Humility. Have you ever felt like it’s when you’ve lost yourself completely that you truly find yourself? This week has been one of the hardest, in terms of my mind and heart. I actually only did one day of “Midwifery”, but some how or another, every one of the days held some pivotal moment of humility and brokenness. Last Sunday, I was overwhelmed with a feeling of “doneness”. I was simply done. For those of you who have done “missions” for any length of time will probably know this feeling and understand, for those of you who think I was born to do this, that I eat, sleep and breath to be a missionary in a developing nation, this feeling of “doneness” may surprise you. I do love India, I do love developing nations, but it is hard, and some days the only thing I want in the entire world is to board a plane and fly anywhere west. Fly to places I understand, where things aren’t so difficult, where I don’t see such hard things, where I know the language, and where the weather isn’t as hot as the food that makes me sweat, places more like home.

Sunday I was bombarded with these thoughts, these feelings. As I was going down to get water, I fell down the uneven, slippery stairs- the “Indian stair death trap”. I couldn’t breathe under the pain, and arose from the ground somewhat shocked. I didn’t know what to do, so I walked to the kitchen trying not to cry. The cook (bless her beautiful heart) stopped me on the way and tried to feed me with her hands whatever on earth she was eating. I kindly declined, fighting back the tears that so desperately wanted to leap out from my eyes. My back and my shoulder seemed to be groaning in pain themselves as I tried so hard to stop the signals to my brain that I had just fallen down the stairs. I walked slowly, shocked, back to my room. As I opened the door the flood gates opened and I began to cry. “I fell down the stairs…” I told my roommates, probably in somewhat of a pathetic whimper. When I said it, I cried even harder as my pride was almost as bruised as my back. Thoughts began to overwhelm my mind, thoughts of home, of giving up, of foolishness, and embarrassment, hopelessness and pain. We looked at the damage, I had two stair size marks the length of my back on my lower and upper back, both swollen, with patches of broken skin on the top bit. Everyone else went out to dinner that night, I stayed home.

Monday I was supposed to be in Admissions, but as walking was a difficult chore, I stayed back on the prayer team. I was somewhat refreshed, as I poured my heart out in prayer for this city, for the hospital, for this nation. In my prayers, I remembered why I was here. I was filled. I felt the grace of God wash over me.

Tuesday Michaela’s mom (visiting from B.C. Canada), Michaela and I were supposed to go on a house visit, but the man who planned to come to pick us up didn’t come. I ended up talking to our translators for about an hour, finding that I was falling in love with Indians again. We were able to discuss, and laugh at the very things I find so frustrating in this country. Laughing is sometimes the most powerful medicine. There is perspective in laughter that you cannot find in anything else. Because the house visit didn’t work out, Michaela’s mom took us to a fancy Italian restaurant in the “nice” part of town, and I had the nicest, most western meal I’ve had in six months. I felt God’s grace washing over me. After lunch we went and bought saris for woman in the slums, then went back to Bev’s hotel and drank tea in an AIR CONDITIONED room. As I sat there I felt God’s grace wash over me; a small break from the madness. That evening we celebrated becca’s 25 birthday at a park near the lake, played games, played with water balloons, and ate Subway.

Wednesday I was on prayer team again, but had to accompany Darcy to a meeting, and ended up making 13 welcome cards for the Discipleship Training School that just arrived from Perth. I was lost in the art of card making, and felt the grace of God was over me. That evening I was humbled again by a avoidable miscommunication. Broken in ways words couldn’t express fully. Humbled, fully and completely broken. I wept under the weight of humility, under the raw feeling of brokenness. When I felt as if I could not grow any worse as a person, becca and Hollie prayed for me, a prayer that blessed me, and healed me. As they prayed I felt the grace of God wash over me. I felt it as well as later that night when Michaela invited me to say in the hotel with her for the last night. As the warm water washed over me in my first real shower in four months, it felt as if it was the love of Jesus washing over me, reminding me that I am forgiven, reminding me that I am loved no matter the circumstance, reminding me that he is faithful.

The next morning in our prayer and worship time we have every morning, I broke. I broke under the mix of brokenness, humility, healing, love, and faithfulness that had so bombarded me. I wept and I wept as I prayed out the faithfulness and worthiness of my beautiful Saviour. In the midst of the tears and the prayers I felt as if I had lost myself completely in the presence of this amazing God. However, in loosing myself, I found myself. This is who I am, broken, humble, desperately in love, and simply undone. This is who I want to be, forever. This is who I am so far from being much of the time, but who I want to be.

