A typical birth...

Things you will need...
First off, a laboring woman thats a must!
diapers
a change of clothes for you and baby
betadine
baby oil
bleach
laundry detergent
sterile gloves
baby soap
pads
an adult diaper
and a couple of burb rags/ or receiving blankets
newspaper
This is on an official sheet that we give the women at prenatals when they're about 38 weeks

HOW it's done...
We lay the newspaper under the birthstool to catch the mess and it really works well and keeps the mess contained. pads to guard the perineum...The receiving blankets are used to help rub the baby while he/she is recovering on mums tummy and also to clean up mums after the birth. We use the betadine to cut the cord. Sterile gloves to catch the baby and baby oil to clean him/ her off and hand back to mum...and then we mop the floor with the bleach and wash any of the dirty laundry with the detergent and last but not least we send mum home in an adult diaper...6-10 hours later

What your bill will come to...
an average birth at the clinic costs around $18
this will be for things like oxytocin, lidocaine, a supply of methenamic acid and amoxicillin to take at home...erythromycin for babies eye's and a vit K shot too

up at nite with fever...

so somebody said something dumb like I'm going to get hemorrhagic fever and now I can't sleep...the enns' paranoia and feeling that I am 'very, very, ill' (Persuasion) is now giving me insomnia so i will be a real pill tomorrow morning! But I was given the week off so now I can rest and keep myself up at nite, paranoid about my fever...sheesh...and since my parents tell my I'm quite inspirational when i have a fever (i inspired them to drive 4 hours at 10pm or so to get to auntie clara when i was little) I also thought I'd do alittle creative writing just to test the theory...

If I was a flower...no thats too lame.

Whatever happened to tapioca pudding?...this is a truely sad and significant issue but will wait for a less inspirational time to be waxed upon...

life is...
terribly impatient, never fast enough
always rushing forward, just to back up
sitting in the middle, sleeping on the crack
full of hugs and kisses, and some hearty wacks
never 'made to order', always fits just right
full of nasty rodents, in my ceiling tonight
illusive and shadowed, tangible, 'in sight'
greats us every morning, chases till night
leaves us where we start,
with nothing but a heart
crashing on a shore, we've never been before
life is just a breath, walking towards a rest

okay, now my head is fuzzy... A lady told me that single people get really eccentric in their old age...i wish i could have replied or said something back but i didn't...so i just thought of something...married people have twice the issues...I'm glad I got that out...release it, release it...

oh and the midwvies said if a fork drops a woman is coming to visit.

oh and since i have pimples i am in love...been in luv a loooooooooooooong time.

don't you have better things to do than read this?seriously!

cheeky-girls

A cheeky girl with a penchant for stealing footwear...
beautiful brown eyed babe's...
Friends...
finished an almost 60 hour shift this evening. I literally begged the girls to spell me off for a bit, it's not that I mind working, it's that I really don't like dealing with labors and babies without my friends. Practicing midwifery where situations can get scary and it can be a life or death call, I learned that i like to have people i can trust around me during birth, I think I can say I learned i generally like having people around 24/7...not that I'm always 'the life of the party' but I like people. I need people.
At the clinic all the midwives bring their kids to the clinic and work as they put them down for naps or play 'we are the cheeky' girls every morning at 6am to entertain them...while the rest of us get to enjoy the disco music and laugh ourselves awake.
Maybe thats the biggest surprise about this whole trip...I luv people, any time of the day or nite...if you just give me a couple of seconds in the morning...
And getting to be around when a new little life takes the very first breath is pretty stinkin cool too.
But mostly finding that I am so blessed to have a strong family who supports me, as well as living this crazy time with some of the best people God could put in my life. Friendship.
I know somewhere mums is saying she new I had it in me somewhere:) but at the same time sometimes when you look back at a stretch of your life you try and find those people who made it easy to wake up every morning smiling, or someone to run home too, or someone to take your side even though your being a 'bit' emotional...well you can have some pretty lean stretches...but this time is not one of them. Today I am surrounded with prayer and love and even friends right here...stink, I could wake Linds up right now just to prove my point but then she might hurt me...but I know she loves me.
and yes, life is usually a dramatic spin of complete bordum and utter chaos...so grab a friend and maybe put on some disco music...it'll do ya good

games nite

I have recently discovered that most people I meet in the Phils here, love games as I do...it has been great! Last nite me and the roomie went over to the Wassell's and played settlers, spoons, scum and dutch blitz till midnite. So stinkin fun. I would like to tell people that I did win the dutch blitz but was the first one out in spoons. However, my roomie represented for the midwives quite well and was in the final round.


Can I just tell you how great mango shakes are. WE get one almost every day off, made by the housekeeper who is staying in the house while the family is away. House-sitting was never so first-class before...and just to get you really jealous she insists on cleaning our bathrooms for us. Seriously how good can the 'good life' get? But I still do the laundry. I am even tempted to ask for hers too...we'll see about that!

the birth blob

So it's 3am in the morning and I am wiping down the birth mat in the bathroom after a birth and I am thinking, i am awake in the phils cleaning up after a birth with a cockroach. Then i stepped on it. And then I squealed and felt dumb...cause it's 3am and I'm being noisy and it's only a cockroach, I've just caught a baby and delivered a placenta and done all these seriously intense things and I'm squealing over a cockroach. So then i went back in the room and did the postpartum watch.


