894: I Couldn't Help but Notice

27:39They speed the gurney down the hall to the operating room. Katie is far from out of the woods. The baby has to survive through the surgery. And if she does, what about the possibility of brain damage or cerebral palsy? An anesthesiologist puts Katie under. At this point, Dr. Fuchs has been riding the bed for almost 90 minutes. Remember, no more than 10 minutes to C-section is best practice. She still can't leave her post, which means now they have another problem. The nurses can't fit the surgical tool table over Katie the way they normally would, because Dr. Fuchs is in the way. So her back will have to serve as the table.

28:20They throw a drape over her, basically a plastic bag. Dr. Fuchs will become part of the surgery. So we basically put the surgical drapes over the top of Dr. Fuchs through the, you know, betadine sterilizing fluid on Katie. They opened a bottle of iodine and dumped it over her belly, over my top of my arm, my forearm that was, you know, near her. So my cheek is laying on Katie's thigh. I have my head sideways, trying to breathe in a little air pocket in this drape. It's a very awkward position, to say the least, for her and me. We have surgery equipment and tubing and electrocautery and suction kind of sitting on top of Dr.

29:10Fuchs because she's right there between Katie's legs. They are, I can feel they are putting their tools on my back. But they're missing some usual tools, like a Doppler, to monitor the baby's heartbeat. And nurses sort of scurried about looking for a Doppler. They either couldn't find one or they didn't have one available, but they had no Doppler anyway. And so I told her, it's okay because I can feel the heartbeat. And so, you know, it had been 120s, but then at one point, while they were still prepping, it went down to like 90. And so I called that out to her. I said, so we're down to 90, you all better hurry.

29:48And what is optimum? A normal fetal heart rate is 120 to 160. And so we allow a little bit outside that range, but 90 is definitely getting in trouble. It's often the signal that there's an impending disaster. My fear was the next beat was going to be 60 and the next beat, you know, nothing. And then I did my usual, which I pushed a little harder on the head, tried a little harder to protect the cord, and I felt the heart rate go back up to like the 120s. So then I sort of called out again to reassure them, we're back up to the 120s, you're okay, we're doing all right. Dr. Shearhard starts the surgery.

30:32As soon as she went to sleep, I made the incision, got down to her uterus. I could feel them start to cut the skin and the muscle layers to enter the abdomen. And I thought, oh dear, my fingers are awfully high up there. What if they cut my fingers? I better pull back a little bit at just the right moment, but not too soon to lose the heartbeat. So I withdrew a little bit, and then I could sort of feel them that they were in the uterus. And my hand reached down to pull the baby's head out, and our hands touched. So my hand touched Dr. Fuchs' hand as I was lifting the baby's head out of the incision.

31:08The C-section is done in two minutes, and the baby is breathing. She's born at 7.58 a.m. She's 7 pounds, 12 ounces. Dr. Fuchs, gasping for air under the drape, slithers out and climbs off the table. When she leaves the OR, she's shaky, starts to see black before her eyes. She almost passes out from the sheer effort of the delivery. Her nurse, the one with the big blue eyes and the loud voice, she runs and gets her a chair and a glass of water.

31:43When Katie wakes up, her baby is alive. But she's in an incubator that has lots of tubes. Katie can't be with her, and they can't stay here in the hospital. With the department closed, the nurse is gone. Holton has no way to admit a newborn, no one to take care of the baby, or of Katie, who should recover in a hospital for a couple of days. The life flight medics are there, and they start getting the baby ready to fly to a bigger hospital. Katie doesn't understand what's happening. I could see her off to my left when she was getting worked on, and then when I was in the recovery room, she was still getting worked on because then that's when they put her in their incubator type thing.

32:28I still didn't get to hold her. Then they load the newborn into the Life Flight helicopter, and it takes off for Eastern Maine Medical. I cried. I cried. I mean, like, I didn't know at that time. I didn't know how she was. I didn't get to see her. I didn't get to know anything. And then I just saw her and wheel her away. It's just a, I don't know how to describe it. It's a very hard thing, especially seeing her leave. I don't know. It's just hard. It was hard. Very hard. Katie has to follow her new baby to the other hospital by ambulance. But she's just out of a major surgery. She needs an OB nurse to accompany her.

