Woman Who Lost Husband and Father Gives Birth on a Jakarta Bridge

Jakarta Globe, Erwida Maulia & SP/Fana FS Putra, January 7, 2014

Mutia Rahmawati cradles her newborn baby, while her three elder kids sit to
 her right and left, at a community health center (Puskesmas) in Jatinegara,
East Jakarta. (JG Photo/Erwida Maulia)

Mutia Rahmawati simply looked tired as she cradled her newborn baby girl in her arms in the waiting room of an East Jakarta clinic. Three elder children, aged 2, 4 and 7, glued to their mother’s side, were not yet old enough to understand the magnitude of the ordeal.

“Yes, after this, I’m planning to go back to my home town,” Mutia said on Tuesday. “With my kids.”

Mutia’s journey from her East Java home town of Kediri was prompted by tragedy. Barely a fortnight ago, her husband, 32-year-old M. Abi Rifa’i, was struck by a vehicle when crossing a road shortly after he had disembarked from a ferry at Surabaya’s Tanjung Perak port. Abi, who was returning from working in Kalimantan, died in the accident.

A heavily pregnant Mutia scooped up her three young children on Saturday and, with Rp 600,000 ($49) in her pocket, boarded a bus from Surabaya to Pulo Gadung terminal in the east of the capital to find her father and tell him of her husband’s death.

On arriving in Jakarta, after 800 kilometers on a bus across Java, Mutia was forced to confront yet more bad news.

“The local urban ward head said my father died of a heart attack two months ago at Cipto Mangunkusumo Hospital,” Mutia said. “He was buried at the public cemetery in Karet [Central Jakarta]. I did not know that; nobody told me.”

With her three young children in tow, Mutia planned to travel across town on Monday to Puri in West Jakarta to purchase herbal medicines for her work back home as a traditional healer. After paying for the bus tickets, local transport in Jakarta and food for her children, Mutia was left with only Rp 100,000.

She had planned to spend the night in a mosque in Tanah Abang on Sunday night before continuing on to Puri on Monday. She forewent meals on Sunday, but finally decided to buy satay Padang for her and her children in Jatinegara, East Jakarta, late in the evening.

The 33-year-old and her children stopped on an overpass in Kebon Pala, Jatinegara, to eat and rest at around 11 p.m.

“Suddenly my stomach churned and I couldn’t stand,” Mutia said. “I thought I was just too full from eating Padang satay.”

Alone—except for her young children—on a filthy overpass in East Jakarta in the middle of the night, Mutia’s water broke and she entered labor.

‘I just kept pushing’

Marni, a midwife at state-run clinic Puskesmas Jatinegara, cuts a reassuringly maternal figure with kind eyes and an easy demeanor.

“She said ‘I just kept pushing and pushing here and there’ [pointing to her belly],” Marni recounted, saying that Mutia had said she simply practiced what her relatives told her when giving birth.

Shortly after Mutia’s baby girl was born, weighing 2.7 kilograms and 48 centimeters tall, a passerby walked over the bridge and ran for help. A coffee vendor then went to Marni’s clinic and staff there were dispatched to bring Mutia in for treatment.

Mutia, however, refused, saying she needed only to rest and that she would be unable to pay for care.

“She initially refused to be taken here, saying she had no money,” Hafitawati, an official with Puskesmas Jatinegara, said on Tuesday. “She said, ‘I don’t want to! I don’t want to!”

She was, however, persuaded in the end and was given a Class III bed (the lowest of three classes of medical care in Jakarta) for two nights.

Hafitawati said both mother and the baby were healthy. Mutia, who had believed the birth to be premature, thought she was only six months’ pregnant, but the weight of the baby and examinations by medical staff indicated that all was as it should be.

“If infection happens, the symptoms usually appear within 24 hours,” Hafitawarti said. “But there have been no indications of infection. Hemorrhage often happens in the case of a woman giving birth to a fourth child.

“But both the mother and baby are in good health.”

Medical bill waived

“She speaks articulately; speaks the language of an educated person,” Hatifawati said. “When the first TV station arrived today for an interview, she asked whether it would be live. She said she did not want to be interviewed in a live TV report.”

An exhausted Mutia answered journalists’ questions in a matter-of-fact manner as Jakarta Governor Joko Widodo arrived at the clinic to wish her well and offer the city’s assistance in getting her home safely.

Hafitawati said Mutia would have been liable to a Rp 240,000 already-subsidized medical bill for the maternity service, which included the fee for the room. The clinic chose to waive this, but said it had made an exception in doing so because Mutia had not been able to present a valid ID card, which is commonly required for government-sponsored free or low-cost medical care.

World Bank data from 2012 show a maternal mortality rate of 220 per 100,000 live births and 26 infant deaths per 1,000 births. Some 270 mothers died per 100,000 live births in 2005, and Indonesia’s infant mortality rate has steadily declined in recent years.

“Seeing her and the baby’s healthy condition, they can already be discharged [from Puskesmas],” Hafitawati said.

At 12 p.m. on Tuesday, Joko arrived at the clinic, walked in and shook Mutia by the hand. She was then transferred to a boarding house in Central Jakarta to rest and recuperate.

Asked what they thought of Mutia, Hafitawati and Marni both nodded at each other in agreement. “Tough,” they said.

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