Family Planning for Guatemalans Living in Poverty

WINGS brings direct reproductive health services to communities that would not otherwise have access to this care. Often the communities are remote and difficult to get to, either because of the terrain or limited access roads.

Last month, WINGS staff left for Chacalté Carchá early enough to compensate for the fog and the roads, muddy from the rain the night before. For hours, the truck slid through the narrow trail, unguarded on the mountainside. Then the truck sunk into the mud. Then it began to rain. Since hardly anyone passes on this road, there was no one to lend a rope or a hand. The staff thought they might have to cancel the clinic, so Eli, a WINGS driver, walked thirty minutes to the Health Center to let them know that they would be late. Upon returning to the vehicle, he continued trying to maneuver it out. Success! Though a short distance later, it was stuck again.

Carmen, a WINGS nurse, said, “The stick shift just wouldn’t comply, we weren’t getting through. At that point we just put ourselves in God’s hands since we thought that at any minute we’d be rolling down the mountain.”

It started to rain harder when the staff decided to walk the rest of the way to the Health Center, hours late. Eli carried all the equipment he could by himself from the truck to the center, and the staff used what was available there to improvize. During the day, the rain stopped but the wind picked up, bringing with it the makeshift curtains and registration forms. Staff grabbed the edges of the curtains to ensure patient privacy, and paperwork had to be held down with rocks. Despite everything, WINGS nurses performed 31 cervical cancer screenings, 11 Jadelle 5-year implants, and one IUD.

Thankfully, after the clinic community members helped get the vehicle out. They followed the truck with buckets of rocks to place under the tires, pushing when it got stuck. Carmen reported, “I have to thank our team, that even in the worst circumstances we help each other out—enthusiastic, optimistic, and always with the desire to do the best we can with what we’ve got.”

WINGS provided Foundation Against Hunger with training in the themes of Sexual and Reproductive Health, and Celia was one of the employees who participated in this training.  Celia is a thirty four year old single mother of two, and she talked to us about her experience of the workshop she received from WINGS.

 “Before the training started, I was worried because I had never taken part in anything similar, and I didn’t see how it would be helpful to me as I am only the secretary.  Now I am grateful to God for the opportunity I was given, because I learned so much. Sometimes the knowledge we have and the things we believe are wrong, and now I feel more comfortable with these themes and am happy to have taken part in the training.

The way the training was done was great – you are not aware of time going by because you are so engaged with the workshop.  My coworkers and I felt really comfortable, and didn’t want the training to end.  I commend WINGS staff for the language [Note: WINGS’ delivers trainings in Spanish and/or a Mayan dialect depending on the language used by the audience] and methods that they used, which made the information really accessible to all of us.  I hope that they are able to replicate their work with many more organizations.

I have never used birth control and anything that I knew about it was from comments or stories that other people had told me.  Now I know so much more, and have already made use of the training.  For example, I shared some of the things I learned about family planning with my parents, brothers, and sisters. They were surprised because, just like me, they had believed many myths about family planning. They say that they want to learn more, and that they are interested in using a family planning method themselves.

Many of my doubts have been resolved.  When I was pregnant with my second daughter, my husband had a vasectomy.  They explained to us what would happen in the operation, but many people say that vasectomies turn men into womanizers and cause them to leave their wives.  I have always been worried that this is why my husband left us, but now I know now that every person makes their own choices and that using a family planning method does not make a person leave their family.

My coworkers are also very happy to have received the training, and what impressed me most was how mature everybody was during the training. Nobody made jokes or used inappropriate words. We have since talked about how ignorant we were before and how we have a duty to share what we have learned ourselves with the communities in which we work.  Although this is difficult to do, it is important that others have the opportunity to learn like we have.

I have made a promise to myself to keep learning more about family planning, and to share what I learn with my parents and my siblings.  I still have many relatives who I have not spoken to about family planning, and I want them all to know what I have learned, because it is so important to our lives.

I am an evangelical Christian and in my church there are many women.  I feel that it is my duty to speak to them about the methods that are available so that if they choose to have sex, but do not want to have a child, they can make healthy, responsible decisions and use a family planning method.

I hadn’t heard about WINGS before this training, but now I pray that God blesses WINGS so that this work can carry on, because it is really helping communities in Guatemala.  I am going to pray for WINGS’ donors, and I hope that they get a chance to see the work that WINGS does.