33:15And Holton doesn't have anyone. So the ER makes another call to Heather Quint. Heather's the nurse you heard at the opening of this story, the one who used to run labor and delivery, and got the sudden matter-of-fact news that the OB department was closing. They ask her to go with Katie in the ambulance. Heather races to the hospital and walks into the recovery room. I asked Heather why she showed up that day. I wanted to be like, when they closed it down, I wanted to be like, okay, this is what you guys want, this is what you're going to get. But the nurse in me, the person in me, that's my patient.

33:56Hell yes, I'm going to be there. I threw on my clothes and I was there and I went to Bangor with her and I sat and I held her hand and I talked to her the entire time. So no, oh, when I got the call, I wanted to be like, figure it out, but not when my patients are involved. I'm like, yep, I'll be right down.

34:16When I think about what it took to deliver this one baby, this is the thing I've been struck by the most. So many people's instinct to save a life, no matter what. Right now in America, the majority of rural hospitals no longer have labor and delivery departments. And instead, here is a collection of people choosing to jump in, to fill in gaps. This is a success story. Katie's baby is fine, healthy, no brain damage, no cerebral palsy, which is remarkable because this baby was much more likely to die than to survive. This is what success can look like today. In some places, we're creating a hero-based health care system, and we can't rely on the Avengers in order to have a baby.

35:07the whole Marvel universe showing up to help a person give birth safely. That's what hospitals are for.

35:26Elaine Appleton-Ground. That story was produced by Lily Sullivan and edited by Fia Bennett. Elaine originally learned about this story from reporting by Emily Hedegaard and Stephanie McPheeters of the Main Monitor. Coming up, raise your hand if you know what Trud de la Cestia means. That's in a minute, comrades, from Chicago Public Radio, when our program continues. This message comes from Schwab. At Schwab, you can get everything from self-directed investing to full-service wealth management all in one place. No matter your investing goal, life stage, amount to invest, or know-how, you can invest your way with Schwab.

36:06This message comes from Betterment. Their automated investing and saving tools give you the quiet confidence of someone who knows where to put their money with tax smart tools that help grow your after-tax returns year-round. Get started today at Betterment.com. That's B-E-T-T-E-R-M-E-N-T dot com. Investing involves risk, performance not guaranteed. Betterment is not a tax advisor, nor should any information herein be considered tax advice. Please consult a qualified tax professional. This message comes from Capella University. That spark you feel? That's your drive for more. Capella University's FlexPath learning format lets you earn your degree at your pace, without putting life on pause.

36:48Learn more at capella.edu. This message comes from NetSuite. They say that every day your business is late to AI, you fall two days behind. Fortunately, there's NetSuite Next. NetSuite Next is where your business meets AI because AI is built into everything you do. It automatically surfaces custom insights throughout your day. AI agents work alongside you to solve problems. It's just like you're having a conversation with a colleague. If your revenues are at least in the seven figures, try NetSuite next for free. Go to netsuite.ai slash story. It's this American life from Ira Glass. Today's program, I couldn't help but notice.

37:29We have stories where people see a new future arrive, one that is not quite as pleasant as the past. And they can't help themselves. They take action in some way or another in their own little corner of the world. We've arrived at Act Two of our program, Act Two, conversations about important things. So the documentary that won this year's Academy Award is called Mr. Nobody Against Putin. It was co-directed by a Russian guy and an American, Pasha Tonkin and David Borenstein. And it's about the propaganda campaign that was rolled out in Russia after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. And the shock of that propaganda push for one person in particular.

38:08If you haven't seen the film, it is really worth seeing. I am one of the people on staff here at This American Life. Valerie Kipnis has watched it four times. She'll tell you why. Here's Val. Here are some scenes from my family growing up. Someone, let's say my mom, would say this to me. Glory to labor. She'd say it in Russian. Then she'd hand me a broom. Or she'd say, Trud делечести. Labor is a matter of honor. She used to say that on Sunday mornings when she woke me up for chores. These are all propaganda slogans from her upbringing in the Soviet Union. She and my dad both grew up there. My dad would say things like this too.

