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>>Lalanbai
“Lalanbai is as
close as one can get to a living saint. She emanates
wisdom and love,” remark Stanford students who
listened to her recount her life story.
As she tells it,
she has learned a lot in her thirty-six years as a
Community Health Worker (“CHW”). Married away
at the age of six, she did not know love from her
family. She had her first child at 12 and her
second at 13. After her husband died
unexpectedly, she was remarried at 15 to a man more
than three times her age; she did not know love from
him either. As a member of the lowest caste,
she was forced to live outside the village,
hand-to-mouth. During those days, she
remembers collecting cow dung as fertilizer for an
upper caste family, and if she was lucky, receiving
some food in return.
Unloved and
unable to love in the earlier years of her life,
Lalanbai says, “I was a stone… one of the first
things I learned at Comprehensive Rural Health
Project (“CRHP”) was how to be a human being.”
She learned how to love others and be loved.
She learned to read and write. She unlearned
her superstitions about health and learned how to
spread more effective healthcare to her village.
Equipped with knowledge, she changed her village.
Her accomplishments include delivering 750 babies
successfully; reducing the neonatal/maternal death
rate in her
village from
approximately 1-in-2 to 0; ending tuberculosis,
leprosy, and malaria; breaking down barriers within
the caste system; and dramatically curtailing
“violence and hatred against women” in her village.
As she trains
other CHWs at CRHP where she got her start, Lalanbai
offers much wisdom in setting their expectations for
the long haul in needing to earn trust, change
hearts and minds and, eventually, health outcomes in
the village. She underscores that the village does
not change overnight. It is a long-term
effort, and one must work on an individual level,
household by household. CHWs must recognize
that every family is a process – none are successes
or failures. Some families will take a long
time to accept you while others will do so more
quickly and your work with each is never done.
If a husband or wife will not listen, treat their
children or relatives first and then they will
follow. Lalanbai continues on about the social
and emotional challenges that health workers face at
the outset. She urges, “You cannot fear anyone
in your village, even those from upper castes or
those opposed to your efforts. Treat each family
individually, recognizing their individual needs.
When you meet with them, talk to them about their
family situation and get to know them; don’t just go
in and start telling them what they need to do.” She
continues on in more detail. “When in the
home, be sensitive to the family’s specific context.
If they are very poor, when they offer you tea,
politely decline. If they offer tattered or
dirty mats to sit on, do not blink an eye or brush
them off when you sit down. Little things like
that matter.”
The woman sitting
with poise and grace at the head of the room left us
with a few parting words, “To be a good CHW, your
heart has to be in it. Even if it’s your
enemy, treat them with love. Unless you truly love
and care about each family, they won’t care about
you. Nor will they be able to care about their own
family. You are the role model, not just for health
treatments but also for giving love.” With advice
from Lalanbai and other veterans as well as training
from CRHP, new cohorts of health workers are being
deployed to improve health and lives in their
villages every month. |
