Awestruck at being present for the birth of Francoise's baby!

When we got a phone call at 6 am, I said “I wonder if Francoise is going to have the baby?” Sure enough if was Odense telling us that her water had broken at 3 am.



Originally Françoise had wanted a home birth with a midwife like she had with her other children. But we were suggesting that that wouldn’t be a good idea because at that time she lived in an area that was pretty accessible. Where she lives now, if she had had an emergency situation, someone would have had to help her down a small cliff to the ravine and take her down the ravine a few hundred yards to where the car so she could get to a hospital. So we invited her to stay at our house when the time was coming close.

A little over a week ago, when we thought she still had a month to go, she went into labor. Then the labor stopped and she was on bed rest. It was a rough time for her. Then her doctor asked for another sonogram and when he saw it he said he thought the baby would be born within a few days. He was right about that, but he said the baby was small. Apparently a lot of babies born in this country are low birth weight babies, but this little boy weighed 7.7 lbs. So I guess the original due date was wrong.

When we first got to the clinic, we were happy to see that it was nice and clean, but when we questioned the request to buy pitossin and antibiotics, we were told that we should take her somewhere else if we didn't agree with that. This was the clinic where Francoise received all her prenatal care and she felt comfortable there, so finally we all agreed to stay. The first nurse was not very kind or friendly. But I guess she was perturbed when I tried to suggest that she wouldn’t need pitossin to get labor going since the water had already broken. I didn’t like the idea of giving her the antibiotic just in case of any infection that might happen because where I’m from they don’t like babies to have antibiotics. But, Francoise said that this clinic had a good reputation—many women we know have had their babies there, so I kept quiet and prayed. First prayer answered: First nurse went off duty! :) The second one was nicer. Next prayer answered: Nurse #1 forgot to open up the drip for the pitossin—so all the labor was natural. But later the other nurse opened it up, presumably to help with the placenta.

After checking Francoise's blood pressure (normal) when we first got there, we never saw the doctor again. Guess that's why you can have a normal birth here for about $30.US. Thank you US AID for subsidizing this clinic!

I was the first one to hold the baby in my arms, even though I tried to tell the nurse to let Odens hold him first! But everyone else wsa busy helping Francoise. After a little guilt, I enjoyed it. He’s a beautiful baby. He seemed very healthy except that his body was fairly blue/pale. His face was nice and pink though and he was breathing pretty well, just had a little mucus. He cried well when he was born and then he looked alert. He also tugged back well when I held his hand and tugged gently. He found his thumb to suck and liked that a lot. Then he nursed. Mama and baby are doing well! - Carol

PS : After a little research I found out that as medical professionals are trying to reduce maternal mortality, they encourage the use of oxytocin (pitossin) for postnatal use to avoid postpartum hemorrhage.

I also found out that more than 500,000 women die each year in childbirth--99% of them in third world countries. So the systematic use of antibiotics is in reaction to that. I don't think there was a risk, or hardly at all for infection in this birth. In the US and other countries it's not considered safe to give antibiotics to a pregnant woman unless there is a serious infection because of the risk for the child.