Not The End

I’m not sure how this is possibly true, but it is already November 11th which, besides meaning that I’m another year older, lamentably means I am getting on a plane to the US tomorrow. (I am also lamenting that twenty-four doesn’t rhyme with “fancy-free,” but that’s not important.) I would expect myself to be a conflicting mess of emotion on this last day in Haiti but I am finding myself remarkably peaceful today. It is hard to be anything but thankful. Thankfulness fills you up like too much guacamole and makes it rather impossible to concurrently be sad or stressed or anxious.

Last year I read the book One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp and learned a lot about practicing thankfulness. And it does take practice to be thankful. If I were to make a list of the things I am thankful for from the past three months I can’t even fathom how long it would be. There are simply no words to describe how incredibly blessed I am.

I honestly don’t want to try to come up with some eloquent speech about all of the lessons I’ve learned and the moral of the story and the conclusion to my time in Haiti. For one thing, my overwhelming feeling is that this is not the end, that I have more adventures awaiting me in this beautiful place. The planes fly both ways and I’ve got a lot of Home Sweet Hispaniola to still explore.

I also know that each chapter is beautiful in its own way. God likes to amaze us and He is never going to run out of creativity in doing so. There is enough of Him to keep boggling our minds for endless centuries. I feel like my vision in seeing Him has been sharpened here and I want to keep seeing the beauty in everything. I want to keep living this vibrant life, and it’s not just here; it is in Him.

I’m going to keep learning from the past three months for a while to come. I am looking forward to talking about it over and over with a bunch of you people who I’ve been dying to see. There is so much more to tell you about the part of my heart that is staying on this side of tomorrow’s travels.

Today I’m thankful for all of the incredible people I told goodbye today- co-workers, patients, neighbors. I’m thankful for the big, beautiful painted sky above the mountains. I’m thankful for fried plantains, pikliz, and Haitian Coca-Cola. I’m thankful for flowers and bumpy roads and sweating and colors and Kreyol and hugs. I’m deeply, overwhelmingly thankful for Haiti.

The Ones That Stick With You

The Ones That Stick With You

Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it. -Confucius

The five year old boy who came in with altered mental status and irregular respirations. He was intubated and sedated, but kept fighting the vent so was taken back off of it. Had crazy breathing patterns, like really crazy. Other than his disoriented grabs at the ETT tube in his throat when sedation was waning, I never saw him move. I never saw a glimpse of the beautiful normal boy he was before getting sick. We did all the tests we could do. Doctors emailed other doctors and we all scratched our heads. He got worse. Respiratory failure. Heart block. Brain Death. We watched him die without any answers, any idea why. It was hard to see the beauty that time.

The seven year old boy with a massive complicated growth disfiguring his tongue, which hangs out of his mouth letting secretions pour down his front side constantly. I have no idea what caused the mass or what doctors and surgeons will be able to do for him. He also has a strange skin disorder and eye problems. My first interaction with him involved trying to hold down all of his limbs as he tried to fend off the nurse attempting to clean his mouth out, screaming all the while. After that rude introduction I didn’t know how receptive he would be to letting me assess him. Haitians are generally extremely wary and unreceptive of people with any sort of physical disfigurement, so I’m sure this poor boy and his mom had been given a wide berth for some time. With a friendly voice and smile I had a new friend. When I listened to his lungs and heart with my stethoscope he was curious and wanted to take it from me. So I helped him listen to his heart with it and then mine. That got an attempt at a smile out of him. Later in the morning we had to hold him down again so I could pop in an IV and we could clean his mouth again. A tiny toy car reward won him over again and we raced it up and down the bed. There’s no telling how much of his drool I got all over me this week. He gradually started helping us clean his mouth out instead of fighting. He would cry when his mom stepped out for a moment, but if I sat with him and talked to him he would sometimes stop. Love conquers all.

The ten year old girl who had typhoid which caused her bowel to rupture. She had one surgery, got better for a few days, got worse and had another surgery. She came out of the second one with a large abdominal wound and an ileostomy. I held her hand through a lot of dressing changes and tried to reassure her in many, many moments of terror. Her mom couldn’t even stay in the room for dressing changes at first. We all talked ourselves blue in the face with her and her mom, trying to explain what was happening. She didn’t understand. She was so afraid. Yesterday we put a vacuum dressing on her abdominal wound and I tried to calm her while she cried for Jesus and said she was dying. She wrote a note of a prayer asking God to forgive her for her sins and her mother’s sins, which were causing her to die. My heart is broken for this girl. I am so angry with myself for getting so lazy in learning Kreyol that I don’t know how to tell her Truth with my own words. I held her hand and stroked her head and smiled and said the few encouraging phrases I had. She liked to play with the end of my long ponytail and touch my face when I was sitting close to her. I am angry at myself for not having the words for her, I am sad and broken-hearted for the physical pain she is in, I am devastated that she doesn’t understand the earth-shattering love that God has for her. My prayers just don’t seem like enough.


