How do you measure your day?
on Shona in Sierra Leone (Sierra Leone), 09/Jul/2011 13:08, 34 days ago
How do you measure how good, bad, successful or unsuccessful your day has been? It turns out that I now measure my day by whether I have electricity and running water, and whether (and how many) any babies or children have died.Tuesday was possibly one of the worst days I have had here. Four babies died in S-C-B-U. Three within about half an hour of each other just after the ward round had finished and another one an hour or so later. And that was only while I was there; one had died in the early morning before I arrived and another died in the evening.It was awful. I felt terrible. I kept questioning– what else should I have done? Should I have kept resuscitating for longer? Why did these babies die? Why all at the same time? On the same day? Why all this suffering? What else should I have done? Several nurses even said to me “Don’t look so upset Shona, it’s not your fault”. I know deep down it’s not my personal fault, but that doesn’t make me feel any better.And if it feels like that for me, how does it feel for the nurses on the ward, who will have to keep going back to work day after day, year after year? The culture of death is different here (it’s very much part of life, and it’s always “God’s Will”) but it can’t help but affect you, watching so many children die.And if it’s like that for health care workers, what is it like for the parents and families?Everyone here knows the statistics of child mortality. I know that there are probably children dying in the hospital while I write this blog, while I’m asleep at night, while I’m on the beach or enjoying myself with friends. But those deaths won’t affect me in the same way, because I’m not there to witness them. And I am lucky that I am able to escape physically and mentally, that I am able to reflect on it, put it all away and move on so I can go back in the next day.Many of my friends here have very frustrating jobs working in the slow moving Ministries of Health and Sanitation or various other organisations. I met a friend on Tuesday evening who was telling me about his unproductive day. He realised“I’m telling the wrong person.” I was glad however to escape my bad day to hear about his!I also have a running joke with my husband about who“wins” for having the worst day. I teasingly tell him off for complaining about the bus running late or the coffee machine breaking. Clearly it’s all relative to the context and everyone is allowed to moan and to have a bad day. Clearly there are also many people who suffer greatly in the UK.I’m sure it’s not normal to measure your day by how many children have died. That’s why I don’t mind hearing about other people’s little moans. I’m sure that when I go back to the UK I will still be impatient when I have to wait in a long queue (I can stand for ages here at the bank without batting an eyelid) or annoyed if something doesn’t go to plan. But I hope that when I am annoyed or frustrated with something trivial at home, I will be able to put those things into context. I will remember those babies and how I felt and how I imagine their families feel. I can’t imagine anything being worse than that.(Thank you - to Fred for extricating me from S-C-B-U on Tuesday and taking me for lunch and for putting up with me not being very good company, to Becky for allowing me to vent on the way home, to Sandra for your kind words of support, to Dave and Laura for cheering me up at the beach and to Andy for virtual hugs and for reassuring me that the coffee machine is now working).