CleanBirth - Saving Mothers and Babies in Laos
CleanBirth.org - Donate $5 Saves 2 Lives
The project is moving and growing. We are in the process of sending 1,000 kits to Laos. Our July training of 16 nurses is scheduled for June 23-29.
The nurses have requested digital cameras to use when registering mothers, tracking the kit use and for capturing Safe Birth Outreach sessions. This will enable us to better document the work being done.
19 Days into the campaign we have raised $3050!
19 Days left to raise $1930. We can do it!
Last weeks CleanBirth.org + World Moms Blog campaign kicked some serious butt: $685 raised from 23 donors! That’s birth supplies and training to keep 137 moms and 137 babies in Laos safe.
These donors would not have learned about us without the efforts of Jennifer Burden and her team of global moms! I am so grateful.
I got pregnant in Oxford, England. My pregnancy was easy. I was cared for by a wonderful Scottish midwife; never saw a doctor. I maybe had 2 blood draws and 1 ultrasound. I felt healthy and like what was happening was normal. My husband and I took a Mongan Method, Hypnobirthing Class http://www.hypnobirthing.com/.
At 30 weeks we moved to Berlin, Germany for my husband’s MBA internship. I explored Berlin’s neighborhoods, increasingly slowly, took a German class (world’s most pregnant language student) and saw a local doctor once to check-in.
At 37 weeks we returned to Oxford to learn that my baby was breech. At the hospital at 38 weeks, a doctor tried to right him via ECV to no avail. So, my midwife advised that we schedule a C-section for 39 weeks because “only 2 doctors at the hospital have experience delivering a breech.” I trusted her, so that was that.
On the big day, we hopped in one of those cool English cabs, and en route I decided that if the baby was a boy he wouldn’t be Dimitri but Nikolai. The girl name was as locked in as my breech baby: Nadya. (She came 2 years later)
A spinal block, epidural and I was under the lights. Tugging, my husband’s blue eyes, and a baby put right on my chest. Perfect. Mine. Nikolai.
Last night Jen Burden, founder of World Moms Blog and my awesome partner for good, hosted a Twitter Party for CleanBirth.org.
My friend Cate texted me in response to a FB post pre-party:
A. I don’t know what a twitter party is
B. Are you still up at 9pm?
She hit it right on the head. No real clue about the first and yeah for sure I am tucked up in bed by 9pm.
9pm comes, I’m logged on with my #worldmomsblog at the ready, waiting… And then it happened, +/- 20 advocates for maternal health showed up. Jen was the perfect moderator: welcoming newcomers, asking interesting questions, and clarifying points. And I got to spread the word about CleanBirth.org in an interactive way.
So, Cate, now we know what a Twitter Party is and I did the whole thing in my PJs:)
Thanks a million to all of our donors.
In particular this week, thank you to World Moms Blog for getting people excited and spreading the word.
In the past 2 days, we were featured on 2 blog posts and more than 50 tweets:
1. http://www.worldmomsblog.com/2013/02/05/social-good-saves-lives-laos/
2. http://www.finneganandthehughes.com/2013/02/06/worthy-wednesdays-shotlife-cleanbirth-org/
World Moms Bloggers changed the Facebook pictures to reflect the campaign AND forwarded many of my posts and those of Jen Burden. A word about Jen: I am wow-ed by this woman who, while running World Moms Blog and caring for her kids, has managed to devote hours to CleanBirth.org.
Thank you to all!