My best friend introduced me to one of my favorite songs, “Farther Along” by Josh Garrels. I listen to it a lot here. Because I don’t understand why any of these sad things happen. I want to trust God that He’s always good. Maybe one day I’ll understand, maybe never. Until then it is enough that He knows.

I’m glad He is big. I’m glad He is a mystery. If He was a God that my small mind could understand He wouldn’t be a big enough God to save me, or any of us.

Farther along we'll know all about it

Farther along we'll understand why

So, cheer up my brothers, live in the sunshine

We'll understand this, all by and by

Tempted and tried, I wondered why

The good man died, the bad man thrives

And Jesus cries because he loves 'em both

We're all cast-aways in need of rope

Hangin' on by the last threads of our hope

In a house of mirrors full of smoke

Confusing illusions I've seen

Where did I go wrong, I sang along

To every chorus of the song

That the devil wrote like a piper at the gates

Leading mice and men down to their fates

But some will courageously escape

The seductive voice with a heart of faith

While walkin' that line back home

So much more to life than we've been told

It's full of beauty that will unfold

And shine like you struck gold my wayward son

That deadweight burden weighs a ton

Go down into the river and let it run

Wash away all the things you've done

Forgiveness alright

Farther along we'll know all about it

Farther along we'll understand why

So, cheer up my brothers, live in the sunshine

We'll understand this, all by and by

Still I get hard pressed on every side

Between the rock and a compromise

Like the truth and pack of lies fightin' for my soul

And I've got no place left go

'Cause I got changed by what I've been shown

More glory than the world has known

Keeps me ramblin' on

Skipping like a calf loosed from its stall

I'm free to love once and for all

And even when I fall I'll get back up

For the joy that overflows my cup

Heaven filled me with more than enough

Broke down my levees and my bluffs

Let the flood wash me

And one day when the sky rolls back on us

Some rejoice and the others fuss

'Cause every knee must bow and tongue confess

That the Son of God is forever blessed

His is the kingdom, we're the guests

So put your voice up to the test

Sing Lord, come soon 

Farther along we'll know all about it

Farther along we'll understand why

So, cheer up my brothers, live in the sunshine

We'll understand this, all by and by

Night Shift

Canucks 

On Tuesday when I stepped onto the unit (‘cause I played hooky and went to the beach on Monday, remember?) it was super weird, like stepping into the twilight zone. I looked around and not a single Haitian nurse was to be found. Instead, there stood half a dozen blonde-haired, blue-eyed white chicks from Canada. I knew this was coming, but I was still startled to find a whole bunch of people who looked like me. Trippy.

This large group of volunteers not only exceeded the number of volunteer bunks at the hospital; it provided an opportunity to do several in-service education days with all of the Haitian nursing staff for the Peds unit. Of course I participated in the classes, because I’ve been here long enough and picked up enough Kreyol that I’m pretty well Haitian now. We made use of the education center in the new hospital buildings across the street that we are expanding to. We went over assessments and ventilator settings and NICU protocols and new unit procedures. It was a really constructive and much appreciated opportunity for the Peds staff. Meanwhile, I got the impression it was an overwhelming few days for the volunteers who were left manning the unit on their own.

When we were on break from the class or done for the day I would go over to check on the ladies on the unit. It was kind of fun to see how comfortable I was with the chaos that was making some of them spazz out. The chaos is totally normal to me now. I embrace it, it feels like home. In lieu of having Haitian nurses I played hostess for them in some ways, being the person most acquainted with where things are, how things are done and so forth. That little overstuffed building feels like home now and it’s fun to feel like I’m not a guest anymore but part of the family.


Night Shift

Since there were so many volunteers in this week it really didn’t seem imperative for me to be at the hospital. I just floated and helped out around the unit, mostly cuddling with the two orphaned kiddos we have on the unit right now or running errands and tracking down supplies. But I just enjoy being at the hospital too much to not be there when there are such fun people to be around and you never know what you will get to see or do there.

Since I could afford to be flexible and my friends Sam and Kensy were going to be working night shift in Peds at the end of the week, I decided to try out my first night shift and see a different side of the hospital. So I lounged around the house all day yesterday, tried unsuccessfully to take a nap in the afternoon, drank a Coke and headed to the hospital at 1700.

