One Brave Mama
On Monday and Tuesday, we enjoyed having a guest at Notgrass History. Seth Dunham came to give us some ideas and training. Having him come was a delight, and the visit reminded me of a post I wrote about Seth more than six years ago. This morning I’d like to share that message with you again.
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On the last night of the HSLDA conference, Ray and I sat at a table with our friend Seth Dunham from Demme Learning. You know how conversations go. One story led to another and soon we were on the edges of our seats while we learned the story of Seth and his mama.
Doctors told Seth’s mom that she would never have any children. When she got pregnant in 1971 (two years before the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision), her doctor told her that she must have an abortion. He said that the baby would die and she would die. When she refused to follow his advice, the doctor refused to treat her.
Seth’s mom moved back to her hometown where she found a doctor who gave her the exact same diagnosis, but agreed to treat her. The doctor insisted that she lie on her back for the entire pregnancy. She complied. Seth’s dad visited her on weekends.
On Mother’s Day — two months before her due date — Seth’s mom went into labor. The doctor delivered a three and one-half pound baby boy and left the delivery room. Soon a nurse went looking for the doctor to tell him that there was another baby! The shocked doctor came back and delivered two and one-half pound Seth!
Migrant worker with his wife and twins
in Wilder, Idaho, in 1941.
Courtesy Library of Congress.
The boys went into incubators. Seth’s mom tells the story that he spent his time in the incubator screaming and pushing against the sides of the incubator with his hands and feet which made him spin around and around. Evidently the activity was good for him. Though he soon lost down to two pounds, his lungs began to develop. Seth and his brother spent two months in the hospital before going home to be rambunctious twin boys.
God provided a doctor willing to take care of Seth’s mom during her pregnancy and willing to deliver what he thought would be one baby. No one knew that the doctor himself was seriously ill. He died unexpectedly at the hospital when the boys were only two weeks old.
While Seth was growing up, his mother spoke at churches on Mother’s Day. She told the story of the birth of her twin boys. On Mother’s Day, when Seth was sixteen years old, he noticed a pretty fifteen-year-old girl at the church where his mom was speaking. Seth was quite taken. As she usually did on these occasions, Seth’s mother asked her sons to come up on stage. The fifteen-year-old girl later said that when she saw them, she believed that God wanted her to marry one of the twins. At first, the girl thought her future husband was to be Seth’s brother, but, at the table last Saturday night, Seth told us with a smile and a fist pump that he won out!
Seth’s mother told him that she used to pray that the boys would have twins so they would be paid back for being their rambunctious selves. God answered her prayer when He gave Seth and his brother each a set of twin girls! Seth and his wife later had another beautiful daughter.
Whenever a woman is in labor she has pain,
because her hour has come;
but when she gives birth to the child,
she no longer remembers the anguish
because of the joy that a child
has been born into the world.
John 16:21