Catching Babies Safely
Shawn Marie Fox was a toddler when she witnessed her brother's home birth.
Shawn Marie Fox, Accelerated BSN/MSN Program
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Reaching a Milestone: Scholarships: Faculty Research: Service-Learning: |
At an age when most kids haven’t yet learned to read, write, or ride a bike, toddler Shawn Marie Fox 12N 13MN was witnessing her brother Jeremy’s home birth. “My parents really involved me,” she says, and a fascination with nurse-midwifery was born.
Flash forward two decades, and Fox has just started the nursing school’s accelerated BSN/MSN program, on the heels of more than three years of Peace Corps service in Ghana. It was there that she participated as an adult in more home births. “I got to catch a baby in a little mud hut,” she says, “To see that firsthand in Ghana changed my life completely—realizing that birth is such a natural process.”
Fox had other realizations during her time in Ghana. “I recognized my limited ability to offer practical skills to people,” she says. “People wanted me to be able to treat their illness or teach them technical clinical skills, and I didn’t have any of that.”
A heartbreaking moment drove home that realization for Fox. She’d been helping establish a health clinic for her rural area when a woman went into labor and suffered life-ending complications.
“It was a tragic situation,” says Fox. “That was very sad. I had the resources to help build this clinic, but I couldn’t help this individual survive.”
In response, Fox got busy educating her community about ways to access health care during childbirth. In her off hours, she filled out her application to Emory, spurred by the nursing school’s strong community health focus.
Her application quickly came to the attention of faculty members. The school offered her admission—and then, after her acceptance—the Harriet and Ellis Williams Scholarship. “I chose Emory before I received the scholarship, but I had resigned myself to the idea that I was going to be in debt for the rest of my life,” she says. “So knowing I won’t be in quite as much debt for quite as long is big.”
Fox already has big plans for life after nursing school. Her goal is to become a family nurse-midwife in a rural area—either in the United States or abroad. There, she’ll increase access to health care and be ready to catch many more healthy newborn babies safely in her arms.—Dana Goldman
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While serving with the Peace Corps in Africa, Fox assisted with several home births. “I got to catch a baby in a little mud hut. To see that firsthand in Ghana changed my life completely—realizing that birth is such a natural process.” |
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