It was super chill, quiet, laid back. I started off helping out in the NICU and at midnight I traded with another nurse who was coming on and wanted NICU, so I took a few patients out on the Peds unit. I didn’t ever feel super tired like I was going to fall asleep. I jammed to some tunes on my iphone for a bit. I took time to cheer for the NBA games that were on TV in the unit. When my babies woke up I fed them and held them and spoiled them a little bit. I chatted with my friends. I stood outside and admired the sky. It happened to be the Haitian holiday Day of the Dead yesterday, which didn’t change much for me, except to add the occasional background music of gunfire to the nighttime soundtrack for whatever reason. Before I knew it 0600 was upon us and I handed over my kiddos to someone else and stepped outside.

I knew there was an empty bed where I could lie down if I wanted, but I was too jazzed up from the adrenaline of the night and Coke number two. People commented on how perky I was. I too was surprised at my own energy. So I went up on the roof to enjoy God’s gift to me- my reward for being alive and with open eyes at that hour of the morning. He really knows the way to my heart.

The adventure didn’t end there either. I got drowsy after reading on the roof for a little while so I decided to try to go to sleep in the bunkrooms. Unfortunately, that was also the time that the abundantly large group of Canadians were packing up their things and talking loudly right outside the room. That, combined with a few more bouts of gunfire from the rough part of town behind the hospital put an end to my attempts at such a foolish activity as sleep. So I gave it up as a bad job and joined the crowd outside the rooms and ate some delicious breakfast spaghetti. I wandered around the complex a bit and harassed a few people, then found my way back to the unit. It was turning out to be quite busy in there so I made myself useful by holding cute babies and such. Then it got really busy and despite my excuses about being ridiculously sleep deprived, I felt quite alert again (I was onto Coke number three) and when the Meadows arrived to pick me up at 1230 I had just masterfully placed an IV in a little baby and was giving a fluid bolus.

Which brings me to this point- sitting upright at 1730, almost 36 hours from my last pillow-contact. Not really sure how this is happening. I think I am starting to slightly detach from reality. I have snapped back a couple times from zoning out while typing mid-sentenceeeenaoiwdnwfoa;iewnt……….

Whew. I’m back. There you are. At this point it only really makes sense to persevere for a few more loopy-headed hours and then crash in a major way at Senior Citizen hours. I will say though, I never thought I would enjoy and have the energy for a night shift, but when you are with awesome people doing what you love, midnight is no different from noon. I was also legitimately bummed to leave the hospital when I did- there was stuff going on and I didn’t want to leave, not for sleep or anything. That’s when you find out that you really are doing what you are meant to do. When you don’t want to walk away for food or sleep or a shower, because it’s just good and it feels like it matters and it fills your soul more deeply than any of those other things. And even though I’m just volunteering, this work is making me rich, deeply rich.


Pray
I still don’t know what happens next. Please send up some mega prayers for direction. Pray that my last week (ack!! super lame-o!!) is purposeful and so good. Pray that I would have peace in leaving, even if I don’t know for sure when I will be back.

Thanks, friends!! I’ll be seeing most of you very soon!!

Clarity

Clarity 

The rain stopped on Saturday morning. Saturday turned into the clearest, most beautiful day I have yet experienced in this country. The blues and greens were so vibrant. The mountains in the distance looked touchable. No dust. No smog. Dazzling. Like the four straight days of relentless rain were only a fading dream, driven away all the faster by the striking color of real life.

It is amazing to me how quickly I could forget about the misery of the storm in the beauty after the fact. As we drove down the mountain to our new house that we were thankfully able to move into given the abatement of rain, it was almost easy to overlook the evidence. But there it was, the signs that showed how insulated we were in our four strong walls and how different the previous few days were for so many other people.

It worries me how easy it is to forget as soon as the thing has passed. We pray and pray for the crisis and feel it so acutely, and then the sun comes out and it does, it fades like a dream and we forget that we should still be praying- in thanks for the sun, for healing from the wounds. If only the crystal clarity that I saw in the day-after would be afforded to our minds at the same time. I feel like mine is far too often stuffed dumb by bits of lint and bad music. What if we kept praying?

 I was once compared to Dori from “Finding Nemo”- I can only hope due to the elastic versatility of my face in pulling many humorous expressions much like my marine animated doppelganger. But also, what if my attention span is too much like hers? What if I am too quickly and easily distracted? I get up off my knees too readily, it’s uncomfortable and I start to squirm and think of how my feet are going to sleep and I’m bony and the ground is hard and….

I also wish I could speak whale….

 Case closed. For those of you that are less easily distracted, please kick me in the shins and let’s keep praying for Haiti and those that are hurting or homeless from the storm.

Hair

Today I enjoyed tagging along with my friend Cody and his family on a return trip to the beach. Man, I still love the countryside. It has more green things and animals and space and naked children. Fantastic. We made the drive in a turd of a van with no AC, so windows down. I loved it.