Oh, in the news...
Dianna has been dead for 10 years. And her sons are putting on a concert.
Billy Graham's wife died.
It's Father's Day soon...Dad I luv you!
random thoughts...
I am taking quizzes with my roomie...blogthings check it out...
apparently I am cut out to be a factory worker...seriously, If only I would have known!
oh and then I tried to make chocolate chip cookie dough cause who likes to be told they were ment to work on an assembly line and it tasted terrible...I think the brown sugar is responsible...so now it's in the garbage and I am really considering becoming a factory worker...there are alot of clothing outlet factories here...

some good ole days and a goodbye

This is Grace and her baby boy. She gave birth while I was away on holidays in April with mums and Dad. In May I went and visited her and saw the wee baby. Actually he was almost 8lbs when he was born-for a Philipino baby that is HUGE. His mum weighs about 100lbs pregnant so to me...it is a miracle and also you just can't help but saying, aiyah!
Turns out the girl next to her is her younger sister and i ended up doing a prenatal on her while I was visiting, we had a great time together-they remind me of my sisters-good times. Anyway i thought you should be updated on Grace.
Below is me and my birth partner for a majority of my birthing experience...we haven't been working together that long but when we did it was intense and busy and very rewarding to be doing things with someone who became a 'kindred spirit'. Now Linds is going back to Winnipeg and I will be trying to find another partner or going it alone until I finish up.

My sad face

life is a...blob?

Well, vaca is almost up...Naga and rice feilds and sun and a wake-boarding resort and natural hot spring will soon give way to concrete...shacks...malls...and babies:)
Not feeling ready to go back into the smog-but I have been wine and dined here in naga...fried chicken, brownies, pumpkin pie...ribs and well every good thing:) I always talk about food because food is special...
Oh had a walk down memory lane playing the game of life...what a game...I got married though...and had a big convo with Koleen about how I should be praying everyday for marriage...and then i said well, I think it's just nice to leave it in God's hands...and then she was like, well you have to make sure you let God know how much you want it...and then i went, "I feel it's more a trust and wait and see issue" and a be content with life this moment issue...and then she was like, i think you need to be more proactive! and then I said, thats a facial product I use!...and then we talked of other things...(the last part didn't happen but the whole marriage talk did...I am 25, I think people feel they need to remind me I'm single...)
But seriously it was nice to talk, and talk and talk about missions, church planting, people and then to hear about other things than birth, and get out of my own bubble.
So anyway, vaca with missionaries turns into touring the site of a huge mudslide and disaster instead of going to the beach. Singing in church, cause I'm David Enns' daughter...thanks Dad! Eating wonderful food. Having my clothes washed for me every day. And drinking refridgerated water...cold! yummy. Talking and praying and sharing and laughing and games...it has been so fun.

Blob it up!

Okay, so i am recovered from my weekend i think. And then i realized that the Frenches (missionaries with WT) bought me a ticket for this weekend to visit them in Naga. So off I fly for another time. I am excited but alittle scared too. I will be speaking at their house churches, they meet at nite. Nervous! my last public speaking engagement did not go so well...
I think it should be super fun but I have shift the nite before I go...and I'm like-please no babies, i want to sleep so i can be awake for my time in Naga...what kind of midwife wishes for no babies...so now I am processing thru that:) here in the phils we process alot. verbally mentaly and of course the written way:) So really you could all receive councellor degree's with me as the guinea pig, just for wading thru this blob with me.
Okay so June 8-11 I'm in Naga and then come back and work at the clinic.

long time no blob...

someday I will get over how cool my grandma's nickname for my blog is but until that time you might have to be reminded about what a cool grandma i really do have...seriously, who thinks of blob...only the funniest grandma ever!
Okay, so i have been at the clinic for 5 days straight while my commrades at arms went on holidays...can I tell you how retarded I am to have sent them off thinking I was so strong...
okay so in a nut shell...
-2 primagravida's births...which means long labor watching and alot of back rubbing and hip massaging and encouraging and just telling them, "no, don't give up...you can do it" but as it turns out both births happened to be continuities and so it was very rewarding to know these girls a bit and be with them as they suffered to bring their little one's into the world....oh and i was asked to be godmother of little Kaizhen Mia!!! She is so stinkin cute!
-one more sutering adventure...I just pray that if God is big enough to birth a baby thru it then He can be big enough to heal it back up properly...I just need to get a few threads in there and speak healing over them....
-4 catches out of 6 births...one last nite so i am running on two hours of sleep...
-eating liver, chicken and beef with the midwives...chicken was definately better...but I still wouldn't chose to eat liver...
-catching two babies within 3 hours of eachother in the same room...first the left side and then, turn around and catch the right...
-getting invited out to supper by Steve's old soccer coach on wednesday...which means free food and good food...ah sweetness...
-discovering that the house I am staying at now-the cousin was in Steve's class and she is married now, and so maybe they knew the whole time who I was and that is why we are living here...thanks Steve...apparently Chiling, our Filipina housekeeper here went to the funeral and saw me there...so we know eachother.
-it has been comforting to be taken in by all these people who remember my bro...steve's soccer coach even said i remind him of steve...that I have some mannerisms like him. and it made me feel so good. Even if i forget somethings Steve did or just can't see his face so clearly anymore-knowing that other people can see a glimpse of him in me was pretty stinkin cool.
-I hope you heard that Steve, you look like a girl:)
-can you tell I have had 2 hours of sleep...
thanks for praying and reading and just being friends. I am so rich to have friends and family who read my little blob...