38:50So did my grandmothers. They both live with us. And these lines always got a laugh from each other. Like my mom would say,

39:02And my grandmother Bella would laugh and say,

39:12Unlike them, I grew up here, which meant I was always behind, always playing catch-up in a household full of inside jokes, always trying to see into this world they had in their heads. I was obsessed with it. So I'd ask the same questions over and over again. And they would answer my questions, patiently, kindly, on long car rides, on the subway to school, on our walks near the BQE. But I kept going. I wanted to understand what it actually felt like to live surrounded by banners and slogans. My grandmother would shrug and say, It just was what it was. It didn't feel special to us. We didn't know another version of life.

39:56And then, she'd call me by my family nickname, Puchimuchka, which means roughly, kid who drives us crazy by asking why all the time.

40:08Being a Puchimuchka and all, it's only natural that I watched this new documentary four times. Three times before it won the Oscar. Just saying. And the thing I couldn't get enough of was that here was a movie that answered some of the questions I'd been asking for so long. The documentary starts less than a month after Russia invaded Ukraine, the beginning of the full-scale invasion. And it focuses on one school and one town in Russia, as the Ministry of Education rolls out a massive, nationwide propaganda campaign, a new, quote, patriotic curriculum, which would include new lesson plans for teachers, nationalistic poem recitations for students, mandatory school-wide salutes to the flag, and mandatory lessons called Rozgavore o Vazlom, conversations about important things, where teachers are asked to talk about stuff like the importance of war songs or the heroism of Russian fighters.

41:07Also, a single approved set of history textbooks written by two people closely affiliated with the Kremlin. High schoolers would start paramilitary training in gym class. And in the school that's in the documentary, one teacher captures how this all plays out. Pasha Talankin. And I called him up. Here was a person who made a whole film about what it felt like to see slogans in the auditorium. Different slogans than the ones my parents and grandparents grew up with. A very different time. But with an undeniable similarity. Both then and now, the state had a tight grip on its own people. And here was Pasha, who wasn't just seeing what was happening around him.

41:48He wanted the whole world to see what he was seeing.

41:56This is Pasha. He's got a round, wide-eyed baby face, big glasses. He's an impish kind of person who talks through a smile like he's in on some joke you don't know about. The school in the film is actually the same school he once attended. And he loves the school, loves his students, loves his grumpy mom. She's the school librarian. And when the film begins, he's the school's event coordinator and videographer. He films the piano recitals, graduations, performances. And under the brand new patriotic curriculum at Pasha School, Pasha was told he now had a brand new role. He would be filming teachers and students performing the new lessons.

42:37He'd be filming the new flag salutes and paramilitary trainings. And he'd be sending all of that footage to the government as proof of compliance. I wanted to know what he thought of his new role as he was doing it, how it actually felt. He answered by telling me a story that never made it into the film.

42:57What was I thinking about when I filmed this? I mean, at first I was just, how do you say this in Russia, I started like sweating under my visor. I just lost my mind about what was happening. I just totally freaked out.

43:18When I was going to film computer class, it didn't end up in the final cut, I asked myself a question.

43:28Who is that idiot who is going to be watching all this shit? I mean, who is he? Who is that moron? I mean, it should be some sort of paid job sitting and watching all this shit. I mean, they should pay you some money for that, at least a little bit. Anyway, I did this one little bit of trickery where I left in only the beginning of the class where the teacher says, hello kids, and the end where they say, okay, class is over. But the shot itself went the whole time of the class, 45 minutes. So in the middle there was just a black screen as if something had gone wrong with my camera. And I sent the video in and I sat there waiting as they looked over the footage.