I have to brag a little about how I also achieved what I considered to be the perfect windswept surfer chick hair today. My lion’s mane usually tends in the direction of that type of thing when it tends towards anything, given it is not accustomed to taking orders of any kind and more often does what it wants. If you were wanting to know, the trick to the PWSCH (perfect windswept surfer chick hair) do is a combination of the hair product salt + chlorine + seaweed + street dust, and the stepwise styling techniques of soaking + sun frying (repeated 4-5x) + car window drying. The downside to the PWSCH do is that it smells like a combination of dead sea creatures and burning trash and it required half a gallon of conditioner and a miniature pick-ax to undo it. Ah, the price of beauty.

On another note, I would like to open pre-registration for the Winter Tan Competition. It is open to all of you people posting statuses about Pumpkin Spice Lattes and scarves and fall while I am enjoying the perpetual summer of my tropical paradise. In exchange for me getting to flaunt my brown skin when I get back to Texas, you get to laugh as I go into climate shock since I haven’t worn anything but shorts for the last 9 months.

Cheers! (My favorite Aussie/British-ism, learned from my new Aussie/British friend, Sam!)

Floods

Floods

This is day two of sitting on a comfy bed in a strong house and watching the wind and rain pound against the walls. It is the first time since being in this country that I have worn jeans and a sweatshirt, which is refreshing even though I am a good Texas girl that loves the heat. We discharged half of the pediatric unit at the hospital on Tuesday and there is a large group of volunteers in this week, so I know no one is the worse off for the fact that I am unable to make it down to work. So I can relax and enjoy the opportunity to read and watch movies and think and pray.

But I cannot ignore that there are hundreds of thousands in the few miles around me that sit shivering under tarps or tents or shanties in the mud, soaked through along with all of their few possessions, in fear of floods and mud and collapsing roofs and falling branches. It is for them that I keep asking God over and over to please, please calm the storm, end the rain, dry the waters. His voice has commanded storms before, I know it, so I am going to ask and ask again until He does.

At the end of last week I feel like God was showing me some ways in which I have become complacent, even in this place. I see how I have been content with less than everything God could accomplish through me. I wonder at how easily I can make it through the day, surrounded as I am by suffering, poverty, hunger, sickness and not pray, not speak the Gospel with my words or actions, not live with any sense of urgency or eternity. Blegh, disgusting! It is as if the enemy is in the background of our mind, playing a lullaby to slowly and subtly sway us into spiritual sleep. We can be on guard against outright attack and not even notice that he has already lured us into ineffectiveness for the kingdom. I can delight in the Lord’s graces and beauty in this land all I want, but if I am focused only on receiving then I am not bringing God’s kingdom here on earth; I am useless.

I am seeing a lot of ways that I haven’t been actively conditioning myself as a warrior- in prayer, in proclaiming the Gospel. It is not enough for me to serve my patient’s physical needs or be a joyful and uplifting presence among the hurting. Those things aren’t bad, but they are not enough.

Speaking of enough, you know that movie “Enough”? Where J-Lo gets driven to her breaking point by her abusive ex and gets all ninja and kills him so he can’t hurt her or their daughter anymore? Great movie. That’s kind of how I feel about my spiritual state. Jesus is in this temple turning over tables. Enough is enough! Get behind me Satan! I’m sick of being lured so easily into spiritual sleep! We are at war! What will it take to live in the power of the Spirit? That’s what I want!

Whew, sorry. My mind is such a mess. In addition to these realizations, I have been reading Radical by David Platt and trying to figure out what I’m supposed to do with my life after this initial stint in Haiti. I feel torn open, like all these thoughts are too big for my little mind. Like the floods that are happening outside all around, the Spirit is flooding my heart. Pouring all these things into me at once, I can hardly sort them out or catch my breath.

So I think I’m just going to let go. I’m going to be swept away. Because this flood is overwhelming and it is wild and good and it is taking me closer to the heart of God and radically transforming my life into one that is never content with enough or lured into sleep but is effective for the kingdom of God and the Gospel in this world. I am a warrior, and wherever my next battlefield will be, or where it is currently, I must be on the offensive. No sleepy-headed, lackadaisical guard duty for this girl.

Your love is deep, Your love is wide

And it covers us

Your love is fierce, Your love is strong

It's furious

Your love is sweet, Your love is wild

And it's waking hearts to life!!

