It’s not easy to deal with the hardness of life, and everyone can suffer from the weight of it. In Call the Midwife season 14, episode 5, Sister Julienne suffers a crisis of hope, as she deals with the tiredness of current events.
Caution: This post contains SPOILERS for Call the Midwife season 14, episode 5.
The new episode has two main storylines for the nuns and nurses to handle. Meanwhile, Cyril returns, and we get an element of hope that something could happen between him and Rosalind. And yes, this would be allowed, because unlike the U.S., there were no laws against interracial relationships in the UK.
Meanwhile, Sister Julienne wants to help a mom who is squatting and in a dangerous relationship, while Nurse Turner needs to deal with a heartbreaking situation. Try not to cry throughout this episode!
Sister Julienne feels more tired than ever before in Call the Midwife season 14, episode 5
The episode starts with Sister Veronica heading out to an address to find the parents of children who haven’t been to school in some time. They are all squatting, and Sister Veronica realizes that the mom is heavily pregnant. She wants to bring the mom to the clinic to get checked out, but it’s clear that the husband won’t allow it.
Sister Julienne decides to go and change the mom’s mind. She continues to put up a fight, and it’s clear that the husband is the one preventing the mom from getting the help she needs. His whole family is living in squalor, and he is doing nothing to change that. Realizing what she is dealing with, Sister Julienne can just pray. Eventually, she admits that she is just tired of seeing the same type of women in life. Just as they help one woman escape an abusive situation, there’s another one in the same situation.
On top of that, this mom doesn’t like being told what to do. She’s been in the prison system, and now she wants her freedom.
Fortunately, Sister Julienne is on her way when the mom goes into labor. With a baby safely delivered, the nun and mom get ready for the afterbirth. Only, it doesn’t come. Sister Julienne realizes that there is a twin, and that twin is breech. She sends the two older girls together to get help, while she stays with the mom to help deliver this baby. The mom accepts being told what to do for the safety of her child and herself.
It is difficult and painful, but Sister Julienne is able to safely deliver the baby. After first, there is the fear that the baby was trapped for too long, especially coming out feet first. However, Sister Julienne is able to get her breathing again, and now it’s time to find out where the two girls went. They were picked up by someone who brought them back and shared that an ambulance is on its way.
The dad shows up at the hospital, but the mom, who was beaten before going into labor and was sure that it was this that caused problems for the second twin, made it clear that he should go. He warned if he left that he’d never come back, but that’s for the best. The sisters of Nonnatus House help the mom and now four daughters get shelter and a start in life. It’s not easy starting out, but they have each other, and those two girls did brilliantly to get help for their mom and sisters.
This whole thing gives Sister Julienne a new lease on life. She has more energy than ever before, and there’s hope yet!
Nurse Turner deals with a devastating case in Call the Midwife
Not all storylines involve births and children. Some of them are about the adults the nurses at the clinic visit, and we meet a husband and wife duo where the husband is in an iron lung due to suffering complications from polio. The wife has been by his side ever since, caring for him, but Nurse Turner is worried about how jaundice the woman is looking.
Sure enough, it turns out that she has cancer. As it’s already affected her liver, there’s little hope for her, and we get this heartbreaking story of a man who was sure his wife would outlive him. How will he go on without her by his side?
Dr. Turner learns that there is a more portable version of the iron lung, and Harry is sent on a mission to see if the husband can get it. While it won’t change the husband’s health overall, it will give him a chance to sit up and be with his wife in her dying days. They can hold hands, and sometimes, that’s all people need.
We get this beautiful moment of him looking around his own house and realizing things that he didn’t know about because of how he’s laid down the whole time. He also clearly knows his wife well, and while he can’t save her life, there’s a peace to allow her to die holding his hand. It’s hard not to shed a tear thinking about it.
In the end, he is taken to a care home to make sure people can be there for him around the clock. I could see him dying of broken heart syndrome very soon.
Cyril has news from Jamaica
Cyril returns in Call the Midwife season 14, episode 5. While he’s setting up for the Poplar Commonwealth Games upon the request of Violet to keep the children safe, he shares with a member of his congregation that he’s likely going to have to give up his job as the pastor.
It turns out that his wife has asked for a divorce. She doesn’t want to move back to England, and he doesn’t want to move back to Jamaica for good. He doesn’t know how he can be a divorced pastor, but he’s convinced otherwise.
This does open the door for Cyril and Rosalind, though. It’s clear there is something between them, but Rosalind shares that he’s married and he’s a pastor. I respect her for holding back her feelings, especially with the fact that he’s married. What will happen when she learns that he’s going to be single soon?
Harry also turns to Millicent to ask her for advice on a change of career. He no longer wants to go through with dentistry. He wants to be a doctor, and naturally Millicent is on board with that, especially when he explains others have transferred because the first year of both courses is similar. Now it all depends on what his mother thinks.
Call the Midwife airs on Sundays at 8/7c on PBS.
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