Yes that is a word, I swear- I've checked because it sounds so silly to say.
What do you think of when you hear midwife?
I think 2 things: crazy hippies who wear long skirts and have crazy long hair (nice stereotype) and I think I want to be one.
This summer has put a lot of thoughts into my head, a lot that I will be gradually sharing with you, this one thought has definitely been the most prevalent.
I think I want to be a midwife.
That thought is a little terrifying to me, to be honest.
I hate science. I'm not good at it and I have only ever taken one science class in college and that was geology and I hated it. If I'm actually going to do this, I will have to take so much science. I will have to get caught up on all those science classes I was so thankful I didn't have to take (chemistry, biology, anatomy, etc, etc). And then on top of that, I will have to take 2-3 years of classes on how to be a midwife.
That's a lot more school than I ever thought I would want to do.
But I think I may want to do this.
Why you ask? I'm so glad that you did.
Because in Afghanistan, 133 babies per 1000 births die (according to UNICEF).
Because in Afghanistan, a woman faces a 1 in 11 chance of dying in childbirth. That means that for every 11 women that give birth, 1 will die. I can easily name 11 women that I know who have given birth in the last year or will be giving birth soon- I'm sure you can too. Imagine one of them dead.
Because in Ethiopia, 94% of women give birth without any sort of professional help. In the UK, 1% of women give birth without help, and I'm sure that is a problem that they are desperate to fix.
Because in India, a woman died on the road in front of the land where I will one day live, trying to walk to the city that is an hour away by car, so that she could give birth.
Here's a fact that boggles my mind- in the UK there are 749,000 births a year and 26,825 midwives. That is 1 midwife for every 28 births. I don't know if that figure includes OB/GYNs, but I would think that those wouldn't be included, meaning there are even more professionals per birth. In Rwanda, on the other hand, there are 400,000 births a year and there are 40 midwives. In the entire country. That is 1 midwife for every 10,000 births.
Could you let that sink in for a moment.
By the way- most of these facts are coming from this BBC article.
Worldwide, about 1000 women die every day giving birth.
In India, the infant mortality rate is 52 deaths for every 1000 births. 254 women die for every 100,000 births.
I am not ok with that. I hope that you are not ok with that. This makes me mad.
I am not ok with women dying all around the world from childbirth.
And it makes me mad when we start talking about how bad the US health care is because our infant mortality is 6 for every 1000 births. Obviously, that is not good, but we need to see the rest of the world.
This world is broken, but we can help make it less broken.
We know things about how our bodies work that women living in remote villages in Afghanistan, India and Rwanda have no way of knowing.
We have access to education and health care that these women couldn't even dream of.
So what are we going to do with it?
I don't know what all this means for you. I don't know what all this means for me. I desperately want to be in India. Adding this schooling could add 3 more years onto my time here. Could I wait 5 years?
I'm sitting in my bed and just looked up at a picture of sweet Heena and thought, can I wait 5 years to be with you? 2 is hard enough.
And so I'm thinking through all this. I will be praying through it. Is this really what God wants for me?
I'm asking that you think through this with me. All my friends out there in the nursing school/ heading to med school, could this be where God wants you to serve?
We need people in health care here, but I think we can safely say that they need them more.
Will you think about this with me?
And also- this is totally part of orphan care also. how many of those 1,000 women that died today in childbirth do you think had 1, 2, or 3 kids already at home. Who is going to care for them now?
Maybe we can stop orphans from being made. Wouldn't that be amazing?!
What do you think of when you hear midwife?
I think 2 things: crazy hippies who wear long skirts and have crazy long hair (nice stereotype) and I think I want to be one.
This summer has put a lot of thoughts into my head, a lot that I will be gradually sharing with you, this one thought has definitely been the most prevalent.
I think I want to be a midwife.
That thought is a little terrifying to me, to be honest.
I hate science. I'm not good at it and I have only ever taken one science class in college and that was geology and I hated it. If I'm actually going to do this, I will have to take so much science. I will have to get caught up on all those science classes I was so thankful I didn't have to take (chemistry, biology, anatomy, etc, etc). And then on top of that, I will have to take 2-3 years of classes on how to be a midwife.
That's a lot more school than I ever thought I would want to do.
But I think I may want to do this.
Why you ask? I'm so glad that you did.
Because in Afghanistan, 133 babies per 1000 births die (according to UNICEF).
Because in Afghanistan, a woman faces a 1 in 11 chance of dying in childbirth. That means that for every 11 women that give birth, 1 will die. I can easily name 11 women that I know who have given birth in the last year or will be giving birth soon- I'm sure you can too. Imagine one of them dead.
Because in Ethiopia, 94% of women give birth without any sort of professional help. In the UK, 1% of women give birth without help, and I'm sure that is a problem that they are desperate to fix.
Because in India, a woman died on the road in front of the land where I will one day live, trying to walk to the city that is an hour away by car, so that she could give birth.
Here's a fact that boggles my mind- in the UK there are 749,000 births a year and 26,825 midwives. That is 1 midwife for every 28 births. I don't know if that figure includes OB/GYNs, but I would think that those wouldn't be included, meaning there are even more professionals per birth. In Rwanda, on the other hand, there are 400,000 births a year and there are 40 midwives. In the entire country. That is 1 midwife for every 10,000 births.
Could you let that sink in for a moment.
By the way- most of these facts are coming from this BBC article.
Worldwide, about 1000 women die every day giving birth.
In India, the infant mortality rate is 52 deaths for every 1000 births. 254 women die for every 100,000 births.
I am not ok with that. I hope that you are not ok with that. This makes me mad.
I am not ok with women dying all around the world from childbirth.
And it makes me mad when we start talking about how bad the US health care is because our infant mortality is 6 for every 1000 births. Obviously, that is not good, but we need to see the rest of the world.
This world is broken, but we can help make it less broken.
We know things about how our bodies work that women living in remote villages in Afghanistan, India and Rwanda have no way of knowing.
We have access to education and health care that these women couldn't even dream of.
So what are we going to do with it?
I don't know what all this means for you. I don't know what all this means for me. I desperately want to be in India. Adding this schooling could add 3 more years onto my time here. Could I wait 5 years?
I'm sitting in my bed and just looked up at a picture of sweet Heena and thought, can I wait 5 years to be with you? 2 is hard enough.
And so I'm thinking through all this. I will be praying through it. Is this really what God wants for me?
I'm asking that you think through this with me. All my friends out there in the nursing school/ heading to med school, could this be where God wants you to serve?
We need people in health care here, but I think we can safely say that they need them more.
Will you think about this with me?
And also- this is totally part of orphan care also. how many of those 1,000 women that died today in childbirth do you think had 1, 2, or 3 kids already at home. Who is going to care for them now?
Maybe we can stop orphans from being made. Wouldn't that be amazing?!
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