Hospital day 2

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Today the weather was sunny and hot although I had to spend most of my time inside. I turned down the opportunity to see a spinal surgery to go back on the labor and delivery unit. Sadly it was a very slow morning on the unit. I was only able to observe one delivery right before leaving for lunch. A lot of the moms on the unit had complications/high risk pregnancies. Some of these complications/situations included epilepsy, twins, SVD, and hydrocephaly. The hydrocephalus case was very interesting. The babies head was already measuring over 10cm! The doctors plan for the birth was for it to be vaginal. Once the baby descends into the birth canal, the doctor will tap into the babies head and release the fluid so that the baby can safely make its way down the canal and into the world. This did not seem like a good idea to me. By entering the birthing canal the babies head with be squeezed further, thus increasing the pressure on the babies brain. Taping into the head while the baby is in the birth canal would expose the baby to lots of bacteria. This would increase the infants risk of infection. When asked why not a c-section, a nurse instructor stated that it’s safer to deliver vaginally. She also mentioned that theres a good chance the baby wouldn’t survive the delivery. This broke my heart because I knew that in the States this mom would get a c-section and the baby would receive shunts which would basically solve the problem. Here there is a very high chance the baby won’t make it, but in the States the baby would probably live. The delivery I saw today was different from the ones I saw yesterday. It seemed more organized, someone was talking with the mother, and the examination of the baby and mother was more thorough. Autumn, Mary and my impression is that the delivery was different today because Debbie was present for the birth. Autumn noticed the nursing team looking back at Debbie multiple times throughout the delivery. Two things did remain the same however, there was an episiotomy and a nurse pushed on the mothers fundus. I still don’t understand why they do those two procedures. Before the mother delivered I was able to massage her back and apply counter pressure with a tennis ball. Although I wasn’t able to talk to her I hope my presence and touch was soothing.



After the delivery I had lunch. I got this amazing Oreo frappe! Mmmmm I can’t wait to get another one tomorrow! Following lunch everyone met up and we learned about alternative medicine. We observed acupuncture and were able to receive traditional Thai massages. Although I was a little hesitant, I ended up getting a massage. Thai massages focus on energy/pressure points, so sometimes it hurt. Others times I’d laugh because it’d tickle. In the end my shoulders felt a lot less tense, which was good. The acupuncture doctor was a trip! He made us all ask him questions, and he tried to get us to meditate and focus on our auras. My aura today was black which doesn’t usually mean good things. Oh well, i don’t believe in auras anyways! We ended up leaving the hospital early so we had a good chunk of time before dinner. I did some homework and then went on an adventure around the campus. I listened to my worship music and prayed, but I kept getting strange looks from people. I think they were confused as to why I was alone. One lady asked me if I was lost or needed something. Since I obviously couldn’t venture far by myself in this community oriented country, I went back towards my room and sat on the balcony. Watching the sky start to dim, the people below moving around and listening to my music was a highlight of my day. At dinner we had watermelon and blue colored lemon/lime iced tea! (We had other things too) The tea was colored by a flower, which I think is really neat and also so natural. During dinner I saw a bunch of our Thai girl buddies outside chatting. I went out to see what all the commotion was, and honestly i still don’t know what they were doing. Oil saw me, ran inside, and then brought me a dessert she had bought. It was very sweet and orange in color, but i couldn’t get Oil to translate what it was in english. It was so sweet of her to buy me a dessert though! I was just really happy to see her because I hadn’t seen her since this morning. Tonight we had class, and talked about assertiveness and the stages of becoming an expert nurse. There were a lot of laughter during the meeting, which made it enjoyable. Now it’s about to turn 11pm so I should probably get ready to head to bed!

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