(Jeremy Riddle, Furious)

Home

Light bulbs 

It is so easy to take for granted the things that are always there. One of the great things about being in Haiti is that you can hardly take anything for granted, nothing is consistent enough. Not water, or electricity, or supplies. We almost had a party in the Peds unit this week when we got a special delivery of blue UV light bulbs to treat our jaundice babies. For quite some time we have had 3 semi-functioning bili lights out of the 12 bulbs that are needed for our three units. I almost danced a jig this weekend when my friends shared their chocolate candy with me. I feel such immense relief every evening that I get to take a hot shower, since there have been many times that I have been super nasty and we haven’t had water or electricity to take one. I was so excited when I started an IV on a tiny baby this week. Hopefully that will one day be a simple thing for me and even then I want to be glad each time that I have the ability to do it.

Furthermore, it’s hard to take for granted things that people around you don’t have. I have never in my life worried about having enough to eat. But when I hold a malnourished baby or talk to a parent who is thrilled with a single meal in a day, how can I not be thankful? I guess this means I am always going to be a cheap date. It’s refreshing to be easy to please; your heart is always joyful.

As I get nearer to heading stateside I find that I’m fearful. Here my heart is so content, so thankful. Life seems simple and beautiful and such a gift. I never want to lose this. I always want to get excited over the little things like light bulbs and hot showers. I want to be content with hardly anything. I want to sit and watch the stars or the sunrise or sunset and feel as rich as royalty. As I walk back into America’s holiday season consumerism I want to be a fortress, my heart immovable. This is my prayer.

Home

“Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid.” -Frederick Buechner

In orientation classes this week we practiced code situations, when the patient needs CPR and respiratory support. It turns out that was great timing. Thursday afternoon we received a six-month old from another clinic that was in respiratory failure and needed to be intubated. Nothing like walking out of class and seeing the procedure and giving the meds you just talked about- getting the supplies, sedatives, paralytics, problems getting the tube in, bagging the patient in between attempts, taping the tube, setting up the ventilator. Knowledge in action.

On Friday I walked on the unit and took up my post for the next few hours. That same girl was not getting enough respiratory support from the ventilator and so I spent two and a half hours bagging her with an ambu bag while half a dozen people tried every different setting on the vent to get it to support her oxygenation. I would have to switch hands every so often when my hand was getting tired. My friends and I joked about how muscular my thumbs were going to be and I told them how I was going to dominate them at thumb war after that workout. Despite our joking we knew that she was not in good shape. When there weren’t people buzzing around us I would stroke her head with my free hand. She was so beautiful. Please God, this girl needs your help. 

Her lungs sounded like they were underwater. She was developing signs of shock. We alternated between giving her diuretics to try and get fluid out of her lungs and giving her fluid to try and maintain her perfusion. The ventilator didn’t work as well as my bagging because the fluid made so much resistance in her lungs and I had to use a lot of pressure to push air in. We had to start her on dopamine to support her circulation. We needed to start another IV and no one could get one in. I felt like my eyes were glued to the monitor willing the little waveforms and numbers to stay high enough: enough oxygen, enough blood pressure, enough heartbeats in a minute. After bagging her for almost three hours we finally got the settings on the ventilator to replicate the motion of my tired hands and I got to go have a break and get some breakfast.

It wasn’t long after I came back to the unit before her body gave up the fight. For about thirty minutes we fought for her. We pushed meds in her veins, pumped her heart, bagged her lungs, and willed her body not to give up, willed it to keep on living. I was mostly on medication duty- drawing up doses of epi, bicarb, calcium gluconate. But I took my turn at chest compressions and it was my very own hands that had to stop pumping her heart when we decided to let her go.

When we finished pulling off monitor leads and tape, taking out tubes, washing off blood and fluids, changing her and wrapping her up she was the prettiest, most peaceful little girl. I didn’t cry for her. She is home. And God is still good. He is always good, even in the hard things that I don’t understand. Especially in the hard things.

I recently re-read the Chronicles of Narnia. The final book, The Last Battle makes me long for heaven like nothing else. That is our home. Glory be to God that He made a way for us to get there.

“It was the Unicorn who summed up what everyone was feeling. He stamped his right fore-hoof on the ground and neighed, and then cried: ‘I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it til now. The reason why we loved the old Narnia is that it sometimes looked a little like this. Bree-hee-hee! Come further up, come further in!’” (C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle)

We had another little boy, about a year old, at the hospital on Friday that was abandoned by his parents. That afternoon we didn’t have a bed for him, so I just held him and we snuggled while he fell asleep on my chest. I thought about how God was holding that little girl who died. I thought about how precious that little orphan was to him. Snuggling that sweet boy blessed my soul. It was one of those moments when this world feels a little like my real home. He is so dear to our Father’s heart. What a privilege that I got to love on him. I love my job. The hard things are hard. The beautiful things are so beautiful. God is at the center of both.

