Friends-
My mother was a matwòn, a traditional midwife with no formal training and I grew up observing births. In Haiti there are too many women who die from lack of skilled care. I wanted to learn how to save their lives. I first became an auxiliare nurse.
While I was a nurse I saw women come to the hospital too late. Sometimes they were brought after having seizures at home and they were in a coma. Sometimes they came because they had postpartum hemorrhage and had lost too much blood when they arrived. I remember one woman who had severe eclampsia and she died 45 minutes after she arrived because she came too late for us to save her. I wanted more information about how to save these women and how to educate them on danger signs. But to receive a good education is difficult in Haiti.
Without paying tuition, I received the education to be a skilled birth attendant from Midwives For Haiti in 2009 and 2010. Because of this education I am now a teacher of skilled birth attendants. I love my work. It not only gives me an opportunity for a better life, it trains other Haitian nurses in the skills to save the lives of mothers and babies.
