This is my friend Zara. We met at the hospital, a couple of us went to visit her. Enjoy the photos. These are the women of India.


Zara's sisters. The one on left (I forget her name, ahhh) did all my henna. Fatuma, with the blue scarf, she is 17 and awaiting her marriage in a couple months, she did our arm tat henna.




This is when they served me Bidyiani, three times, I was so full.


The mahindi-ed us (henna) and did our hair. Doesn't Kali's hair look great?


mmmm...henna


All too quickly we had to leave, and once again...burqua-ed up.

this is the world's largest imax theatre.


these are the world's largest 3-d glasses.


this was the world's most thrilling movie to see.

And now, completely unrelated to Avatar...

This week I spent three days in the labour ward welcoming babies with the students. I stand in awe at the end of this week thinking about the foot in that I have into women’s lives because of the favour G*d has on this school to get us in these doors. After processing with a student on Friday, she told me about her English midwife friend who couldn’t believe what she was learning to do, the skills, etc, and I agreed with her and we talked about how cool it is that when G*d calls us, he equips us. We are living testimonies.

As much as I would like to, I often shy away from graphics or too intense of imagery in relation to the labour ward, those stories are better for one on one conversation. That is, seeing how I don’t know my blogging audience and all. Perhaps I should start a separate blog? Kidding. I know I appreciate the details, but I have learned that my language needs to be accessible to all, especially when talking about things pertaining to birth.

With that said, the following is appropriate for all.

Our image of a woman labouring in a hospital with her separate room, having ice chips served to her hourly, the contractions recorded on the monitor are things of luxury and not actually how most women in the world spend their hours labouring. With that said, it is not at all wrong, but not like any of the deliveries we as birth attendants usually are a part of. The women here in India, as well as the women of every other country that I have birth attended in, labour in community, all sitting on their separate-or sometimes the same, bed. Usually there are about eight women in labour in one room at a time, but on an especially busy day, like it was most days this week, there are 10-14. Every once in a while, there are those quiet women that don’t say a word, and before you know it, baby is coming and it isn’t waiting for nobody. One time this week, a woman delivered into her sari and the rest of us were so engrossed into our work with postnatal moms until we heard a crying baby and realized, “it’s too late”. In these situations, although it hasn’t been the best care for the mom, but you can still slap on some new gloves and welcome the baby in the name of J*sus, sing it happy birthday and ask the mom “larki-larka?”, “babu-papa?”, “bathchi-batcha?” and any other way you can remember to say “boy or girl?”. The mother has to respond with the answer of the correct sex of the baby before you can take it to warm it up. If no one is looking, we can keep the baby on mom’s belly, turn off the fans and let a little bit of bonding happen… Sometimes there are no students around and as baby’s don’t wait for nobody, I get the chance to stand with the mom, encourage her to push, smile at her, ask her what her name is, introduce myself and reunite mum and bub. Although we want all the students to get as many opportunities to be a part of conducting deliveries, sometimes they all are busy and in these situations, I am so happy to take part!

On Friday, there was one mom who had been labouring since six am in the labour room, and once they are in there, they are not allowed to eat (for cases of caesarian sections, etc.) and this mom was crying at us, begging us to let her eat. We tried to advocate for her and ask the madam (OBGYN) if we could give her something or if she could get some tea from her family, but she still said no. The mom was so angry with us, she didn’t want us to listen to the baby’s heart, to let us put a line up for her, nothing. We stayed with her and continued to encourage her. Low and behold, at the end of the day, when everyone else was tied up, baby was coming. I went and stood with her and asked a student nurse if she would like to learn to conduct a delivery. I began with guiding the mom in her pushing and recognized she wasn’t progressing well and asked the madam to come. After about 45 minutes of focused pushing, her baby girl was born. Anjana was a new woman after, she cried and thanked us for all of our help and we told her J*sus helped her and then she insisted on exchanging phone numbers. Hopefully we can visit her. These joyful-ending situations with tough beginnings can seem frustrating. Yet, I think of how Jesus is so persistent in standing with us, even when we push him away-kicking and screaming we deny his help, and in the end, we are so thankful, so thankful that he has been there with us through it all. Granted, women usually can’t be held accountable for how they act during labour, but that doesn’t mean G*d can’t teach me through this stuff.
G*d is right there with us in the labour room.