44:10And I kept waiting for them to say, you know, we can't see it, something went wrong, It's just a black screen. And they didn't give me a single note. And I thought,

44:23Holy shit. I'm here not to actually record, but to surveil the teachers. You know, watch out. We're watching you. We have a camera. Here it is recording you. And in that moment, I thought, I'm being used. bullshit. I'm being used. He figured, yeah, okay, they were using him. But he was simultaneously and obsessively filming the changes at his school for his own purposes. And the footage that Pasha captured was really eye-opening for me. It answered so many of the questions I'd badgered my family with over the years. Because the propaganda, as it rolls out, is sort of the opposite of what I'd always imagined it would be.

45:12You know, the classic images of state control. The seamless, crisp obedience. Massive signs, arms being raised in unison, echoey speeches delivered to neat rows of thousands of people. Pasha shows scenes that are so intimate and small and messy. A teacher is stumbling over new words she's now required to say. Denotsification. Demilitarization.

45:39He films teenagers, bored out of their minds, staring blindly into space, as another teacher tells them.

45:50If you were born in this country and you don't believe we're doing the right thing, then leap. Go to the country that you think is better. Pasha films young kids with these tiny red berets chanting new slogans in an assembly.

46:08They're excited, but looking at each other like, right? We're saying the right thing? The school days in the film look kind of normal, in so many ways, despite all the changes. Kids still horse around and tease each other, there are still piano recitals. It's still just school. But Pasha was like the kid in the emperor's new clothes. Every change stood out to him, and he couldn't stop talking about it. His own mother was like, of course these things are happening. They've always been this way. Shut up. And he argued with her. He lived in a sort of continuous state of shock, about the war, about the propaganda.

46:46And he told me that when the patriotic curriculum started, he kept sort of waiting for the people around him to freak out as much as he was about what they were being asked to do. But most people just went along with it, adapted, or chose to stay quiet. I wondered why he didn't do that. Then when I talked to him, I got it. For starters, Pasha and I are almost the same age, in our 30s. And part of why he's so stunned by what's happening is because of the era he grew up in. It was right after the Soviet Union fell apart, but before Vladimir Putin really started consolidating power. So Pasha was raised in this short window of time when students weren't flooded with slogans and propaganda in the schools.

47:27when schools were left mostly untouched by the state apparatus because the state apparatus had fallen apart. And so what Pasha was seeing was something my parents and grandparents never got to see, the beginning of a propaganda push in the schools, which meant he understood what his school was losing when it adopted these changes. And he knew what he was personally losing as nationalism became more and more strictly enforced. Over and over again in the film, He addresses people in his life in the camera directly. Like, can you believe this? Why is this happening? Почему? He told me that off-camera he had many more exchanges like that, especially with the other teachers.

48:11The teachers came to me. They said, Pasha, we don't like all this. And then they come into class and started to say what the Ministry of Education had sent over to them. The teachers are hostages of this system, too.

48:31Pasha also saw himself as a hostage. Before the war and the new curriculum, Pasha was the teacher with the pussy right poster on his wall. The cool guy. The weirdo's office all the theater kids hung out in. The teacher who had different politics than what was on TV every night. And for a while, even after the war was underway, he was able to continue being that guy. He wore blue and yellow paperclips on his clothing as symbols of support for Ukraine. He hung an image of an anti-war flag in his office, flipped a Russian flag outside the school upside down. One time, he even played Lady Gaga singing the Star-Spangled Banner during a flag assembly, instead of the Russian national anthem.

49:13In the movie, he does things that I could not believe he was getting away with. In a country that was introducing laws to criminalize things like even saying that the war was in fact a war. How on earth could he just do these things and not get in trouble?

49:30People sort of saw me as a jester, a holy fool. You know, there he goes, walking around, being foolish.

49:45In Russia, there is this historical tradition that the jester, the holy fool, could speak out even to the czar, you know. the lowest level of society, the most seemingly worthless people, they could say exactly what they thought, tell anyone, right to their face. But that didn't mean the czars would just ignore him forever. When I talked to Pasha about how his constant provoking was playing out in real life, he told me that behind the scenes of making the film, he could feel his status changing from holy fool to persona non grata. This isn't in the film. But at some point, at Pasha's school, compliance started being supervised in person via a new quote advisor on student affairs.

50:28And this advisor took a special interest in Pasha.

