One thing that Call the Midwife has routinely taught us is that the saying “it takes a village” is very true. Some times, that village is other members of the family, and sometimes, it is support from the local council. Then there’s the support of the midwives at Nonnatus House. Well, Call the Midwife season 14, episode 4 continued with that lesson.
Caution: This post contains SPOILERS for Call the Midwife season 14, episode 4.
Nonnatus House started the episode by getting ready for the arrival of a new postulant, Sister Catherine. She arrived ahead of time, ready to start her studies and learn more about the way of the midwives in the order. However, the main focus of the episode was two patients, both needing support from those around them.
A mother of seven asks for an abortion in Call the Midwife season 14, episode 4
When Mrs. Wrigley comes to the clinic, it’s to ask the doctor for an important request. She would like an abortion. It’s clear that this is something she’s thought about. She’s 46 and has seven children already, and she just can’t face having another child. Her husband does little to help around the house, and it’s not like all her children are old enough to look after themselves or help out around the house.
The one child who could help is pregnant with her own baby and showing some signs of pre-eclampsia. Fortunately, she has no protein in her urine, so the doctor is able to rule that out, but she needs to temporarily move back home so her mom can help her as her military husband is stationed in Cyprus.
While the doctor is on board with an abortion — which is now legal in the 1970s — he points out that another doctor needs to confirm that it’s something that should be done. He also wants to book Mrs. Wrigley in for getting her tubes tied to prevent pregnancy happening again.
Mrs. Wrigley doesn’t get as far as the abortion, though. She suffers a miscarriage, and she needs a procedure to remove some of the tissue left inside. The doctors decide this would be a good time to get her tubes tied as well, and so, she undergoes the procedure. Sadly, she doesn’t make it out alive, and the entire family is thrown into turmoil.
This is a huge eye-opener for Mr. Wrigley, as he realizes just how much his wife had to deal with while he worked and went to the pub. His eldest daughter blames him for her mom being gone, especially now that she is left picking up the slack when she should be resting to keep her blood pressure down. When she goes into labor, Nurse Crane has the perfect idea to help. With the midwives not being all that familiar to the young mom, Nurse Crane goes to see Mr. Wrigley to get him to come to the hospital. There’s a beautiful bonding moment as Mr. Wrigley experiences the world of childbirth for the first time — to be fair, back in this time period, men weren’t allowed in the delivery rooms in most circumstances.
The entire situation offers a chance for the family to heal, as the daughter remains at home until her husband is able to get back home. It’s time for dad to step up, and it’s heartbreaking that it took the death of his wife for him to finally realize this. There is time to change, though, as many of the children are still in elementary school.
Nurse Turner helps a mom get her child back into an appropriate school
In the second story of Call the Midwife season 14, episode 4, Jill Trottwood returns. She is at the laundromat with her disabled son Andrew. Fortunately, Nurse Turner is there when Andrew accidentally cuts his hand when slamming a washer door over and over again. It’s clear that Jill is in over her head, but she keeps trying to focus on her son and his needs.
It turns out that Andrew caught measles as a baby and it led to a brain infection. He has been like this ever since, but he was once in a school for disabled children — they call it a Special School in the episode because that’s what it was known as at the time, and that’s the wording I’ll use in the rest of the post as I don’t agree with washing away darker parts of history.
Jill, who sells catalogues because it’s a job she thought she could do easily from home, explains that the council decided to stop the funding for the bus to the Special School because it was out of the boundary. Andrew needs to go to a closer Special School, except there isn’t one. Nurse Turner is appalled by this, and she goes on a mission to figure out what to do.
At first, Sister Veronica goes to speak to the council. There’s a lot of paperwork to fill out, but since when is a nun afraid of tedious work? She gets to filling it all out, but the answers aren’t coming. Nurse Turner needs to do something else. She needs to find someone else to help.
Who better to turn to than Violet? After all, she’s routinely proven that she wants to do what’s best for the people of Poplar. It’s what makes her such a popular mayor. Sure enough, she’s able to get the council to rethink their ridiculous policy, and the episode ends with Andrew getting back into the school.
You see, the school was helping Andrew and he was learning. There was also the benefit of friendship. As he was back home, he started to regress and he was struggling not having friends to play with. Jill was also struggling due to her husband leaving them (because he couldn’t handle Andrew’s disability) and she had nobody to turn to for help.
Jill turned out to be the perfect person to help Nonnatus House and the clinic, though. Dr. Turner had commented that the sign up sheet for the measles vaccination wasn’t filling up all that quickly. The nurses had some leaflets printed out, and Jill decided to use her own experience to help get more people to sign up for the vaccination. Outside the playground, she made people realize that Andrew’s condition was due to catching measles, and he caught that before there was a vaccination.
There is a slight fear when the strike action affects the trains and Dr. Turner has to drive to pick up the vaccines, but Sister Veronica is able to use some “unsavory” tactics to get people to stay. She tells them there will be free biscuits handed out at intervals. Who wouldn’t stay for free biscuits? This is also great for Andrew, as other kids hang out with him and offer him the social interaction that he needs.
Sister Catherine shares everything she’s given up in Call the Midwife
I’m not sure that the life of a nun is actually what Sister Catherine wants. She shares about how she believes that she needs to give up everything, going through what that means to her. It includes choice, and that’s what she misses the most. She misses choosing the food she wants to eat, and what she wants to wear.
The way she talked, I’m not sure the call to be a nun came from God. It’s almost like she is running away from something, and the promo for the next episode also suggests that. I get a feeling that Sister Julienne realizes that as well.
Call the Midwife airs on Sundays at 8/7c on PBS.
Stay up to date with the latest historical fiction news with Claire and Jamie.