Everyone reading this probably know Martin and I have been trying to get some projects off the ground here in Peru. It seems they are now happening.  To be honest we have both discussed feeling totally inadequate at moments and it is always hard to know what difference the things we do makes, if any, but we certainly have been very blessed by them.

A few posts back I mentioned that I had attended a meeting at the hospital with a group of women who are called “promoters of health”.  These women are considered leaders in their communities and they are helping to connect members of their communities to health services.  Voluntarily, they attend different training sessions on various health issues and mostly know who in their towns are malnourished or sick in anyway.  They also know who is pregnant in their community and try to ensure they attend their prenatal care etc.  They are incredible women.

It was decided that these women would talk to the expectant mothers in their communities and if they were interested in meeting with me they’d let me know.  One of the women got back to me and said there were five pregnant women in her town who might be interested so I went and met with these women for the first time about two weeks ago.  They live in a place called “Las Campanas” which is about 10 to 15 minutes out of Chulucanas.  It is a very under resourced community to say the least.  I walked around the town with the promotor of health  visiting these women’s home and she introduced me to them all.

That first visit was pretty brief and rushed so I went back on Monday morning to really chat with them.  For about 3 hours I sat with these different women in their very humble homes and we talked about birth.  I often felt uncomfortable and out of place and not totally sure of myself.  They live in extreme poverty and their struggles are many.  For one woman coming up with just one sol (about 40 cents) to get insurance at the public hospital to give birth has been hard.  I was very aware, as they probably were, of the extremely privileged life I live and wondered how can we possibly connect and what was the point anyway.  But I guess that is a great thing about birth, it is an experience we share and there were a few brief moments when the differences didn’t seem to matter and I felt that we were just two women sharing stories about birth, as women have done and will probably do for all time.  I had to continually to remind them that I am not a medical professional, just an ordinary woman like them, passionate about birth rights and wanting to offer some physical and emotional support.  It was a very special experience for me.

Martin had his first workshops last weekend.  They went really well.  A few little hiccups, things I would find very stressful, but they all dealt with really well.  As Martin said Peruvians are fairly resourceful and coming up with solutions to things not going according to plan.  People commented on how practical they were which was what they had really wanted.  The other engineers involved were really excited to be involved and hoping to keep up the relationships which was another outcome were hoping for.  Like me Martin really loved hearing them all share ideas.  Again he had to deal with the expectation that he was the expert but he really tried to make it clear everyone was there as a student and a teacher.