Children Coping with Stressors

    I was very fortunate to grow up surrounded by people who loved and wanted the best for me. I have always been close to all of my family members, especially my maternal grandmother. I loved visiting her and spending time with her. She would always greet us with a big hug, smile, and homemade treats. I remember the first thing I would do after saying hi to grandpa and her was to run to the laundry room and start snacking on her delicious treats! She meant the world to me, and was the best grandmother anyone could ask for. We had a very special bond. When she passed away, it felt as though I also lost a part of myself that I could never get back. I couldn’t imagine going into that house and not seeing her beautiful smiling face. I couldn’t imagine going into that laundry room and seeing it empty of the food she put her heart and soul into for us. I couldn’t believe she was gone. Being a young child and losing someone that means so much to you is unfathomable. My parents did as best they could helping me through the grief, but they were also grieving the loss of a parent. I became introverted for a while, trying to sift through my thoughts and emotions. That’s when I leaned to writing poetry. We had been learning poetry in school, and I found that this was the perfect outlet to get what I was feeling out of my body. I would sit and write poems about my grandmother and the times we shared, and found that this would help me to feel better about the grief. I saved all of these poems, and sometimes go back and read them to this day. The day I turned eighteen, I got a special tattoo to commemorate my grandmother, I’m not sure how she would feel about that J but it’s a way for me to keep a part of her with me forever. Although I only got a short time with her here on this Earth, I believe that she has been with me since that fateful day watching over me as my guardian angel, and for that I am eternally grateful.

    Grief can be very hard for children to cope with, not only in the United States, but also around the world. In turn, everyone copes with grief in different ways and what works for one person might not work for another. While teaching in Ghana, I came across many students coping with some form of grief. I taught at the SOS Hermann Gmeiner Primary School, and 10% of our students were actually orphans who lived on school property. They became orphans for many different reasons. These children lived ten or fifteen to a home, with only one house mother to take care of all of them. Like many schools in the U.S., there were no counselors at the school, and no opportunity for the school children to travel to get outside help. The other teachers and I would often invite our students to our sun hut after school to talk, play, and ultimately just listen. The stories we heard could range from happy to sad, but mainly we just wanted the students to know that we were there for them to talk to need be. With so many kids in one house, it was nearly impossible for the house mother to give each child uninterrupted individual attention, and we didn’t blame them. We became very close to the children that lived at the school, and it was very hard for me to leave them knowing that they would go back to having no one to talk their grief or problems out with. I had brought some pictures of my house, family, pets, and the beach with me to Africa and decided to leave them, along with a handwritten note, with the children I had become so close to. I wanted them to know that even though I was millions of miles away, I would never forget them and would think of them often. My hope is that I gave them enough strategies and tools to use to cope with their grief after I had left.

Public Health Topics

 

As part of my student teaching experience in my undergraduate studies, I was given the amazing opportunity to teach abroad in the country of Ghana, Africa. I experienced many different things and learned a lot from the country, people, and culture.

This week, we were given the assignment to choose a public health topic to research. We also were to find research about this topic in another part of the world. Because I experienced the lack of healthy drinking water in Ghana firsthand, I wanted this to be my topic. What I found amazed me.

I knew that the water in Ghana was unsafe for me to drink, coming from the United States, but it is also extremely unsafe for the inhabitants of Ghana as well. Take a look at the picture above. The girl on the left is holding a glass of clean, sanitary water like we would find here in the U.S. The girl on the right is holding a glass of what the majority of Ghanaians experience on a daily basis. Out of the 24 million people living in Ghana, 9.5 million lack clean water and 22 million have no sanitation services. The lack of clean water is obviously more prevalent in rural areas, but these numbers are astounding.

Due to drinking unsanitary water, diarrheal disease is the third most commonly reported illness at health centers across the country and 25% of all deaths in children under the age of five are attributed to diarrhea. In a country with such a strong infant mortality rate, these deaths are sad because they can be prevented.

Ghana is a country close to my heart and I hope this information opened your eyes as well. If you would like to get involved or donate to the cause of providing Ghana’s citizens with better access to safe water and sanitation, I urge you to visit the following websites. Every bit helps!

www.water.org/country/ghana

www.wateraidamerica.org/ghana

Childbirth in my life and around the World

            The first part of this assignment was kind of tough for me. Considering I have no children of my own, and I have not taken part in any other births, I had to choose my own to write about. You can see how this can be difficult as I do not remember anything about it, but instead go on how my Mom and Dad have always described it to be. I am the first born in my family, and my Mom had a great pregnancy. She never had morning sickness or any difficulties, and only gained 27 pounds! The day she went into labor was also the night my Dad bowled in a bowling league, and he just happened to be bowling really great that night. Mom had to call up to the bowling alley and tell him to come home; of course all of his teammates were pretty upset. J Labor started around 10 pm and I was born at 4:23 am weighing 7lbs 5 oz. My Mom was tough and had a natural childbirth with no drugs or no epidural, but my Dad almost passed out in the delivery room, LOL. The coolest thing about my birth is that I was born on my Dad’s birthday, so we will always celebrate together.

            I believe that birth can impact a child’s development in many different ways. The birthing process is a very stressful thing for a child to go through, and it is their first experience into the World. Obviously, I think it is important for expectant Mother’s to take care of their bodies and to not put harmful things into it that may affect their unborn children. It is also important for them to do the same after the child is born. Proper prenatal care is also very important to ensure that your child is born healthy.

            I chose to research birth in Ghana, because it holds a special place in my heart. I lived and taught there for 2 months and actually taught with a teacher who was pregnant with her second child. I left before the baby was born, but would be interested in what types of birthing experiences Mother’s in Ghana have in relation to births here in the Unites States. In Ghana, women must often choose between modern, traditional, and religious caregivers when pregnant. The type of care they choose depends on what cultural and religious beliefs they hold. Pregnant women can receive prenatal care at a hospital, maternity house, or church, and all have different practices in how they treat the mother. Ghana is a very superstitious place as well, and infertility is looked at as witchcraft that is taking place. Having children is a social status, and the more children you have, the higher your social status is.

            Birth in Ghana is nothing like my birth experience. My Mother regularly went to the hospital for check ups, and I was born in a hospital setting. Most births in Ghana are at home or in a village common place because of the far distance to the nearest hospital. Poverty in Ghana is also high and their diet mainly consists of carbohydrates. Proper health care and nutrition are not as readily available to Ghanaian women as they are to women in the U.S. This can have major impacts on child development.

Fischer, Michelle, “Childbearing in Ghana: How beliefs affect care.” (2002). African Diaspora ISPs. Paper 76. Retrieved November 2, 2012, from http:www.digitalcollections.sit.edu/African_diaspora_isp/76