Thursday I delivered babies 19, and 20. Samson David, and Adam Aften. I have now delivered 20 babies. It was a day confused with joy and sadness. I assisted with two IUDs, (Intrauterine deaths), delivering babies words could not describe even if I wanted to attempt it. As we delivered the second one, horribly deformed and macerated, I remembered humility. I remembered my own weakness as this broken child was birthed into the world lifeless. In the face of such a brutal reality, nothing and everything makes sense. All I could do was lean on the strength I’ve learned this week I am desperately dependant upon. Samson and Adam, my saving graces, beautifully perfect baby boys. Life in the face of death. The madams asked me to do more that afternoon than they have asked me to do in the three months we’ve been working there. Despite the fact that I was somewhat overwhelmed, drawing medicines, changing IVs, drawing blood… it felt good to be trusted, it felt good to finally feel like a team. I remembered when we were told we could only observe, and I was overwhelmed by the faithfulness of God.

Friday we did an orientation with the DTS that just arrived from Perth. About all of them are between 17- 19, fresh faced, just out of high school, and about the cutest things you’ve ever seen. We shared about our city. As we shared I began to realize that Hyderabad really has become my home. I’ll have lived here longer than I’ve lived anywhere since May 2005. Despite my “doneness”, I unknowingly have made this place my home. In humility and brokenness, I realized that He is worth every moment. He is faithful, He is good. He is worthy of every knee bowing, every tongue confessing, in every tribe and in every nation that He is Love, He is Life, He is God.

This week could not have been fuller, or have gone faster. It was intense to say the least. Tuesday I was in admissions. In the morning while the doctor was doing an exam on an 8 week pregnant woman who was bleeding, the sac holding the baby came right out in her hand. It was perfectly intact, and you could see the tiny little baby, perfect for its age, the size of a kidney bean. However, it looked very much like a baby, even at 8 weeks old. It is very rare to see such a thing, so while every one was gawking at it, and taking pictures at the mother's feet, I went up to her head, and stroked her hair as she cried. Even at 8 weeks, she felt the loss. I've seen still born after still born, but I believe I felt the loss of this tiny 8 week fetus more than some of those full term. Why, I'm not sure, but I felt it none the less.

A short time passed, and the slowness of the morning was broken by a panic driven stretcher, carrying a woman with IVs and an airway. She was gasping, and unconscious. The doctor tried for a blood pressure reading on one arm, and asked me to look on the other. I couldn't get a reading, nor could she. We searched for a pulse, nothing on her wrists, we used the Doppler on her left breast, we found one, but it was slow and faint. As I held the oxygen mask up to her face, over the airway, she stopped gasping, while her pulse grew more and more faint till it was simply gone. Some resuscitation was done, but it was no use. She was gone. The defeat that comes over a room when someone dies is indescribable. This girl was two years younger than me, 22 weeks pregnant with her first baby, the baby was gone as well, and had been for a few days. I tried to pray that she would be raised from the dead, but somehow, bewilderment got the best of my faith; I just stood there dumbfounded, and prayed for peace. Her father came in, he began to weep. Through tears he sang out Hindu prayers. He would touch her feet, and turn away as if the sight of her was too much; bury his face in his handkerchief, and continue to weep and sing. Her husband came in and wept, her mother and wept, one man just hung onto the arm of the woman's husband, as if the couldn't stand in the face of reality. As the weeping persisted, I covered her exposed breast, where minutes before we had found a heart beat. We removed the airway and IV line, we smoothed the wrinkles in her sari, and I closed her eyes. For the first time, I looked at her face, unobstructed by the airway. She was beautiful… two years younger than me. This is the second woman I have seen die here in India.

Right as we were leaving for the day a little girl about 10- 11 years old came in with her mother and a police officer. She needed an exam and swabs taken, as they claimed someone had tried to rape her. I stroked her tiny little arm, and prayed for peace.

I spent Wednesday and Friday observing at a private hospital near our hostel. It was so refreshing to see what health care is supposed to be like. Clean, kind, thorough. I was able to watch a delivery, the first one I've cried at. It was beautiful. At our hospital, the woman is by herself, as the labour room is just bed next to bed, next to bed, due to the high volume of patients. It would be chaotic, if any attendants were allowed in. But I feel as if for the last 3 months I have been watching incomplete births. This woman's husband was there, and it was one of the most beautiful things I have ever witnessed. It was when the baby gave her first little cry, half way out, and the husband buried his face in his wife's chest, all three of them crying, mother, father and baby. The vulnerability, innocence, excitement and joy of first time parents is amazing. I watched my sixth Cesarean Section as well. It was much more enjoyable than in Egypt, although I am thankful for the opportunity to have seen so many there. This was more like art, where as in Egypt I felt it was more like a massacre. We were blessed to be able to shadow one of the most amazing women I've ever met. She loves what she does, and is simply brilliant. It was wonderful to be able to glean from her, even when her quizzes on Polyhydramnios threw me through a loop. It was a wonderful two days.