Escape

Yesterday my friend Cody took me to the new Rebo coffee shop. Uhh-mazing. What a freaky experience, in stepping into that swanky, air-conditioned building we stepped right out of Haiti. Seriously, I was transported back to Italy, thinking of sipping cappuccinos in Castiglion Fiorentino. It was far too fancy to remind me of the coffee shops that I practically lived in throughout my time at A&M. It was a perfect little escape. Weird to step back out and find myself in the noise and dirt and crowds of hungry people. I love a good coffee shop. And I love Haiti, too. Thanks, Rebo.

Pray 
For every second of my time here. For boldness in speaking of the Lord to the people I work with and care for, to pray for them. For remembering whose I am in all of my interactions. For what comes next.

Morning and Evening

Hands

It is such a privilege. Being here. Working alongside such incredible people. Seeing the things I see. And holding these babies. This week was so blessed. We are continuing to do orientation classes and the rest of the time I am helping out on the unit. My hands got to hold a lot of special babies this week. They helped out in the NICU and lifted babies to be weighed on the gram scale (one was only 960 grams/2lbs). My hands fed teensie babies from bottles almost as big as they are.

My hands hugged on a two year old with hydrocephalus who was left by her overwhelmed mother and waits to be placed in an orphanage. She is non-verbal, can’t sit or walk, and has to be carefully fed so she won’t choke or aspirate. Caring for her would be a huge task for someone with resources and time and support, things her mother undoubtedly didn’t have.

 My hands stroked the head of my little friend- the boy I cared for several weeks ago with the seizures, brain lesion, intubation stuff. He and his mom went home this week. They need a lot of prayer. He has major irreversible brain damage and will require total care for the rest of his life, as well as many more months of an intimidating TB medication regimen.

My hands carried a malnourished, HIV positive little wisp of a one-year-old to the X-ray machine and back.

My hands measured vital signs, changed diapers, carried medications, lab samples, prescriptions, papers, equipment, mixed bottles of formula, smeared hand sanitizer and hand sanitizer and hand sanitizer, and wiped sweat from the forehead of the blessed and busy person they belong to. One night I stayed at the hospital and my hands got to hold an ice-cold coke at the UN while I ate and swapped stories with an awesome group of volunteers from all over the country- about people dying and living, about gunshot wounds and massive tumors and bizarre maladies and all the crazy stuff we won’t see anywhere else.

These busy hands are so blessed. So are the eyes that get to see such beauty and hardship, evidence of the power of the human spirit and the unfailing goodness of God. So is the heart that is touched by each of these beautiful souls and overflowing with the love of the Father. So is the mind that is challenged and grown each day and filled with memories to cherish. This girl is blessed. So very blessed.

Morning and Evening

“It is good to give thanks to the Lord, and to sing praises to your name, O Most High; to declare your lovingkindness in the morning, and your faithfulness every night.” Psalm 92:1-2

Wednesday morning I stepped onto the unit and was met with the somber tone that accompanies a loss; a beautiful motionless child, tears shed, broken parents. It’s tempting to let it cast gloom over the day, but there are still a dozen beds with kids fighting for life that need all of you. Each morning there is a time of prayer and singing over by the outpatient clinic and I always enjoy listening, but it seemed especially sweet that morning. I recognized the tune of “In the Sweet By and By” as it was sung in Kreyol.

There’s a land that is fairer than day,

And by faith we can see it afar;

For the Father waits over the way

To prepare us a dwelling place there.

In the sweet by and by,

We shall meet on that beautiful shore;

In the sweet by and by,

We shall meet on that beautiful shore.

We shall sing on that beautiful shore

The melodious songs of the blessed;

And our spirits shall sorrow no more,

Not a sigh for the blessing of rest.

To our bountiful Father above,

We will offer our tribute of praise

For the glorious gift of His love

And the blessings that hallow our days.

(Bennet, 1868)

After a long day of class, sorting through boxes in the warehouse, and helping admit a new patient on the unit I enjoyed relaxing with the other volunteers at the restaurant on the UN base. When we got back to the hospital around 10, I decided to poke around and see what was going on instead of heading straight to bed. That decision led to the sacrifice of all but three hours of my sleep that night, but it was totally worth it. A mom had come into the ER in active labor, which meant that we were having a baby despite not being a maternity hospital. I spent the next few hours in a tiny back room that is smaller than many people’s closets, holding mama’s hand, rubbing her back, talking with the other nurse, doctor, and EMT, listening to hip hop and R&B playing from an iphone, and waiting waiting waiting for the baby. Our little party of night owls was rewarded by getting to welcome a strong, healthy, beautiful baby girl into the world around 2:00 am. Even having helped with births before, it was beautiful and exciting and miraculous. And even more so in this place where it ends in tragedy instead of celebration far too often.

