Amy Brenneman’s Mother-to-Mother Connection

Despite our focus on global reach and far away places, I’m reminded time and again how very small the world is. My recent conversation with actress, Amy Brenneman revolved around her recent trip to Peru with CARE (one of our favorite humanitarian organizations), and served as a reminder that the world is only as big as you want it to be and most of it is common ground. 

Eager to travel with CARE, Amy says, “It took a while to find the right opportunity because, y’ know, there’s the day job.” When Amy’s television series, Private Practice, ended last week, Amy says it, “closed one chapter in my life and opened another.”  That chapter began as a trip to Peru with her family to learn how CARE is addressing malnutrition and hunger in pregnant women and small children with their Windows of Opportunity program. 

Outside of its larger cities, Peru is largely a mountainous country whose citizens live in small villages and rural areas without electricity, running water or access to transportation. Prior to the implementation of a major CARE-supported maternal health overhaul, called the FEMME (Foundations to Enhance Management of Maternal Emergencies) project, most women gave birth in their homes without a skilled birth attendant.  If complications occurred, these women could not reach emergency medical care.  In 1999, Peru’s maternal death rate was nearly 240 for every 100,000 live births. In 2005, it had plummeted to approximately 120. By 2008, it was down to 98.

Both Christy and I have traveled to Peru to witness the dramatic maternal health turnaround CARE helped implement. Our visits to this beautiful, resilient country and the generous, creative people we met there inspired both of us to dedicate much of our careers to learning, writing and doing all we can to help others experience the successes achieved in Peru.

Amy flew to Ayacucho, a small city whose colonial architecture indicates how old their culture is, but whose advanced capabilities to provide medical care to a wide swath of Peruvian citizens hints at Ayacucho’s adaptability.  Amy traveled with our friend, Dr. Ariel Frisancho-Arroyo (who blogged about Christmas in Peru) an obstetrician and CARE staffer working to improve maternal-child health in Peru. Dr. Frisancho and Amy visited two small villages each a few hours drive from Ayacucho over twisty, slippery mountain roads.

Amy with Dr. Frisancho

Amy shares her impressions of the first village they visited, Violeta Velasque:

We arrived with a jolt to the village square – an empty expanse in front of a church where the rain now steadily droned.  Beautiful local women greeted me with flowers, their traditional stovepipe hats keeping them warm.  We were shepherded into a community building where three men – the town’s leaders – stood rather formally behind card tables.  Women and their children lined the sides of the squat building, which had no heating or lighting…It had been some time since I had been in a place with no heat, electricity, running water, cars, or – and this is what struck me the most – no glass in the windows.  There were few windows and so little light on this gray day, with no lamps to help.  The combined effect was medieval.

[There were] clear, well-detailed posters on the walls, which charted the status of each of the village’s 123 souls.  There was a legend on the bottom which showed which households had children, gestating mothers, running water, animals – all the details important to this life.  Because my trip was focused on Windows of Opportunity, they also showed me charts where each infant and child was periodically and rigorously weighed and measured, so that malnutrition could immediately be red-flagged.  The nearest clinic was days away by foot; through CARE’s support, Violeta Velasquez had created its own well-baby clinic, and if any babies were not well, they could alert someone who could help.

Later, Amy traveled with her husband and children, to another village, Guayacondo.  Amy says, “Guayacando was similar on the surface to Violeta Velasquez – no paved roads, cars, and little electricity – but the houses were bigger, cleaner, and some even had running water.  I was once again shepherded into a community room where I saw the plans for the community and the records of the growth of all the children. One chart showed the community’s status from years ago, when many children were malnourished (indicated by an ominous red marker). One chart showed the community’s status now, where virtually none of the children were malnourished, thanks to the Windows of Opportunity program.”

As Amy listened to the presentation, her children, Charlotte and Bodhi played outside.  This was the moment Amy had hoped for, one where children connect without shared language, culture or toys, and did what kids do all over the world – play.  This was also when Amy made her mother-to-mother connection. As she talked with Dr. Frisancho, a local woman approached.  She’d been watching the children play and recognized that she and Amy had something in common. Through translators, she told Amy, “My son is six and he doesn’t speak.”  Amy’s daughter, Charlotte has what Amy described as learning disabilities and she’s “coming along” in her abilities to communicate verbally.  Mother-to-mother, Amy and the woman shared an understanding of what it means to have a child with “differences.”  Amy wondered what would become of this boy, growing up without access to therapy that might make a world of difference.  She realized though that in this tiny village, this child would be cherished, cared for, valued and supported regardless of his differences. Amy says, “That’s what every mother wants for her child.”

Amy’s next mother-to-mother moment demonstrates how powerful change happens through common techniques.  Amy says, “I personally related to the “Plan Familia 2012,” posted on the kitchen wall (in one of the village houses).  CARE encourages each family – as well as each community – to discern personal goals and strategies for achieving them.  There were separate categories for the woman and her husband, and columns for each month of the past year.  Neat checks marked accomplished goals; neat notations marked explanations of why they were not met. It was exactly what I do for myself, and what I encourage my children to do. Here in this village, which on the surface differed so much from my home, we were employing the same strategies to lift ourselves out of vague intentions and discontents, to put pen against paper and say, against seeming insurmountable odds: 

That’s how CARE, Every Mother Counts, communities, families and individuals all over the world accomplish the goals that ultimately go toward creating more common ground, less disparity and more mother-to-mother, person-to-person connections.