Guest Blogger: Valerie Anderson, Coolest Girl on the Planet

Warning: Valerie keeps it real. Not for the squeamish. 
Visit her blog:  Life in the Loony Bin.  (Link on sidebar.)

 It is called Fistula.
If my sister-in-law who gave birth last week had lived in Africa, chances are that she would now have developed a whole new set of problems in her life.

It would be called Fistula.
What's that? Fair warning: If you are male (or female for that matter) you might not want to read this.

Today I am feeling real and I wanting to really say it. I took a class in the UN about this topic, and it is time you learn about it for yourself. I have thought about it for two weeks, and I am tired of thinking
about it all alone.

Fistula holds no respect for money, fame, status or education.

And I quote: (remember, this is just one country's example)
Rural Ethiopian girls traditionally receive their first water jar at age two. By age eight they are carrying loads of water, wood and grain that are much too heavy for their physical size. Despite females being assigned the beast-of-burden role, if food is short, it must go to the boys before the girls. This favoritism exacerbates the stunting of girls’ bones, particularly in the pelvic region.


In Ethiopia rural, poor and often illiterate girls are betrothed between ages of 9 and 13. Married two years later, they usually begin having babies usually by 15 years of age while their bones are still undeveloped. Rape victims may be as young as seven. Whether married or raped, most Ethiopian women have at-home deliveries under dirty conditions with no clean water.


The fistula damage begins early in the labor process when babies become lodged in narrow birth canals, blocked by underdeveloped pelvic bones. This obstructed labor lasts for an average of 3 to 4 days, sometimes as much as a week. During that time, repeated, futile contractions cut off blood to vaginal tissue compressed between the fetal head and the bony pelvis. This tissue becomes necrotic, sloughs off and a fistula (opening) develops between the bladder and the vagina, the rectum or both. The uterus squeezes the unborn babies to death in 95% of fistula cases. The girls are left mourning, traumatized inside and out.


These meant-to-be mothers soon realize that, rather than gaining the status of having produced a child, they are incontinent due to their fistulas. Urine and feces continually trickle down their legs causing sores and soaking their clothes. Due to the resulting stench, husbands, families and communities ostracize these victims, forbidding them from using the village well, which in most cases is their only water source. Because delivery is often on the ground, dirt often enters the uterus and thus many women die from septicemia and other gynecologic injuries. Fistulae can lead to kidney disease and even death. Many of these women drink as little as possible to avoid leakage and thus become dehydrated. Some victims of fistula choose suicide as the only escape from living as a pariah.

Did you know that the US answer to fistula is called a Caesarian Section--C-section. Chances are if you had a C-section here in the states, you would not/could not have had one in Africa and the risks of fistula happening to you are very real. There are an estimated 2 million women and girls living with this every single day. Those are the ones who survive. A woman dies every single minute in pregnancy or childbirth, almost all occurring in Asia or Africa.

There are two countries that this is rampant. Afghanistan and Nigeria. Not passing judgment on culture or religion. Just stating the facts.

My sister-in-law holds a Master of Education and is the director of an environmental education center in California. My foster sister, who gave birth last month, is a foreign diplomat to Tanzania, holding a Masters degree from Columbia University. Both had C-sections. What would their story be if they were in Ethiopia or Nigeria?

The experts say that the number one cause of fistula is children having babies. Their bodies cannot handle it. Their bodies weren't designed to do it. The number one cause of children having babies is child marriage.

That, my friends, is a subject for another day. Another day very soon.

If you want to know more, go to http://www.endfistula.org/

So many things to share...no time to write!

So I went to this amazing Convention at the UN about the Status of Women and my mind was filled with all kinds of cool thoughts and I've been so busy I couldn't share them and now my life has taken over and I can't quite seem to get them all in writing. Or any of them for that matter. Anyone want to take over my life so I can write? Hmmm, no takers.

Well, one thought that I wanted to put up here and that keeps coming back to me from NY was one that came from a great panel discussion about human trafficking. Yes, human trafficking--there is an alive and well slave trade where you can buy and sell human beings for sex. And not just adults, children are bought and sold like commodities for use in horrific ways. So, while I was meeting with amazing women from all over the world to discuss how they are combatting this horror, Nan Kennelly from the US State Department said this,"It isn't getting better. And while every culture values its children,we are still failing them." Failing them. This isn't failure of the "I-forgot-to-pack-your-lunch-money" type. This is the type of failure that I in my suburban little world of Wal-Mart, Target and 7-11 on the corner cannot event fathom. I came away wide-eyed and moved by the stories and statistics that do not lie: we are failing.

But, this was a Convention of Women, so there was this feeling of hope in every session I attended--even those on this topic--and a feeling that change can happen. Me, I can't be like the nuns I learned about who carry big sticks and shut down brothels in a very, shall we say, "old west" kind of way: they walk in, remove thier obstacles and take the children out and hide them and keep them safe. I want to meet those nuns, but I can't be them. What I can do is talk about this topic and others that I started learning about. I can ask YOU to talk about them and that by talking about them and bringing them out of the shadows where they are protected, we can find ways to help. And we can make sure that there is no human in our realm of influence who thinks there is anything that gives a person the right to enslave another human being for sexual purposes.

Want to know more? Go to: http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2009/ to read the official report.