On Thursday I was back in the labour room, after a long week and a half. There was a woman in labour who was a G7 P4 A2 L2 D2. Translated it means she was on her 7^th pregnancy. She had had 4 vaginal deliveries, 2 abortions, 2 living children, and 2 children that had died after 3 years. I wanted to cry as I read through her history. I went to her bed, hoping to make this a good experience for her, but I found that I was no help. She hated me. I couldn't monitor her baby, I couldn't take her vitals, she hit me away, and yelled at me. At first I thought, there is no way I can A) deliver this baby B) handle this woman for the next however many hours. But I just stood by her until I worked up enough courage, then began to softly rub her back. She closed her eyes and took a break between contractions. I stayed by her until the woman at the bed across from her looked as if she would deliver. As I was waiting for the other woman to deliver, Hollie called me over again to the "impossible woman" telling me the baby was coming. And sure enough, there was hair. The baby was out in a few minutes, a beautiful little girl, my 18^th delivery. As soon as she was out, it was as if someone switched women on me. The woman who once yelled at me stroked and kissed my hand, "Thanks. Thanks. Thanks," she said in the best English she could. She later told the student nurse, "I was so angry, but they didn't get angry…" It was one of my favorite deliveries, peaceful, calm, and with a beautiful outcome. I named her Halenah Lindsey. Due to poor skin integrity, the woman tore, and as I was suturing her, the power went out. I had to finish a stitch using the light from a cell phone. I usually sweat heaps while suturing, but this little circumstance made it just ridiculous.

There was an incident at the hospital in the middle of the week, where they found an attendant of one of the patients hanging from a tree. The hospital says it was suicide, the family claimed a hospital staff member murdered the woman after she witnessed them trying to swap babies. There is a lot of fear about baby swapping here, as most people desire males. It remains a mystery, I have my thoughts, but mostly I am concerned for the Superintendent of the hospital. There was a protest outside of her office, where people smashed potted plants, and chanted. We stayed towards the back of the hospital till our shift was done, and the commotion died down. It's been a wild week.

So many ups and downs, I have a few more stories, as well, but I'll leave you with this. Thank you for your faithfulness in reading every week. It blesses me to share my life. I love you all so much.

Mother Teresa's Sisters of Charity Home for the Dying and Destitute... It was when I had elderly women on both sides of me, holding and kissing my hands, three young children on my lap, caressing my arms saying, "kite!" there speech kissed with the sweetness of there own language. Ahead of me was a developmentally disabled young woman singing the same five lines of a song over and over with a beautiful stiff dance somewhat resembling a wooden soldier. I was kissed a thousand times that day, by lips that have seen far more days than mine. Kissing and singing was kindly interrupted by loads of freshly washed bucket laundry awaiting a place on the line to dry in the Indian sun. I gladly helped lift the heavy tin bucket from the deformed hands of the young woman carrying it. I worked along side a beautiful young woman, a resident here, possibly dying tomorrow, but that day, she was alive and working with me. We rang out countless amounts of fabric, drenching my hot feet with cool water. I began to understand the signs made to me to communicate one thought or another, I began to become a part of the community. It was as if culture, ethnicity, age, colour, and language held no power. The fact that they were dying didn't matter, for I was dying too. And in those treasured moments, we were all alive. Mine seemed to be so much brighter that day. Brighter than it has been for a long while. I "drip fed" a woman glucose and water. She was having test done to define the problem, but she looked as if she was wasting due to either AIDS, or some sort of cancer. Her tiny shell of a body was wrapped in a blanket, revealing only her shaved head, butchered. Her cheek bones were high, her eyes sunken, her teeth seemingly too big for her shrunken mouth. Each swallow she took was a chore, and I struggled to grasp the world she must be living in. Even though we were sharing the same moment, I understood that I would never be able to grasp her thoughts. As we left that day I began to weep. Not tears of sorrow so much as tears of life. I was overwhelmed by the gift of life, the gift of love, the gift of the old, and the new. The gift of the tired, and the gift of the dying.



