So Many Babies!

I had a fantastic weekend and hope yours was the same.  I got to help celebrate my nephew E's first birthday (ha you can't see it but I just tried to type first and birthday at the same time...my spell check hates me ha ha ha ) which was wonderful, watched a bunch of boy movies which was interesting, actually got to spend some time outside with the Hubbin which was glorious, and was even productive enough to get to sessions of CMU's in.  And of course I read, oh I read and read and read.  Finished a book, started two others and bought two more YAY ME!  One of the interesting things about this weekend was a conversation I had with Hubbin about crowded and potentially unsafe living conditions in the area.  As an EMT I see every kind of living condition you can think of, this paired with my Baby E time and my CMU's in patient care all came together to remind me of a book I just finished reading.  Call the Midwife: A Memoir of Joy, Birth and Hard Times by Jenny Worth.  I picked this book up 'cause I love the BBC series by the same name and was in the mood for something a little different.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD (kind of)

This book is not one that has a plot so much as it has a bunch of stories all strung together.  The memoir format is not one I have read in a while, being more of a fiction person, but this book reminded me why I used to read a lot more of them.  Quick synopsis.  Jenny Worth arrived in the East End of London in the 50's to what she refers to as Nonnatus House, a pseudonym to protect the privacy of the patients and caregivers involved in these stories.  The author takes the name from St. Raymond Nonnatus who is the patron saint of childbirth, midwives, children, and pregnant women.  The author takes us through her first year or so as a trained midwife in this new and different environment.  In the 50's in the after math of WWII people live in crowded tenements  where running water is a luxury and a whole floor, or even a whole building sharing a lavatory is not uncommon.   Families often had children into the double digits all living in two or three rooms, heated by a stove that doubled as the kitchen.  In these conditions our young midwife had to learn to how to deliver babies as safely as possible.  She tells us of the various patients she saw and the various circumstances in which the births occurred.  Some of the stories are sweet, some silly, some sad (obviously I am in an alliteration phase today) but all of them real.  My favorite stories are the ones about Conchita Warren and her 25 live births, there a couple stories about this exotic woman who spoke no English yet seemed to be the paragon of wife and motherhood.  Both stories she is involved in makes me want to stand up and cheer.

This memoir is fascinating to me as a health care professional because it shows in some ways how far we have come (gloves were rarely used, shaving and enema's before birth were the norm, hygiene was optional for most patients), but also how we are starting to lose some of the personal touch that makes a nurse or doctor or even EMT a good one.  I also noted how much more parents were involved in making medical decisions for themselves and their children.  Now day's, especially if you go to a hospital to give birth, the mothers are made to feel that they must do everything the Dr. or Nurse says.  Now the vast majority of the time this is a good idea, but sometimes a Mamma has to go with her gut and say no, or speak up about something wrong.  In the book a baby is premature and the consensus is that he should be placed in an incubator in the hospital, but his mother refuses to let him go, knowing that she can give him the best care.  In the time period this happened, there was not a whole lot the Dr. could do but come check on the little guy, now days there would have been court orders to take the child away to be placed in a sterile incubator with minimal human touch.  Again, Drs. usually know what they are doing, and Nurses tend to be top notch, but this example of society allowing a parent to be a parent seems to be missing now days to our detriment (that was an awkward sentence, but I think I got my point across.).

The TV show so far has followed most of the stories fairly faithfully from the memoir.  I watched the first season before I read the book and was surprised at how closely they followed it, with a few tweaks of course, but totally recognizable.  It will be interesting to see if the future seasons follow the later memoirs, or if they go off on their own, but either way I am enjoying both immensely and cannot wait to get my hands on the next book.  Books like this remind me that as much as I will always be a fantasy/sci fi/fiction girl, that real life is just as exciting, varied, and interesting if you look for the right opportunities...it also makes me want to write down some of my favorite calls for future people to read.  I give this book 8 out of 10 babies and recommend it to anybody who is interested in post WWII history, midwivery, a couple good stories, or enjoy the tv show.

What type of memoirs do you like to read?  What era interests you?  Did you ever think a tv show about midwives would ever be so popular?