Who is Rachel Abrams

Rachel Abrams is the wife of author Douglas Abrams, and although she is only mentioned a handful of times throughout the book, she has a close relationship with not only the author, but with Archbishop Tutu. She has served as his physician for several years. At lunch, when discussing maternal love, Abrams recalls the traumatic birth of his and Rachel's twin daughters. The second twin, Eliana, was having trouble passing through the birth canal, and her chances of survival were decreasing by the second. "I've never witnessed anything like the strength Rachel had exhibited as she threw herself headlong into the pain and wrenched every ounce of maternal will from her body to push our daughter out," he remembers (76). Eliana was born unresponsive, but the doctors urged Rachel to talk to her baby, "the voice of the mother having an almost magical healing effect, even in the high-risk operating room" (76). Eliana survived, which Abrams credits to the power of maternal love.