Thanks for reading guys, I hope the details were palatable.

Your friend,
Bekah

feeling the feb.

February, I remember feeling that last year this month went too fast, and again I echo this thought.

Last year, a girl called becca led my outreach until the month of January. She then went back to Perth briefly and then to Vancouver and got engaged and was married before we saw her for our debrief in May. She was a part of staffing the lecture phase this year and then moved to Wollongong . Last week, the pregnant becca and her husband Chris visited our team while they were doing a project here, ahhh friendship. While on our way to get iced coffee, she began sharing with me, “it’s not about the outcome, it’s about the relationship on the way”. Oh how I needed to hear that, to hear it from someone who has been in my shoes with years of experience. That’s why we are here, to meet the women, to share with them in their pain, to learn together as a school. There are tasks, skills, evaluations that of course that need to be ticked off, but those are not to rule me in co-leading the team. The principles of the kingdom are based off of what builds relationship. I once heard a man, (I think I’ve shared this before) who said you can replace the word “sin” with the term “relationship breaker”, that’s how serious G*d is about relationships. My feeble task-orientated self needs to change.



I have been sharing in my blog updates about how the battle between life and death has intensified here. We are not elite to the strongholds of the city, but aware, and thus must stand strong. Just opening your eyes in the morning can be a brawl of lies. We have entered into more fights for our unity, more difficulties with sickness and most of all, more struggles in communication. As a result, we have gone deeper into wor*hipping and inter*eding for this city and recognized our authority because of the name of J*sus.



We have one more month here in India . Staying for only two months is actually such a short time, then again, even four months in Tanzania felt short. We will be heading into the Philippines in my next update. I do have a mailing address here. I can send it to you individually, but through a mass email is slightly insecure.

I want to leave you with a beautiful testimony from earlier in this week. G*d has met us in the hospital. Since the first birth attendants came here seven years ago, we have seen his kingdom begin to advance. There is now a new location/building of the hospital-that gives much more space and is just more livable, there are more doctors-whom we have seen relationships increase with, there is newer equipment-that we have seen give much better care since we have been here…

So here is the story from Consuelo. Consuelo was once a student on the school and then returned back to Texas to receive her accreditation as a midwife there. Since the car accident in Nigeria in 2005, Consuelo has committed to see the school rebuild so she is here for our final month in India- teaching us, working with us at the hospital daily.

The Miracle of Life at the Edge of Death

(Consuelo York, midwife serving with the Birth Attendant School , 2 March 2010)

A lady was laboring today. When she was feeling ready to push one of the other tutors saw that the umbilical cord was coming out before the baby’s head. This is a very dangerous, and often life-taking emergency situation. I was called over, as well as the doctor. I arrived first and checked to see if she had opened enough for the baby to be born, and she had. I maneuvered the baby’s head to take pressure off of the pinched cord so she could get the blood she needed to stay alive.

The doctor arrived and told me that they knew that the cord was coming first and that I should just wait. I asked if the baby was still alive. I knew that if she was, the mother had opened enough to deliver quickly to preserve the baby’s life! I knew that delay would certainly mean death. WE checked and found the baby to have a heart beat; so I commenced with assisting this baby to be born safely. The doctor saw that the baby delivered quickly and revived immediately. Resuscitative measures were not even necessary.

As I entered the newborn room a few minutes later to see the baby, I had such joy that G*d’s hand in this child’s life had preserved her to fulfill her destiny. Yet, I was also aware that sadly her mother seemed not to be delighted to have a female child. So, for my pr*yers over this child, I called her Joy. My prayers to G*d for this child were that she would fulfill her destiny as a child of G*d, He delighting in her life being preserved, and asking that He would cause her to be accepted and loved by her family.

tank you (as said in telagu) for reading.
bless you guys.