St. Martin's Cloak

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To talk about what was really going on … was therapeutic in itself.

Carol Sudtelgte

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While taking the medical history of a woman in a Mayan village, Nurse Midwife Carol Sudtelgte calls out for translator Pam Nesbitt and then reflects on how universally important it is for a women to know that her story has been heard.

I would be in about ten sentences into my basic questions that I could …, you know … “When did it begin? Where is it?” and I could understand and communicate in my rudimentary Spanish and then all of a sudden off would come a huge trail of words, and a story would come out and there was always a story. And I’d step out of the room and I’d yell, “Pam!” And she’d look and me and her eyes would raise and she’d know exactly what I needed and in she’d come and sit down with me and we’d figure out what this story was. So, we had lots of talking, a lot of talking with women to find out what was going on. And I think that very often that when I saw the way the medical care usually was, which was very, you know, lines and lines of people,

“What’s your complaint?” “Headache.” “Here’s some Tylenol. Goodbye.”

I think that’s what people usually experienced.

“What’s your complaint?” “Painful menstruation.” “Here’s some Motrin. Goodbye.”

And to have the opportunity to talk about really what was going on, I think was therapeutic in itself.

The women in Guatemala I found to be so gracious and poised and full of grace – grace filled. They love their children and they love one another. They would sit together in groups outside of my little exam room area and be just chattering away. There’s a community among the women there, they have so much that they share, so many hardships that they have in common. That was another beautiful vision that I have, of women in community. And we’ve lost that in our culture, in our nuclear families, where we’re separated from our aunts and our cousins and our grandmothers. And the women that we grew up with are now 3,000 miles away. Our best friends in college are long distances away. You know, we don’t have this community of women. And it was everywhere. It was around the kitchen, the cooking area, it was in the waiting area. It was just everywhere. We have so much to learn from the women of Guatemala.