Praise be to our great God- in the morning, in the evening, in grief or gladness. He is the author of life and it is beautiful. How glorious that this life is but the introduction and title page of our true lives. The joy of a baby’s birth is only a glimpse of the joy that will be ours when we come into His eternal kingdom. The pain of loss is but temporary. He is the King of it all. Glory be to God!


Pray- I am heading back to the states on November 12. I don’t know what comes next, whether a job there or coming back here. I LOVE Haiti. I have awesome people here. I have awesome people there. There are sick people everywhere. More than anything I want God’s will for my life. He is the author of my story. Please pray that I would take each step as it unfolds before me, that I would follow where He leads with a willing heart. He has been faithful since before time began.

High Places

The Lord God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds’ feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places. Habakkuk 3:19

More beautiful pictures and Donald Miller for you!

“It strikes me as I think about it, how beautiful we find massive structures, either man-made or organic. I wonder if we find them amazing because they make us feel small and insignificant, because they humble us. And I remember feeling that way back in Colorado, that I was not the center of the cosmos, that there were greater things, larger things, massive structures forged in the muscle of earth and time, pressing up into the heavens as if to say the story is not about you, but for you, as if to remind us we are not gods.” -Donald Miller, Through Painted Deserts

“These mountains, which have seen untold sunrises, long to thunder praise but stand reverent, silent so that man’s weak praise should be given God’s attention.” -Donald Miller, Through Painted Deserts

“And had these mountains the ability to reason, perhaps they would contemplate the beauty of humanity, and praise God for the miracle that each of us is, pondering the majesty of God and the wonder of man in one bewildering context.
Their brows are rumpled even now, and their arms are stretched toward heaven.” -Donald Miller, Through Painted Deserts

Good Medicine

Give and Receive

This week at the hospital was fairly laid back. With the new month started a few new things around the unit. The leadership personnel for the unit are working hard to make things run more smoothly and enable the highest standards of care we can provide. One thing that started this week was official rounds at 1400 each day. The morning doc, afternoon doc, any volunteer docs, nurses, and translator migrate through the unit going over each patient’s status and plan of care. It takes a while some days, but it enables everyone to be fully informed and I am learning a lot from it. This week we had diagnoses like kernicterus, sickle cell, severe malnutrition, congenital syphilis, and spina bifida.

Another thing that started this week was new nurse orientation for the peds unit. They are hiring four new Haitian staff nurses and I was invited to take part in their orientation classes. We are meeting a few times a week in the morning to go over all sorts of things, from documentation to pediatric-specific considerations for all organ systems and so forth. We had a good time this week and I’m enjoying having a built-in Kreyol lesson, as the class is given by an American nurse and translated for the Haitian nurses.

When I was first considering coming to Haiti as a new nurse I was plagued with mixed feelings about whether I would be useful at all. In nursing school you have so much support around you, which is totally necessary as you learn, but kind of insulates you from knowing what you are capable of. Being here and finding myself stepping up to the challenges, I have realized that I can do much more than I thought, even though I still have so much to learn. It struck me this week as I participated in orientation, as well as rounding with the docs and other nurses- we all have something to offer, all of us, and we all have something to receive. In this realization I find that confidence and humility can co-exist harmoniously. I find it reminds me of the value of each person I interact with- I have so much to receive from them- as well as my own value- I have so much to give. No matter how new or experienced you are in your field, in your relationship with God, in life- I hope you never stop giving and never stop receiving.

Letting Go

“The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job 1:21 

Despite how often we are reminded that we are not in control, it is a hard place to come to the end of our limited abilities and knowledge and say, “there’s nothing we can do.” It’s hard to feel powerless, hard to not be able to fix things. We had a baby come to us this week with a congenital heart defect that we did not have the ability to operate on. We only had him for a few hours and had to just watch him slip away.

Another family left us on Friday to return home with their little girl. She has hydrocephalus and despite sitting with her in multiple hospitals for three months, her brain is so damaged that further treatment will not improve her condition. In the past three weeks I have cared for her several times and watched her parents loving and kissing on her. I cannot fathom her parent’s pain of accepting that nothing more can be done and going home to enjoy what time is left with her.

