Chick in a ditch.

Today another scholar and I saw some baby chicks caught in a ditch. The ditch I speak of is actually a drain…maybe it’s a sewer? I can’t tell. Anyway, it runs along the side of every street and is open on the top so people and cars can fall in if they are not careful. Occasionally there is something that looks like sewage (it’s green, glumpy and gross)…but oftentimes there is grass growing in it, and goats and sheep will jump inside to graze.

But today a whole bunch of baby chicks fell into the ditch, and there was no way for them to get out. The mother hen did seem concerned, but best she could do was cluck from street level and strut around hopelessly. I thought it was a good metaphor for life – don’t become a chick in a ditch – because if you do who will get you out?

Today was another crazy day at the hospital. A baby was born with its umbilical cord wrapped around its neck and not breathing. So we had to use a bag-valve mask to do a neonatal resuscitation on the infant. It was scary. We rushed it to critical care (ie. the emergency room) and got it some oxygen. The mother had not gotten any prenatal care, this was her sixth child…so if he died she had five others she needed to look after. Even after getting oxygen and some dextrose in his veins the baby still didn’t look good. We will see how it looks tomorrow. The maternity nurses were also far less concerned then the scholars and I about the state of the baby…they seemed to think we shouldn’t have given oxygen and just left the baby next to its mother…I still disagree with them…but its hard to go against a culture and a people and their way of doing things even if you think you are right. But I was afraid that by not seeking care…the mother had left her chick in a ditch.

On another note – my project is going ok. People are not excited about adding paper to the chart (I created a new neonatal assessment sheet)…but I’m perfecting my sheet so that each baby has a record of being.