Lessons from Grace: Part 1

 I am living with a dream. That dream is named Grace MacNair. Every single day she teaches me so much about…….everything. Is it weird to look up to someone younger than you?! I say nay!! I totally admire my new housemate, though she is 1.5 years younger than me. That don’t mean nothin. Anyway, I started compiling the following list so I wouldn’t forget all of the many things I learn from Grace each day, most of which deal with food and birth. I am aware that some of them may expose what a lack of common sense I have. Aint no shame:

1)    When you make rice, don’t stir it. Makes the texture so much better!

2)    There are 4 types of placenta praevia

3)    Meconium = newborn baby poop. Sometimes it can come out and land all over the person delivering. Yum.

4)    Don’t rinse off tomatoes before storing them because it takes off their protective layer

5)    Papaya, if eaten in high amounts, can be a natural form of birth control. 

6)    The healing powers of ginger root. One morning my stomach was up in arms and Grace boiled some water with cut up ginger in it, put in some honey, and voila. I was completely better in 1 hour.

7)    The best position for giving birth is squatting, not laying on your back on a table (like I grew up seeing on TV)

8)    Obstetric fistula is a condition that develops during birth where a hole develops either between the vagina and the rectum or the vagina and the bladder, causing either feces or urine to freely flow out of the vagina at all times. This is very common in Malawi for a number of reasons and most of the time a woman’s husband will leave her if she has this condition.

9)  It is NOT that hard to take a bucket bath. Just heat up some water, put it in a bucket, and pour it on yourself. Hello duh. 

And most importantly:

10) You have to know what you don’t want in life as much as you know what you do want. 

More to come.