Anna - A Voice for Life

Anna (pronounced AH-na) is a 21-year-old midwife from the Netherlands. She has the sweetest accent you’ve ever heard. The first thing you will notice about her is her calming spirit. She is passionate, caring, and confident. The short time I got to spend with her made me wish I had known her my whole life. 

She has wanted to be a midwife since about the age of thirteen. As of her time in Uganda, she has delivered fifty babies on her own and assisted in thirty other deliveries.   

I met Anna and her five teammates at a bake sale the families in expat community was hosting at a local coffee shop. For college girls who are away from their home country, homemade baked good were the perfect pick-me-up for a Saturday morning. We enjoyed overloading their bags full of goodies! These six ladies, a few of my friends, and I swapped stories back and forth of why we were living in Uganda. We discovered these young ladies were finishing their 10-week midwifery internship in Uganda. They are in the same midwifery program at a university in Belgium. 

Anna wanted to see the Arise Center, so Meg and I drove her out one evening. We asked her a million questions and Anna also shared with us some of the stories from working in the Referral Hospital. Some were sad, most were with great joy. 

 

When a pregnant woman first arrives in the hospital she is asked for her information/antenatal card and about what is going on with them. Some women come to the hospital without ever having a scan of their baby. After the initial intake, Anna, Anouk, Myrte, or another midwife will check for the lie of the baby, fetal heart rate, cervical dilatation, amniotic fluids, vitals of the mother, etc. If the mom is four or more centimeters dilated, it is considered ‘active labor’ and she is admitted to the hospital. Mom and the baby are monitored closely. 

 

When the baby is delivered, he/she is cleaned and taken to the examination table for examination and given vitamin K. If something is wrong with the baby or if the baby is premature, the baby is taken to the NICU to get the specified care they deserve.

 

These young midwives paying attention to every detail of the mom and baby. They are fighting for each little life. Long shifts can take a toil, but they keep going. 

 

After giving birth, the mom can go home as early as six hours or she can choose to stay the night if she wants to and if there are enough beds.  Anna and her teammates take this time to teach the mom (and the local midwives) about the importance of skin to skin, as it is not a common practice here.

 

Some women lose their baby because they must travel a great distance or they wait too long to come to the hospital. The loss of a baby is unexplainable, but Anna has been at the mom's side with her calming presence while she mourning the loss of her baby. Yet at the same time these women rejoice that their baby is in heaven. Anna believes they can rejoice because they know that it is not God who disappoints them, it is the enemy.  

 

I am amazed at these six young women. I cannot imagine being in my early twenties in a foreign country, where I only know my five other teammates, delivering babies. They were also responsible for turning in papers to their teachers while they were here!

 

Anna loved working with local midwives and doctors at the local hospital here. They have each learned a great deal from each other. Anna was able to show the local midwives about the importance of mother/child bonding. The local midwives were able to teach her more about suturing. 

 

During her 10 weeks in Uganda, God has been her constant strength and help. Sometimes the need is overwhelming, and you can get lost in trying to help or wanting to help everyone. Anna works to remain focused by her faith God. She says:

 

“God is the Author of life and death, I’m just here to help do what I can.”

I wish all six of these ladies could have stayed in Uganda. Our expat community here loved having them around. We were sad to have met them at the end of their time in Uganda. Maybe we were all re-living our early twenties vicariously through these lovely college ladies! Of course, they all have hope-filled plans back home in the Netherlands. Some still have schooling, some have job offers. Anna has a fiancé. He has a job, a house, and he fits in perfectly with her family. She is so excited to marry him this fall. She is planning and hoping to come back here with him, even if just for a visit. 

 

Anna and her teammates have saved lives, changed futures, and literally brought the future into the world. They do it with such passion too. There is a light to their faces and a true care for each individual mom and baby. The more we talked to them and heard their stories, the more we could see there was so much goodness that they brought to the people of our town. These young ladies were changed from their time in Uganda. In similar ways these interns were able to impact the midwives and doctors they worked with and these families and their newborn babes is beautiful. I have no doubt that they will continue impact and change the world wherever they serve in life. 

 

 

Want to hear more? We will be sharing two birth stories from Anna’s experience here over the next two Saturdays.  

***photos by Anna's friends. Used with permission***