Consequences of Stress on Children's Development

I was born in Bogota Colombia and lived in Colombia until I was 25 years old.  As a child I believe that one of the stressors I learned about very quickly was the violence that existed in Colombia.  Pablo Escobar was known to the most powerful and dangerous drug lord.  He killed so many people, he put bombs in building as well as she blew an airplane with hundreds of people in it.  I was very young and would hear the many things this man was doing.  One day while playing outside we heard a very loud noise that we couldn’t tell if it was fireworks or bomb exploding.  I remember my grandpa running out and telling us to come into the house.  A few minutes later my grandfather turned on the news and sure enough a car was left filled with explosives in front of a government building.  It seemed that every time I watched the news violence was always the topic on the news.  There were nights that I felt scared not knowing if one day a bomb would kill us. 

Although we lived in a country where so much violence existed while going to school our teachers would always make us feel safe.  Teachers always found away to help us cope with that anxiety we felt.  My grandparents and mom would also make sure that we tried and live a normal kids life where we would be able to go out and play and have fun and not think about all the violence happening around us.  When I was a little bit older I learned that I should not be scared of what was going around me because if I continued to worry I would not be able to live a happy life. 

I found a website that called “War Child” this is an organization that help children from many different countries to learn how to cope with adversity like when they are experiencing a war in their own country.  One of the countries this organization supports is Colombia.  It is known that over 2.5 million children in Colombia are affected by conflict.  FARC is a revolutionary armed group that would kidnaped children from their homes and train them to be guerillas.  During the year 1972 and 2014 over 11,000 children were kidnapped by the FARC’s. 

What this organization does for those kids in Colombia is to improve they psychosocial wellbeing and strengthen their capacity to cope with violence they experience.  Together with parents and caregivers, teachers and children taking part in the program, they work to boost protection mechanisms and prevent the recruitment and use of children by armed groups.

https://www.warchildholland.org/colombia

Access to Healthy Water

One area of concern that I chose was access to clean or healthy water.  We all know that water is vital for our survival as well as water is used for many other things.  Not having access to healthy water can really affect in many ways.  As I conducted some research on the topic of countries that suffer from not having healthy water I was shock to the number of people that do not have clear water.  It was sad to learn that 2.1 billion people lack clean water, but more frightening to read that every year over 361k children with age of under 5 will die of diarrhea.  The poor sanitation and water contamination is linked to many other diseases like, typhoid, cholera, hepatitis A and other transmission of diseases.  The countries that have the worst problem with having clean water are among, Mexico, Congo, Pakistan, Ghana, Nepal, Cambodia, Nigeria, and Ethiopia.   

I did a bit more research on Ghana’s water and I found out that 70% of all the diseases are caused by the water not being safe and they have poor sanitation.  Six million people rely on using on a daily basis surface water and 67% do not have toilet facilities.  It is alarming to learn that there is such a high percentage of diseases because of the unsafe water.    It is known that most of the water contamination is because people dump waste materials into the lakes, and rivers and people do not realize the harm they are doing in contaminating their own water they need for consumption.  They might be able to survive with not having any food, but water again is a necessity for survival. 

http://www.who.int/news-room/detail/12-07-2017-2-1-billion-people-lack-safe-drinking-water-at-home-more-than-twice-as-many-lack-safe-sanitation

https://water.org/our-impact/ghana/

Childbirth In My Life and Around the World

Childbirth in My Life

I remember the day perfectly November 17, 2010 when my wife told me that our child was ready to be born.  I had to drive two hours to San Diego since she was having the baby there.  She was already there so driving with my other three step-girls felt as if it was a year.  We were all nervous and wanting to be there for her and the baby.  My wife had been at the hospital since 8am and when we arrived at 12pm she was in major pain.  It took the doctors until 9pm to say that the baby was so big that he would not be able to be born naturally and that my wife would have to have a c-section.  I was told that I could be there for her.  I did want to be there for her, but I felt so nervous that I felt my feet so heavy and my heart was pounding a million seconds.  As we were taken to the labor room I held her hand and told her everything would be fine. They put a sheet over and we could not see anything, and I am kind of glad that I didn’t see the c-section because several times I felt as if I was going to passed out, but I was being a tough daddy.  My son was born weighing 11lbs he was a big chunk of meat and I am glad that my wife did not have him normally.  I fell in love the moment I saw him, and I must thank my wife for being such a trooper in having to bear my child by c-section.  I have many respects for women and for my wife giving birth is out of this world and I believe that no man could do it.   

Childbirth Around the World

I went on to research the birth of children in Africa.  I learned that the leading cause of death in woman has to do with the complication of pregnancies.  It was said that one in 22 women die giving childbirth.  I was very shock by the ratio.  The reason for many deaths in woman is because they lack the proper health care, so they have not choice but to give birth in their own home.  I could not find anything about women having c-section in Africa, so I suspect that many of these women that die is because they cannot have a normal delivery and since they are home trying to deliver they die. 

https://www.theguardian.com/journalismcompetition/giving-birth-the-most-dangerous-thing-an-african-woman-can-do