Sad day :(

Hi,

Today has been a tough Monday. This morning when I was working in the clinic, a pregnant woman came in with abdominal pain and a fever. She had malaria and it was causing her to have contractions even though she was only six months pregnant. Basically what happened was I was assigned to sit with her and wait for her water to break because it was too late for Dr Martin to give her medication to stop the contractions. The woman had the baby around 1145 and it was too small to save...This was my first delivery and the baby died within a few minutes of being delivered. This was really hard to see and it was shocking to me that all the nurses, the mother and the family did not seem upset by the event. I guess this happens a lot in Benin and the culture believes that the baby only exists outside of the womb, so anything that happens to the baby before it is born or before it looks like a baby is not upsetting. I still was so sad by the entire event and was relieved to go back to my room for lunch and just be sad. Life in Africa can be so hard sometimes.

This afternoon I went to another village with Dr Martin and one of the men from the clinic. It was a good afternoon and we taught about Moses to a group of children and young men. It was fun and I got some good videos of the kids!

Thats all for now, back to the clinic tomorrow morning. Later!