Saving a Life....

Last night was one of the best and most horrifying nights of my life. A pregnant woman was brought into the aid station last night and she had been in labor for 24 hours and the baby would not come out. The local midwife at the woman's clinic could no longer do anything for her so she was brought over to see if our Doctor could help. The only problem was he is a male and males are not allowed to see Afghan women - AT ALL, or she will be stoned or shot to death.

Here is where the story begins. I happened to be in our TOC when the Doc was making a call to ask for a Medevac to get her to a Red Cross Hospital. It was denied because it is against policy to help local nationals no matter the circumstance. Doc wasn't sure how to proceed because the girl was only 13 years old and the baby was lodged in the pelvic bones and he couldn't get it out. A C-section was out of the question as we have no surgical equipment. The only thing to do was try and get the baby out no matter what means were used. The baby had already died and now the mothers life was in danger. I volunteered to help, figuring I would just be holding her hand as I have NO medical training what-so-ever. We rounded up two other females to be in the room also. The girl was given a 10% chance of living as they thought she would bleed out if we got the baby out.

Without getting into gory details because I'd rather not have to relive what I had to do to this dead baby to get it out of a 13 year old girl who had no right to be pregnant in the first place, I ended up being the one who had to do everything because i had the smallest hands. I got the baby out and was able to stop the bleeding, mind you I was being talked through all of this by the Doc as he wasn't allowed to touch or look at her. The woman lost a lot of blood and was really weak but she made it through this horrific ordeal. I went to visit her this morning and she kept telling me how grateful she was for saving her life. It was a great feeling but it doesn't make it any easier knowing and seeing what I did to that baby.

I got her up and moving and made sure that she was not bleeding anymore and brought her back over to the woman's clinic so she wouldn't get in trouble for being on our base by her family. The only horrible part is her husband who is Taliban is in Pakistan and he returns tomorrow. If he finds out that a man was even in the room during this they will stone her to death. Everything could have been in vain. I just pray he doesn't find out. She has to go back to the woman's clinic in 48-72 hours for a checkup and I intend on being over there.

Due to my ability to act under pressure and not get squeamish, I was asked if I would volunteer in the woman's clinic a few days a week for a few hours. I will have to examine the woman, tell the Doc what is wrong with her, and hopefully be able to be talked through how to help her. I guess a lot of pregnant woman come in with still born babies and they end up killing the woman because they are unable to help them. It's very sad but it's very primitive out here and they have no real medical facilities.

So out of this whole ordeal all it does it make me realize how fragile life is and how we really need to appreciate every moment. When the Doc called to give the head doc in theater an update on how it went he couldn't believe she survivied. He said he delivered 9,000 babies and we had the worst one he has ever heard of. This woman shouldn't be alive but by some miracle she is. God or Allah or whoever is up there works in mysterious ways.....