The rest of the week I remained at home. I was sick. Nothing to be compared to the saints I visited on Monday, mind you, but enough to wipe me out of the week's schedule. So alas, no babies delivered... But maybe more importantly, I felt that God really spoke to me in my weakness this week. Even through watching "Marry Poppins". I have eight weeks remaining in India. I am excited to see all that can happen in eight weeks. They will not be wasted. Not when the goal is love. My goal is love. It has to be, with out it, I'm just dying. With it, I am alive.


We had some fun this week practicing suturing. Lisa turned thirty this week, we celebrated at a beautiful cafe together. Here are some pictures documenting my beautiful family here. I can hardly believe I only have eight more weeks of there company. That's enough to break my
heart...

Yesterday as I drove to the village, my eyes drank in the trees, the bright pink and yellow flowers. I gulped in “fresh air” for the first time in four months. For as far as my eyes could see, there was only land. Not a single building, not a single person. Just land. I felt the hour long bus ride could never have been long enough. I wanted to keep driving, forever. Peace. But when we finally got to the village, I was happy we were there. We were able to do a teaching, and some antenatal checks on 13 pregnant women. These women are from a tribe called the Banjaras. Their traditional dress is amazing, very bright colours, lots of layered skirts, shirts and scarves, white bangles all the way up their arms, huge nose rings in each nostril, big earrings, necklaces, anklets, the whole bit. I always admire them at the hospital, and was very honored to visit the place they call home. The simple life style was so refreshing. As we walked down the dirt road back to the highway, past fields of rice patties, and straw huts, I realized it was the closest thing to “quite” I had experienced in ages. I wanted to close my eyes and enjoy the beauty of stillness, but I couldn’t for fear I’d rob them of the beautiful landscape.

As I was taking in the stillness of the countryside, the others were in the labour room. I came home to hear that we’d delivered eight more babies (that puts us now at 222 babies delivered since January), and seen a resurrection. As the story goes, one of our girls was monitoring the baby during labour, and found the heart beat strong and steady. She went away on some errand, and returned to find that the woman had delivered a dead baby. Apparently the episiotomy had been cut too soon, and the baby had been in the birth canal to long. The hospital staff deemed it “still born”, however, two of my teammates had gotten our baby resuscitation bag, and were relentlessly trying to get a heart beat. Then after five minutes, they found one. They continued, two working with the baby, two praying in the background. There was a crowd of student nurses, and a few student doctors watching this valiant attempt at saving a life. When the hospital staff was ready to put the baby in a metal try, and set him on the floor, as they daily do with still borns, our girls pressed on. At fifteen minutes, he took a little breath, and they continued. Then after 35 minutes, he was back. He was alive. The pediatrician came down and said, he was “good”. They said the atmosphere changed after that in the labour room. The dead had risen, and the tears had flowed. The doctors said “Thank you”, the madam said, “God bless you”. My God is a God of life. I think all of us, Christian, Hindu, and Muslim, all understood that a bit better yesterday, as we all witnessed a miracle. Together.

I visited Lauryn Anne, and her mother again this week. It was really wonderful as this time we brought an interpreter. The mother said she’d been at the hospital that Tuesday and had looked all over for me. She also said that since I told her I’d return, she waited for me everyday for two weeks. It was in that moment that I realized, we are not just delivering babies here, we are unknowingly changing lives. I feel so unworthy.

I delivered a baby this week that was full term, but weighed only 1.3 kgs (2.86 pounds). Her chart said they suspected Intrauterine Growth Retardation. (IUGR). The scan estimated she was only the size of a woman 22 weeks pregnant. I had my reservations about doing this delivery, however the head was coming, and out she came, tiny, into my welcoming hands. They rushed her off to the newborn room as I delivered the placenta. After the mother was all taken care of, I went to do a newborn exam. There she lay in the metal holding beds, tiny, pink, and wrinkly. The hat we'd put on her, tiny as it was, overtook her delicate little head. I habitutally call babies “Monkey”, but felt it almost inappropriate in this case. Instead I called her Katie Pollyanna. My beautiful little girl, baby number 17.

I’ve been overwhelmingly tired this week. It’s as if the last nine months have finally caught up with me. We’ve been given many new and exciting opportunities this week, many outside of the hospital. We have begun working in different villages, focusing more on house visits, and being out in the community. This is very exciting for me. Last week I found that two months seemed so long, now I find that two months seems short. I can’t imagine only having two more months to do checks on the woman in the villages or, two more months helping at Mother Teresa’s home for the dying and destitute. It feels as though we’ve just entered into a season ripe with fruit and bursting with opportunity. Perhaps it’s just God knowing that it’s exactly what we need to finish strong. Renew me Jesus, my strength, my love, and my heart for this nation.

