Giving Up on Life

Yesterday was an interesting day. It started out with Margaret teaching us a class on how to clean the clinic properly and the importance of disinfecting/sterilizing. After an hour, I developed a bad headache so I went to lay down for a bit. Later Dennis came to me to tell me about a situation going on in the clinic. A woman was brought to us in labor. She was eight months along and the baby had died inside her. Her labor stopped and it appeared she was bleeding internally. If she wasn't taken to Wau right away, she could die. The problem was her family said they didn't have any money. Normally, we rarely give money to patients. This is for several reasons. Among them are:

1. We don't have a fund to cover emergencies like that.
2. Most people have money, but they don't want to spend it. They can sell a cow, but often choose not to. They would rather someone die than lose a cow. After years of being at war and receiving handouts from various aid organizations, people still want things for free even if they have the money.
3. You can't give money to some patients and not others.

Because Sabet was in Malony working on the borehole with Eric and Chris and Suzy is in Nairobi, Dennis and I didn't know what to do. Should we give them money even though it's our policy not to? I texted Suzy and got the ok to do so. However, after talking with Stephanie, the three of us realized it wasn't a good idea. The family wasn't taking the situation seriously. They didn't realize this lady could die very quickly no matter what we told them. Stephanie told them they needed to go find money to take her to Wau. They said they had no money and made very little effort to do anything. There were 30 plus people there to see her. If they all chipped in, they could come up with the funds needed. However, people just want to come look and not help.

If we gave them the money to rent a car to take them to Wau, we couldn't be certain they wouldn't keep the money and just take her home. While all this is going on, the ladies that came to see the patient we telling her she needed to come home to die. Basically they were giving up on her and weren't going to help keep her alive. It was so frustrating. We can't make a family fight for a life. No matter what we do or give them, if they don't care then whatever we do doesn't matter. It's hard to see how little value is placed on some people's lives. My heart broke for this poor lady whose family and friends were so ready to see her die. I also felt bad for Stephanie (our midwife) who was trying to help this lady and kept running into roadblocks.

Once we realized the family wasn't going to raise the money to rent a car, we looked into the option of a bus. The bus driver first wanted to charge her five times the normal rate for just a one seat. Then he refused to take her completely. While this is going on, the family increased their efforts to take her home. We kept telling them, it is unsafe for her to go home. She needed to be monitored and taken to a hospital right away. We tried to stall them and get them to wait until Sabet returned to see if he could talk some sense into them. Plus, there was a possibility our car was going to Wau the next day so if she survived the night, we might be able to take her. Around 7:00pm (she had been here since 10:00am), the family insisted taking her against our wishes. As hard as it was, we had to let her go. Our old truck (the one with no brakes) was going to take her home. It was just about to leave when Sabet pulled up. He briefly talked to the family before driving them home. He offered the car to go to Wau, but I don't know what happened.

It was very frustrating and infuriating. How can someone's life be disregarded so easily? Why are we trying to help them when they don't care? It's then that we have to just to the best we can and then release them completely into God's hands. We can't control how they respond, but we can show love and care for her while she is with us.

Please pray for a miracle. Best case scenario she was able to deliver the baby at home and there was no bleeding. That's what we are praying for.