Most women begin the Prenatal program in their first trimester. The majority of the ladies start around week 9 of their pregnancy. We like them to join as early as possible, to get in on the teaching, community, vitamins, and iron.
On occasion we meet a lady that is further along in her pregnancy that we have a gut sense we should accept. Beth McHoul recalls interviewing Andrena at the 20 to 22 week mark in her pregnancy and upon hearing about a previous stillbirth at home, she felt strongly that Andrena should be accepted even though she was later than our ideal gestational age for acceptance.
Andrena arrived at the Maternity Center around 8pm tonight. She said she left her house before the contractions got "hot" because the ride is long to get us. She came with her niece who left shortly after making sure her aunt was going to be staying over night. Andrena walked outside the Maternity Center for about 45 minutes before getting tired and coming in to rest a bit.
By 9:40, without so much as a single loud noise, she welcomed her fourth child, a little boy. For all the midwives and L& D nurses out there, Haitian women have insanely-short second stage(s). It seems odd to us when we have the occasional 90 minute second stage. Andrena wins the second stage award for this summer. It lasted 22 seconds, and baby came with one small push.
Congrats to Andrena, and welcome to the world outside, little baby-guy.
We have purchased land and our long term goal is a larger (second location) Maternity Center. The money that has been raised specifically for the new MC, has been put toward that specific project. The foundation is in place and the walls have been started. We are a long way from completion of that new larger center.
For now we operate from one location, an adorable little house (that we all love) that allows us to have about 40 to 45 pregnant woman enrolled in the program at a time. As one delivers and switches to the Early Childhood program, we can accept a newly pregnant woman in her spot. We would love nothing more than to make better use of this house and do some remodeling here that would allow space to increase our numbers to closer to 60 pregnant women at one time.
We are in need of help networking and finding connections to those that have a heart for Haitian women/children and want to reduce the number of children in orphanages.
If your church or group or foundation or organization wants to help in the area of maternal health and orphan prevention (which IS in fact, "orphan care") please let us know if we can share more about our programs and whom we can contact.
Like most non-profits, we are always looking for funding. We are a small, grass-roots organization with room and a desire to grow slowly. Social Media is great for sharing the message of what we do, we feel so supported in that way, but it doesn't typically equal long-term funding. We'd love to speak to your foundation or committee and share what is happening here.
Interested in helping us? Click this link to go to a donation page.
Interested in helping fund a midwife to live/serve here? Click here, Beth Johnson is currently raising funds to extend her time in Haiti.
