Project Life Subic has been busy in Jail

Leslie has been teaching a series of pregnancy and birth classes in the women's jail every Monday afternoon. A group of inmates and jail personnel are attending. The Philippines has one of the worst outcomes for mothers and babies in Asia and education about  healthy pregnancy can save lives! The women are learning about nutrition, proper care of newborn,  postpartum care of mom, and breastfeeding. Our hope is this information will be shared to the other inmates and their families. Leslie has also connected the jail to our friends' Charity Birth Center (Mercy in Action) and the pregnant inmates are now delivering there. They receive respectful, loving, world class care at the center and are so blessed by the midwives.

Leslie and some of the students.

The Sewing Training is also taking place on Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoons. We are about to have our first graduation of eight trainees soon and will update you. The inmates are coming up with ideas of things to make and sell so they can earn a little money for toiletries, meds, food and other needs. The warden is so happy that many of the women will have a trade and be able to get a job when released.

   

Matain Men's Fellowship Has Begun!

 The Matain Men's Fellowship (in the fishing village) began last Sunday with 19 men in attendance! Sonny and J.R. had to hike the back way in through a maze of shantys, because the seaside trail was under water. The high tide caused flooding of the open sewage canals, but Sonny and J.R. braved the dirty water, sometimes knee deep, to get to the meeting place under the trees. They are so glad they persevered as the men of the village were so excited to begin! After giving each man a bible, they had a time of worship. Then they began lesson #1 of the "Tuklasin" ("to discover") bible study. Sonny is happy to report that the men were eager to share, participate and ask questions. Next Sunday the five men from the visiting YWAM Denver DTS team will attend the fellowship with Sonny.

Another Infant Death

We received a text from one of our Project Life leaders the night before asking for prayer for her sister (for privacy sake we'll call the sister Esther). The text was unclear if Esther was in labor, or already had the baby, or even where she was. As the story unfolded we discovered that the baby girl had died hours before. It turns out that the laboring woman was attended by a poorly trained "hilot", a local traditional birth attendant. When faced with a shoulder dystocia, she didn't know what to do. The head of the baby was born at 2 a.m., the rest of the body followed an hour later. Let that sink in. A simple technique or two would have easily saved this baby's life.
The story doesn't end there. Yesterday, Sonny and I were able to take this grieving mother to our friends at a local Christian Charity Birth Center for a postpartum check. The hilot had disappeared and had done no follow up. We discovered that Esther had postpartum hypertension, a life threatening condition that can lead to problems with the heart or stroke. It was recommended that Esther go to the hospital to be seen by a doctor but she refused. Then she had the option to stay at the center for observation and care, but she still wanted to go home. She was grieving, tired, and wanted to be surrounded by family.The staff at the center prayed with her, gave her hugs, shared her grief and provided her with necessary things to go home with like Tylenol, pads, and even a BP cuff that the family could use to monitor the blood pressure. I took Esther and her sister home, stopping on the way to buy them healthy protein rich foods and clean water. We were in touch with them all last night and this a.m. Her family has been caring for her and they are reporting the BP to the clinic midwife every few hours. It has gone down, but still not fully resolved. Later today, after I teach at the jail, I will be joined by my midwife friend and I will take her to Matain to do a follow up visit in the fishing village.

Why, you might ask, didn't Esther go to the hospital or a birth center? Why couldn't she find a qualified midwife to attend to her birth at home? Why didn't she receive adequate prenatal care? Many of these questions are summed up in the "Three Delays", based on research in the third world. We know that here in the Philippines 32 out of 1,000 infants and 162 out of 100,000 women die during pregnancy and childbirth.

 For more on the Three Delays, go to our Buntis/Pregnancy Project Page) Most of these deaths can be prevented by prenatal care, education and access to well trained midwives and doctors.

 Many women here are hesitant to go because they can't afford it (even the so-called "public" hospital charges) and/or they are mistreated and treated disrespectfully.  Recently I was visiting someone in the local postpartum ward and the woman sharing the bed (yes, they were crowded that day so it was two to a single bed) began to cry and say "They treat us like pigs, ma'am, they treat us like pigs" She had been waiting for 14 hours to see her baby who was in the nursery. It seems there weren't enough staff to process the newborn and get the baby to the mother. Another time we helped a mother who couldn't afford the hospital bill so she escaped, leaving her deceased baby in the hospital. We later helped her negotiate the bill and retrieve the body for burial.  I have many more stories like this, too many to share them all here.

I'll blog an update soon about Esther and baby. Please remember her and the family in your prayers.

Update- Esther's blood pressure still high. She is grieving the traumatic birth and death of her baby and doesn't care about taking care of herself. We were able to share the seriousness of the situation with the husband and family members, and trying to encourage them to take care of Esther. They are all dealing with grief and overwhelmed.