50:35This advisor was supposed to monitor student activity on social media, establish contact with them, basically sniff everything out. And so one day this advisor came to me and said, you know, I'm going to close your little bullshit factory, your office, in other words, right? I'm going to close it. And so I took my door off its hinges and put it in front of her door and said, how are you going to close this bullshit factory if it doesn't have any doors? But, of course, this performance eventually ended, and I returned the door to its place. But in the meantime, she got really committed to this work of telling the students not to come see me.

51:24And fewer kids were showing up at his office. The domain he'd carved out inside the school, not just the physical space of his office, but the permission he represented for kids who wanted to joke around, talk freely, ask questions, and for him to be able to do that. That was being shrunk down to nothing. When I asked Pasha what this period of his life felt like, he gave me an answer that I can't help but classify as literally the most Russian thing I've ever heard. He said it was like this one painting he loves, Marge Hollers on the Volga, which is an oil-on-canvas painting by Ilya Repin. It depicts 11 men hauling a barge along the banks of a river.

52:05These men are at the point of collapse from exhaustion, oppressed by heavy, hot weather, leaning into these big leather straps attached to the boat they're pulling. They're exhausted, covered in dirt. But among them stands a younger man, whose face is in the path of the sun. He looks in a different direction. He looks up, and his body refuses to pull the boat. He seems to be the only one questioning the work they're being asked to do. Like, why are we doing all this? And the rest of them just keep their head down? Keep pulling this ship along the Volga? As if they don't hear what he's saying.

52:48It's like you're speaking different languages. You don't understand each other. You don't have points of contact. You don't have common views on, you know, basically any questions. You can't discuss issues that demand discussion. They require it not because you can change something, but because you need to not be alone. You need to speak in order to feel support, to find at least one person that you can talk about this with. But there's no one.

53:23There's one last scene in the film that really got to me. It's so inside, in a way that lets you really feel how much has changed in this one school, this one town. Pasha gets invited to this party of a recent graduate, Vanya, who's heading off to the army. It's his going-away party. All his friends toast to him and wish him luck in the future. They post for pictures of Vanya. Instead of cheese, they say army. Then they take turns shaving his head with a shaver that breaks halfway through the process.

54:01Pasha takes a turn at shaving Vanya's head. As he does it, he asks, You decided to sign up on your own? Vanya says, Didn't have time. They sent for me. Pasha says, Why didn't you call me? Vanya sort of shrugs as if Pasha's question is dumb and annoying but then quietly he mumbles it just all happened so fast in a split second besides that it's all laughs and jokes and debauchery the shaving part is funny everyone's kind of wasted but then as it gets late Vanya and his friends start embracing one guy cries and hugs him tells him that he really loves him so much that he won't forget him He tells him, you're like a brother to me.

54:49Not by blood, but by soul. Vanya doesn't look so brave in the dark. He looks small and scared. His friends also do. And that's when it hit me. Before now, Vanya and the others seem like they maybe believed in this war. Like they wouldn't mind going to fight for Russia. But in this moment, it feels like you can see everyone grasp the realness of the thing they've been saying, and then immediately understand that there was now no turning back. Like a joke gone too far. Because at this point, so many Russians have gone to fight this war. And well over 100 ,000 Ukrainians have been killed in it.

55:39Do people believe the propaganda? I wondered this question over and over again as I was watching. Does Vanya actually believe in the war he's going to fight? Do the teachers believe that Russia is denazifying Ukraine? Do the kids throwing fake grenades believe in the country they're being trained to defend? It's a version of the question I've been asking my family my whole life. But did you believe in the things you were being taught? The things you were doing? The slogans hung up in the gym? Those are the questions they seem the most frustrated by. It took me asking Pasha to figure out why. When I asked him if the people around him believe in all this, he scoffed at me, the way my grandma does.

56:21Like, that's a bad question, you dummy journalist. Don't you understand? He told me it doesn't matter if people believe in it or not. What matters is that they say it, that they hang the slogans, teach the lessons, sing the anthems. First, it's a routine that's like, you know, I believe, I don't believe, but I say it. Then it becomes culture. These lessons are already in the schedule. Everyone's used to it. You got to say this. You got to listen to that. You got to raise the flag or whatever else. And then it becomes a cage. And you think this is normal. And I'd also add that the cage actually remains open.

