Her Special Skill

Ellen’s sleep was shattered by the pounding on her door and the hollering for help. The young, grossly unshaven man in wet tattered clothing could be seen on her apartment security camera. He had a desperate look of fear as he pleaded, 

 

“In the name of all that’s holy, please help me. I’ve driven for hours to get here and find you.” Ellen could sense the man's desperation was sincere. But why come to her door?  

 

"Why do you think I can help you?" she asked as she continued to observe him through her security camera. 

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"My neighbor gave me this as proof of how you can help," he said as he pressed a newspaper article to the camera for her to see. 

It was a newspaper article dated five years earlier which showed Ellen standing in front of a building where she was employed before retiring.  

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"You were honored because of this skill. You are the only one with the special talent who can help"! he exclaimed with distress in his voice. 

Ellen suddenly understood the urgency based on some of the extreme challenges her previous job presented. 

 

"Please wait while I get dressed and gather what is needed to do this." Ellen smiled while glancing at a picture of her grandmother sitting near items, she would take with her.  

 

Her grandmother was a Voodoo priestess in Haiti and used many ritual chants to summon the god of healing. There was a special chant that sounded like deep humming used with hands-on strokes for difficult situations that Ellen never forgot. Although she was a trained nurse, she found it helpful to utilize her grandmother's ritual chant. Most just thought it was a soothing sound which evoked calm and cooperation with people during an emergency. But for many years she hummed and used her hands in rhythmic motions to aid in relieving people when traditional medicine was not enough for routine medical processes. She earned notoriety because of it. 

 

The man helped Ellen load her supplies into his jeep and said, "Please accept my sincerest apology for disturbing you this way.” His voice cracked as tears flowed from his weary-looking, bloodshot eyes. His chest heaved as he gasped for breath to further explain himself.  

"I fear my wife is in physical and mental danger. She has been hallucinating about dying young. She is only twenty-two years of age and has always been athletic and strong, but she has been moaning with back and hip pain for several weeks."

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"Has a doctor seen her for these complaints?" Ellen asked. 

 

"No doctor nearby, and she won't let the Red Cross nurse touch her," he replied. 

 

He further explained that since a flood had devastated their small community, they were forced to take shelter in government trailers. The normal city services no longer existed, so the area would seem somewhat rural and uninhabited. Ellen assured him she was aware of the continued flood devastation within some areas.  

 

Ellen commented, " I know about the lack of normal city services because I have much experience with that. I moved to this country from Haiti when I was sixteen years old with my mother." 

 

The man's eyes widened with a sense that Ellen truly understood their plight.  

 

"I must hurry because she has no family but me. She is very afraid.” 

 

He continued to increase the speed of the smoking and thundering Jeep as he weaved through the rough terrain that still had enormous amounts of flood debris. It smelled of rotting fish and human waste. She lifted the sleeve of her jacket to her nose and held her breath to keep from gagging. Ellen grasped the door handle frequently to steady herself due the swift moving Jeep's lack of seat belts.  

 

Once at the trailer, the man hastily placed the Jeep in park but left the headlights on. He lunged from the Jeep as if he were high hurdling to get inside. As quickly as he exited, he returned stating "My wife is not here! I've got to find her because something must be really wrong." Within two minutes he arrived at a Red Cross temporary tent. He stormed in shouting for his wife until he found her at the rear of the tent with a Red Cross attendant. Her eyes lit up with relief when she saw the man. The wife cried out for mercy as the man took her hands and consoled her.  

 

The wife then asked, "Why is this woman here with you?" 

 

He explained why Ellen was there and what she would be able to do. The wife rolled her eyes distrustfully at Ellen but said to her, "This is our life, so please be careful." 

 

Ellen assessed the wife’s small stature to weigh about one hundred pounds. Controlling her physically, if necessary, wouldn’t be a problem.  

 

Ellen leaned over the wife and said to her, "Remain calm. I need to touch you and determine the type of massage needed to prevent harm for the procedure." She then slowly placed her left hand at the top of the wife’s abdomen to determine the location of the overdue baby’s head. She then placed her right hand on the forehead of the wife to convey a sense of connection and then began her humming chant. It's was time to prepare and sanitize the area for her grandmother’s Breech style of delivery. 

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Ellen said to the wife “I perfected breech delivery techniques at a research hospital before I retired. I know how to safely manipulate and guide the movement of an unborn child into the birth canal.” 

 

Ellen further explained that pain in the wife’s back would decrease after the baby started moving downward. She advised the wife to only push when she told to do so.

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The wife asked, “Why not push?” 

 

“Because your baby has not turned. I must guide the movement slowly to prevent umbilical cord tightening around neck area.” 

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The wife then exclaimed, “Please don’t kill my baby!”

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The husband swiftly removed the newspaper article from his jacket as he moved closer to his wife’s face. “She’s the special one in this article. I found her for our baby!”

  

“That’s right, you just told me that. I’m trusting her.”

  

Two hours passed and after much sweating and moaning, the baby was ready to enter the birth canal. The wife had a cloth between her teeth to bite down on for the increasing pain while the man held down her shoulders. Ellen could see that birth canal had expanded and she felt confident to allow a small push from the wife. Ellen continued the massage manipulation as the baby began the slide into the world. Ellen had to gently tug on each side of baby’s hip without rotating the body because it was a buttocks-first delivery. Once the umbilical cord was removed safely and the baby’s mouth and body were cleansed, Ellen gave a gentle pat on his buttocks and sound exploded from his lungs. 

 

Ellen placed the baby boy across the mother’s chest and the resounding laughter of joy was heard throughout the tent. The hours of dread and fear were replaced with joy and relief. As the mother embraced her son, she looked at the father and said to Ellen, “Thank you for blessing us with your very special skill.”