Rainy Season and High Tides

The 12th St area floods a foot or so every day during high tide. Usually that high tide is before or after the Kids Church feeding, but once in a while it coincides and creates a challenge! The sewage canals run just under the "sidewalk", and many times a portion of the cement sewer covers are broken or missing. When high tide happens, the water from the nearby river (a drainage ditch), mixes with the sewage, and that's what floods the street and our lot where we hold our Project Life activities. Much of the infections and disease experienced by our kids are a direct result of them playing in the filthy water!


Here's some pictures of a recent high tide and our brave cooks wading in to prepare the nutritious food for the kids. They were still able to serve 200 kids and moms. That same day, a team from the Logos Hope ship came to help with the kids. They were very flexible when they saw the condition of the lot, and helped us relocate kids up the street out of the flooded area for Children's ministry.




preparing food at back of the lot



entrance to Project Life lot with broken sewer cover



 

                                                                                 

 

Ribbons, Butiki and letters arrive on 12th St!

A big thanks to our friend, Krissy, and her helpers who blessed our 12th St kids with hair ribbons, toy lizards, (butiki) and letters. It was their way of sending a big "You are loved" message to the children. The older 12th St. kids (ages 7-11) really cherished the letters and found it so interesting that kids they don't know on the other side of the world wrote letters of encouragement to them. Now they want to write letters to the kids in the USA so Cathy and the Kids church crew are helping them.
Here are a couple pictures:

 

       

 

A NOT so "Chance Encounter"

A short note from Leslie:
We had a NOT so chance encounter with a very special couple from Manila yesterday. It was more like a "Divine Appointment"!
It takes more than passion and energy to run a ministry, it takes wisdom, knowledge and a strategy. We have been facing a variety of situations lately that have us questioning how we can be more effective. I have been pondering what motivates people here and trying to understand how much culture plays a part in what/how we do things. Some of you know me well, you know my heart for respecting the culture of the people we serve. But, I also think we can't use culture as an excuse to do less than excellent!  I often challenge people from many countries to examine our cultural practices and discard what's not biblical, and keep what is healthy and good!
Struggling with a lack of answers, and feeling a bit stagnant, Sonny and I had a random encounter with one of the most brilliant Filipinos we have ever met. This man and his wife are both educated and charming, and have so much experience in government and business. They shared insights to the Filipino mind and culture in a way I've not heard expressed before. Our conversation ranged from livelihood training, business, politics, attitude, motivation and so much more! It helped me gain new perspective and opened my mind to trying some new ideas. We laughed and shared over a lovely late dinner, forgetting the time and just thoroughly enjoying their company! What a blessing (and, I might add, an honor) to meet this couple that has such integrity and grace. I feel refreshed and the world looks a little different this morning!

Lots of changes and challenges this June!

Just when we think we have it all figured out and our schedule is manageable, new things happen and create challenges!

-The Rotary International Grant for LightStrikes and Livelihood has been approved! We will be scheduling a monthly LightStrike very soon. Big thanks to Fern Facchino and the Oakhurst Rotary Clubs for making this happen! This will involve all of our leaders as we attempt to hold a LightStrike in 8 different Barangays of the city over the next year.

The men are gathering to learn about soda bottle solar light installation.

-The attendees of the Men's Celebrate Recovery group are learning that their relationship with God plays a large part of their growth. Sonny is hearing so many great stories of change in the men's lives. He is so encouraged by their participation and eagerness to be a part of this group! Sonny has now translated the first of five Celebrate Recovery study booklets to Tagalog, the Filipino language. This group of men are preparing to help Sonny start a new men's bible study in the nearby Muslim fishing village.

-Leslie begins a weekly childbirth class in the jail next week! She will be teaching guards and nurses about healthy pregnancy, birth and postpartum. Last week she was able to connect the jail personnel to the Mercy Midwives Charity Birthing Center folks and they have agreed to do a monthly prenatal clinic at the jail. Then the pregnant inmates can give birth at the center with loving support.

-After a one year break from hosting teams, we will be welcoming a missions team from YWAM Denver the end of July. They will be assisting our current ministries, plus we will add other events for them to have an optimal experience while they are here. Should be fun and very busy!

-A few days after the team leaves, Sonny and Leslie will be moving to a one bedroom apartment and also relocating the Project Life office. Happy to report it won't be in the flood zone, but it is in the middle of the Red Light district! And near the European Deli and various restaurants. We'll also be able to bicycle to the market.  Moving can be stressful, but we'll have lots of help =)



New classroom for youth activities!

-The new center is finally opening in two weeks! The good news is we are scheduled to offer a variety of youth activities five days a week. The challenge is that our youth leader will only be available one of those days because of his school schedule, and his assistant may also return to school in October. Great news for the two guys, and we know God will provide a solution for this and bring us help!

As we say here, "That's it, Pancit!" So many changes in such a short time! Please keep us in your prayers as we face this busy, busy season.

A recent picture of some of our Project Life leaders and families at church.