May you all be blessed, each one of you, by the love and life of Jesus Christ.

This week began in admissions. I was able to do insert a cannula, take blood pressures, and do my first vaginal examination on a woman before she was fully dilated. I love admissions because I’m constantly asked to do things that give me butterflies and make my hands clam up instantly. The labour room has slowly but surly become a “comfortable place”. I still get surges of anxiousness and energy pounding through my body when I am about to do a delivery, but it’s different, it’s more familiar. Where as in admissions I am doing things I haven’t gotten to do as regularly as deliveries. Like assessing a pelvis for delivery, or checking dilation of a cervix. It is wonderful to feel so vulnerable, so hungry to learn, and instantly humbled. After I finished my examination, I told the doctor my “findings”, she had recorded the same. I was amazed, I did it. The rest of the afternoon consisted of Shannon delivering a baby on one of the back beds smashed against the wall. Meanwhile, the doctor and I where struggling to get a cannula in this woman’s arm. To picture this properly, you need to imagine a tiny, four foot something woman, with dark skin, and big white teeth squirming, kicking, flailing her arms any and every direction they would fly. So, finding a vein, and inserting a needle into this vein was no easy task. The doctor successfully got it in, and walked away to accomplish a task more important, leaving me to secure the cannual in place. “Plaster! Plaster!” I yelled to the student nurses indicating I needed some tape. They sweetly ran off in all directions to meet my request. I watched as the newly inserted cannula flailed every which way along with this tiny, brown arm. The small plastic tube in her vein began to slowly creep out. I caught her arm in mid swing, and held on with all my strength. “Mama, mama!” A student nurse handed me the tape, I tried desperately to secure the cannula, as I did this I peered through her legs to see the baby’s head half out. The cannula seemed like the last thing I should be concerned about. But, I taped it down none the less, real tight. A baby girl was born only seconds later, tiny just like her mother. The woman tore, not surprisingly, as she was so tense and kicking every which way. I was asked to suture. Now, this was my third time suturing, and to be honest it hasn’t quite grown on me. I hear it only gets better with experience, and even becomes enjoyable once you get the hang of how to hold and maneuver everything, but for now, it makes me sweat. I felt more pressure in admissions to accomplish this quickly as beds are in much more need in admissions than they are in the labour room. I stitched and stitched, and stitched. Finally, I was finished, and I was humbled. There is nothing like suturing to remind you that you are still but a student.

Tuesday on prayer team, Shannon and I bought oranges and gave them to beggars on the way to the hospital, and gave candy canes sent in a Christmas package to Becca to little street kids. For a moment, I felt like we were all the same, and as if, the next time I was begging, they would do the same for me. For a moment, I understood family, I understood community. For a moment I realized that we are apart of something so much greater than what we currently understand, and I was blessed.

Wednesday I was in the Newborn Room, where I held and prayed for heaps of babies. I have grown to really enjoy washing, drying, and talking to these babies, untouched by the things of this world. I asked one what it was like, to know purity. They are so soft, each one so different, yet so much the same. There were a few stillborns, born earlier in the day, kept in trays on the ground as they usually are. The only difference from these in my arms to these on the ground was the breath of life. The mystery of life overwhelmed my mind as I bathed new life after new life. At four o’clock, right as our shift was ending, I delivered my 16^th baby. William Christopher. I fell in love with him, I felt as if I could never put him down. We ended up staying at the hospital till 7 o’clock that evening. The other girls got two deliveries each, in three hours. I probably could have gotten more as well, as they seemed to be popping out in every direction, but I felt so sure that I was to focus solely on my woman, and baby, devoted to perfect monitoring and paperwork. This was possible, but not without constant interruption, a madam yelling at me for a cannula, “blood pressure here, blood pressure there, a baby is coming here, a baby is coming there, Sina’s got a delivery, Tina’s got a delivery, there’s babies that need bathing in the new born room…” I would glance at a clock every now and then to find that the 15 minute intervals in which I was to be monitoring my patients had long expired. For the first time in my life, I thought I’d like to work in an emergency room. I left the hospital that day beaming. This is life.

I’m not sure what the future holds, whether I’ll be delivering babies for the rest of my life, or just for the next three months. No matter what the outcome, I feel as though I will be a midwife forever. I feel as though I am a part of this beautiful mystery shared between women all over the world. Whether or not I continue on the road to getting certified doesn’t affect the fact that in these past 8 months I have become a part of something that has changed me. I have seen enough miracles to last a life time, the miracle of life. And I am forever changed.