57:08and you can leave it at any moment. But as soon as you do, you realize that everyone else is in the cage. You walk out and you realize that you've become an outcast, a loner. That like, your opinion, you, yourself, you don't matter to anyone. And that's also the work of propaganda. That's what it does. Pasha became more and more isolated, Retreated from his friends and family. They stayed away from him, too. An unmarked vehicle showed up outside his home. And he got scared and left the country without telling anyone where he was going or why. And he can't go back.

57:53I should probably fess up now and say, all those times I was asking my family about how they felt growing up, when I was posing those exact questions to Pasha, In the back of my mind, I was always wondering, who would I be if I was put in that situation? What kind of person? Would I be able to see what was happening and push back? When I saw the film and when I talked to Pasha, I found all these similarities between us. We're both similar ages, similar tendency to ask questions. And I did think, quietly, to myself, that had I been put in the situation, I probably would be like Pasha. I told my dad this.

58:35Big mistake. He said, really? You'd be like that? What are you doing right now? In this country? There are things happening here that you don't like. Then I said, I'm doing my best. I think. Then he said, well, isn't that great? Your best. What's that got to do with anything?

59:11Valerie Kipnis is one of the producers of our show. The actor who's reading Pasha's quotes in English was Elias Kleinbach. But can it be the mismatch wrong? Have I waited, waited way too long? Have I played life like the game of bomb and then prayed into a song? How can it be that it's all my fault Will I ever reach the tippy top Am I able to untie the knot That bound me all along Now that I've seen it I can't unsee it World Program was produced today by Nadia Raymond and edited by Nancy Updike. The people who put together today's show include Khanna Jaffe-Walt, Adrian Lilly, Tobin Lowe, Molly Marcelo, Catherine Raimondo, Stone Nelson, Ruthie Petito, Ryan Rummery, Ruby Schwartz, Francis Swanson, Christopher Sotala, Marisa Robertson-Texture, Julie Whitaker, and Diane Wu.

1:00:16Our managing editor, Sara Abdurahman. Senior editor, David Kestenbaum. Our executive editor is Emmanuel Berry. Special thanks today to Emmanuel Paré, David Borenstein, Katya Kitsia, Bella Shiavitz, Daniel Plyam, Catherine Emery, Ruth and Mark Fitzpatrick, Henry Frank, Chris Lavoie, and Brett Morse. Elaine Appleton Grant's story in Act One was supported by a grant from the National Institute for Healthcare Management. This American Life is delivered to public radio stations by PRX, the public radio exchange. Special thanks today to This American Life partners, Sean Collins and Stonewall and Traveler Peak.

1:00:49Sean Collins, I know you. We work together at NPR. Nice to see you here in this ad. How's Oklahoma? They and all of our life partners have subscribed to help us keep making our program. when you do that you get to listen ad free and you get other stuff including bonus episodes our most recent one that I did with one of my co-workers Diane Wu turned out so much more emotional and personal than I think either of us expected anyway if you want to hear that you gotta join go to thisamericanlife.org slash lifepartners that link is also in the show notes thanks as always to our program's co-founder Mr.

1:01:26Jory Malatia you know his dream job was actually to be on Sesame Street When he auditioned, he was told his performance was not quite right for children. We're going to count. One, two, three. I'm Ira Glass. Back next week with more stories of this American life. Now that I've seen it I can't unsee it Now that I've been in it I can't comprehend Yeah.

1:02:26This message comes from Capella University. That spark you feel? That's your drive for more. Capella University's FlexPath learning format lets you earn your degree at your pace, without putting life on pause. Learn more at capella.edu. This message comes from NetSuite. They say that every day your business is late to AI, you fall two days behind. Fortunately, there's NetSuite Next. NetSuite Next is where your business meets AI, because AI is built into everything you do. It automatically surfaces custom insights throughout your day. AI agents work alongside you to solve problems. It's just like you're having a conversation with a colleague.

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