Prayer

I’ve been working on this post since October. I have sat down to write it multiple times and have (somewhat willfully) allowed myself to become easily distracted each time. Posts like this are hard for me to write. Not only do I often grapple with the idea of sharing the painful stories of suffering that belong to the precious women for whom I care, but I usually don’t even know where to start. My soul not infrequently aches from bearing witness to the injustices born in the lives of those who reside in the most remote corners of this earth.

The PNG government has a one page report it requires any healthcare worker present and caring for a woman who dies as a direct result of a pregnancy-related complication to submit. As the obstetrician for our hospital, this task primarily falls to me. Somehow, the agonizing days to weeks of a woman warring with and then against her own body to simply live are condensed into a few short questions and a single paragraph report. What this report doesn’t capture is the life that was cherished outside the walls of our hospital – the mother to 3 other young children, the beloved daughter and wife, the first time mom to a child who will now never know her own mother. Since we returned to PNG in June, I have written about as many of these reports as months we have been back; six to be exact.

There was the momma to twins whose local health center brought her to our door, but who had lost the entirety of her blood volume and suffered a cardiac arrest before we even had a chance to successfully resuscitate her. She had 3 older children at home. There was the first time mom who presented to us at 35 weeks with symptoms concerning for a developing severe hypertensive disorder called HELLP. We caught it. We induced her labor early and she delivered a healthy baby. But instead of her condition improving, like most patients do after delivery, she worsened. Not only did her body begin to deteriorate, but her mental status did too. She developed delirium which persisted for days. Slowly, with what little supportive therapies we have, she began to improve. Her delirium started to subside, and she became conscious enough to say to me “Thank you for saving my life. You chose to help me deliver my baby early and you saved my life.” I prayed for her. I prayed with earnest hope for days and I believed she would continue in the odds of most women with her condition who find delivery to be the cure for their condition. And yet, the very next day after she spoke those words to me, she became unresponsive again. She, too, died. Then, there was the most recent momma whose story unfolded around Christmas. She delivered at home in her village; not only was her baby stillborn, but she also had the complication of a retained placenta. Her village home is in such a remote area that by the time she made it to our hospital, her placenta had been retained for 5 days. She was barely conscious, her body fighting a disseminated infection that ultimately led to kidney and respiratory failure. In a hospital without ventilators or dialysis, we did all we could for her, but it wasn’t enough. In the bed next to her, D47, was a woman with almost the exact same story. She was brought to us by plane from the same remote region with a placenta that had been retained for one week. Against all seeming odds, the blood transfusions, antibiotics, and IV fluids we had to offer her were enough. Those simple provisions helped her to recover adequately enough for me to offer her a potentially life-saving tubal ligation just one week later.

It can feel pretty hard to know what or how to pray for my patients. Sometimes all it takes is a single initial look to know she is dying. I feel my own naivety as I care for them and simultaneously hope for what I logically know to be impossible. Not infrequently am I aware of my inadequacy in this privilege I hold to care for the women of Jiwaka – limited by my resources, by our remote location, by my own imperfect knowledge and skills. It is easy to allow those limitations to temper my prayers for my patients. And yet, God is patient and has been working in me as I pray for my patients.

When my dad died, I remember the sharp sting of lament over never having been afforded the opportunity to pray for his healing. One moment he was present in my life, and the next moment he was gone. In the most beautiful way only intimate suffering can teach you, I learned that prayers for healing are not the only or even best prayers to be prayed. What I craved most in the days to months after losing my dad, was the palpable presence of God, for His peace, and for a reassurance He cared for me.

I recently listened to a sermon series by Louie Giglio called The Impossible Prayer and in it, he says the only truly impossible prayer ever prayed was the one prayed by Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. In praying for this cup of the crucifixion to be taken from Him, Jesus knew He was praying for the impossible. And yet, He prayed the prayer anyway. The challenge in the sermon was for us to continue to pray our seemingly impossible prayers because we serve a miraculous God.

So, for the past several months (and I anticipate for a while to come) I have been praying both of these prayers. I have prayed the prayers for the nearness of God to the brokenhearted, to the dying, and to the families who are left grieving in a soul-shattering absence. I have prayed prayers for the healings that seem impossible to my human eyes. I have prayed prayers of forgiveness for my inadequacy as I have attempted to care for these women like they deserve. And I have prayed prayers for God to strengthen my own faith that I may see Him more clearly and that my patients and I together may know His love and presence to be palpable.

Will you pray with me?