand on either side of her bed for about an hour... lots of screaming, lots of rubbing her back. Then the lady in the bed directly across from us is suddenly pushing and next thing you know the nurse walks over and out pops a baby. We were like, ummm... did that just happen?? Baby is handed to someone who takes it out of the room and sits it off to the side for a while. The doctor finishes up with the mom, hands her the baby and walks away.  Lady beside us starts screaming... and lady that just had the baby is wheeled out of the room.  We're still massaging Sarah's back.  Over the next 5 hours we watch as two more women come in - scream for a while - nurses hang out yelling back at them saying, "Hey didn't you know this was gonna hurt? What do you expect, this is the fate of women... deal with it, and while you're at it... be quiet." Sarah is getting REALLY uncomfortable at this point and Kara and I are getting tired. 5 hours earlier she was dialated at 5-6cm... finally the doctor comes to check her again and yep... to our surprise she is now at 5cm. Frustrating.
  
  Eventually she starts telling us she wants to push so we're kind of looking at the nurses and they're like, "well if you feel like pushing then push... we'll just sit here at our desk drinking our tea." So Kara and I (still the only ones standing there with her) are like, "ummm... are we supposed to be watching for something or what? When it finally seems that an eternity has passed the lady in the bed next to us also starts to push. The nurses get up finally and are joking about which baby will appear first. Suddenly both babies are appearing at the same time... and still Kara and I haven't been asked to leave. Just standing there... holding Sarah's hand.  Sarah's baby appears and is completely blue... suddenly the nurses are screaming at her saying, "stop moving... don't push or you'll hurt your baby!" We're a little freaked out, Sarah is writhing around in pain and we notice the cord is around the baby's neck. My heart is beating pretty quick at this point. Everyone is screaming (including the lady who is about at the same point in the bed next to us) and finally the baby is out... still blue but coughing - lots of blood everywhere. That's when the nurse starts yelling a LOT more, asks Kara and I to leave and tells another nurse to call a doctor quick.
  
  We're a little nervous and sit oustide the room for a bit. Finally we're told she needs to have surgery and that we need to go to the blood bank and gets some AB+ blood.  Well the blood bank is NOT located in the hospital... and it's about 2am. "Sake summa chito" is the phrase the doctor used I'm sure... which means... as fast as possible. So we run outside, jump in a taxi, and tell the driver to get us to the blood bank which is about 10 minutes away. We get there and all the lights are off except for one where a guy is sitting. He gets up, unlocks and opens the door and we hand him the paper that says what we need. He replies with, "sorry - we're out. No more AB+ blood available tonight... but we're having a blood drive tomorrow afternoon - should have some by around 2pm." 12 HOURS LATER! Problem. Again, heart is beating kinda fast.
  
  Finally we ask the man what he suggests that we do and he's like, "go back to the hospital and ask them... I don't know." Ummm. Big Problem with a capital P.  We convince him to call another hospital nearby to find out if they have some... no one will answer the phone because it's 2am. The blood bank guy there is probably asleep. Kara and I are discussing our blood types and I'm trying to remember that time in our health class at JBU when we had our blood typed. Was that an A or an O? Can't remember. Yikes. Kara and I sit down on chairs and decide it's time to pray. Eventually the man at the blood bank calls the maternity hospital and they come up with a solution. One pint that had been reserved for another patient could possibly be available. He finds another one that happens to be there. So we have 2 pints.  We pay our 400 ruppees ($5) for the blood, he drops it in a black plastic bag and we're on our way back to the hospital. Hand the blood to the right guy and head up to the OR to wait.  Meanwhile Sarah's husband is sitting in the hallway beaming, oblivious to the gravity of the situation. He just knows that he has a new son. I'm amazed that back home the husband would/should be the one who is the most informed about the birth of their child/status of their wife. Not here apparently.
  
  An hour passes with us sitting on the cold cement stairs trying to stay awake and suddenly Sarah appears semi-concious and is pushed down the hallway on a bed. We follow her to the recovery room which is lined with about a dozen beds and people trying to sleep. Kara is asked to jump onto one of the beds and to help lift Sarah onto it. She is hoisted onto the bed, still caked in dried blood, and the doctor is gone - very little explanation. Just us, Sarah, her husband and an IV in either arm. One normal IV and the other with the blood we had just purchased across town being pumped into her body. The one thing the doctor did say is, "we're gonna need one more pint... and get that one into her fast!" Somehow another pint of blood is located and she's hooked up to that one too. Eventually she becomes hysterical waking up everyone in the room. And I'm left thinking, why is it that in ALL the times I've been in Nepali hospitals - about 3 dozen or so  different times - I've never been with one of the quiet, normal patients? I ALWAYS end up with the one who is screaming and waking everyone up. Perhaps to keep me humble? If so, it does the trick. I'm trying to calm her down while one nurse is yelling,"If you don't shut-up I'm gonna tape your mouth shut."And a second one is asking me, "don't you care about your patient?! clean her up or do something!"
  
  Sarah starts screaming, "don't leave me!" and is clinging to me for dear life. Then yells, "Where am I? Did I already have the baby? Where is the baby? Where is your friend (Kara)? Where are my other kids? Where am I? JESUS forgive me!! Oh, I am all alone... only me and Jesus! Oh LORD! Ah, I am in pain! Where am I? Did I have the baby? Can I have some water? JESUS will forgive me!! Where am I? Where is my baby?" I'm trying to answer her in Nepali over and over again while I'm sure everyone else in the room is being fully entertained. The baby meanwhile has yet to be seen since it was born.
  
  After an hour Kara and I can barely keep our eyes open and are FREEZING cold. It's nearly 4:30 am when I finally ask Sarah's husband, do you think it would be alright if Kara and I went home and got some sleep? He's still just beaming and unaware and is like, "sure no problem." Haha. So we came home and were in bed by about 5:30am.  Kara went back this afternoon to check on Sarah and low and behold, she is fine. Baby is gorgeous - about 6lbs. And Sarah remembers nothing about the whole night. :) The husband... still beaming I'm sure. Not a care in the world.
  
  Wow. Another day.
  
  And, for anyone who made it all the way to the end of this story, here are a few pictures from the orphanage where we have been volunteering. Cute kiddos:
  
   
  
   
  
     
  
   
  
  

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