How do we let go? How do we accept these hard things? Without the Lord it certainly cannot be possible. Sometimes I feel like I need Him to pry open each finger for me. Sometimes I need him to move my lips and pump my lungs to form the words “Blessed be your name.” I need Him to open my heart and put acceptance into it with His own hand.

sunrise on the roof

Transparent 

“A joyful heart is good medicine…” Proverbs 17:22

I’m a flowery kind of person, I tend to be rather emotional and I am usually completely incapable of hiding my emotions. At times I’ve wished I could be more stoic, not wear my heart on my sleeve all the time, and totally despised my inability to appear more controlled. It’s kind of disgusting how many times I’ve ugly-cried in public (and special thanks to all of you dear friends that have been on the opposite side of the table while this happened and still love me). God is changing and maturing a lot of things about me here. My heart is growing. And now I find I’m thankful for this transparent heart, because it is full of joy. Even on the dying-babies days it has peace and joy. It’s content, thankful. I’m glad now for the ease with which I share my spirit, as it becomes one worth sharing- more God and less me.

 I had a very encouraging conversation with a co-worker this week, and was told that I am known by others as a kind and happy person, that I handle things so well and I’m always smiling. Let’s be clear- I am as human as anyone and I know that I fail more often than not (people definitely see that, too). I can be so disgusted by my selfish reactions sometimes. But I want to give God praise for the incredible work He has done that I should be thus described. It brings tears to my eyes to remember the stone-hearted, selfish person that I’ve been and to see how God is making me new, step by step. That I should have this joyful heart, that I should be a blessing to others, is such a gift. Behold, He makes all things new. If our God can make me a lamp worthy of putting on a stand, He can do all things.

“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” Matt 5:16

Pray

-Pray for hurting people who are letting go of their precious babes. 

-Pray that I would continue to be a light and blessing to others, even when I am tired or stressed. 

-Pray for direction- that I would know what the Lord has for me after my time here. 

New Normal

New Normal

So crazy, but I’ve actually been in Haiti for six weeks now! It’s amazing how normal it seems now in a lot of ways. Not that things are becoming more commonplace. The more I know of Haiti the more I realize there really is nothing “commonplace” here. Even though I have established a bit of routine in going to and from work at the hospital, traveling down and up the mountain with Daniel, one of my favorite things about this place is that it seems delightfully new every day. Even though we travel the same route there are always new things to see. I feel like this country is bursting with life everywhere; people walking around, sitting on the sidewalk selling shoes or fruit or chickens, dogs wandering, cars weaving, each building painted different colors, made of different shapes, all of the bright things springing forth from among the trash and rubble and dirt. Each morning we get treated to the sunrise and see the city come to life in the growing light. Each afternoon we sit in traffic and get accosted by people wanting to wash the car and sell us a drink or a snack or windshield wipers or a cell phone charger. At the hospital, normal is doing vital signs and walking back and forth from pharmacy and feeding babies and changing diapers and giving medications and knowing all along that no two days will ever be the same.

I think my new normal is delighting in the newness of each day, celebrating the infinite tiny details that make life here so rich and trying to notice more of them each trip outside the walls of this house. My new normal is having open eyes- to the love letters from God that are all around me; to the people that are all so different and yet all an image of the same God; to the beauty and the pain, accepting both.

Teamwork

Work at the hospital was so good this week. I’m coming to know and really enjoy the people who are here every week, both American and Haitian staff. On top of that, the volunteers that were here this week were so awesome and fun. We had a lot of challenging patients this week, but when you are working with a stellar team it feels like you can handle anything that comes. We work so closely with everyone here- doctors, nurses, pharmacists, EMTs, physical therapy. Every afternoon I got to walk through the unit on rounds with the pediatricians, pedi nurses, and the CMO (who is a rockstar, by the way, and one of the coolest people to have running a hospital). I don’t feel like I’m just carrying out orders. I get to work closely with the whole healthcare team, I get to see the bigger picture for my patients’ care, and I am actively evaluating and conversing with the docs about what goes on through the day. This really is an amazing learning experience.

Fast and Slow

Tuesday we had to re-intubate a baby on a vent when their ET tube got clogged. He then needed a lumbar puncture. Another post-op patient was having some unstable vitals and kept us hopping. On Wednesday we had to coordinate sending one of our kids to another hospital to get registered for TB meds, then a kid came into the ER and got intubated, as well as a baby in septic shock who they coded and intubated, which sent us scrambling to discharge patients so we could have places for the new ones and gave us three kids on ventilators (insanity). I don’t think anyone sat down or slowed down for two seconds on Wednesday.

Thursday was chill. We were all exhausted. Nobody was on a vent anymore: two were extubated and doing well, one died in the night. All the patients decided to behave themselves and be status quo and stable. The nurse I worked with in the PICU this week (also a rockstar) brought out a giant bag of peanut M&Ms and sat them on the nurse’s desk. Party time! It has been over six weeks since I’ve had chocolate candy and that is far too long, my friends. I ate a disgraceful amount of them. One of the EMT guys bought some accra off the street (fried malanga- a potato/tuber-ish kind of vegetable- tastes kind of like a hush puppy) and brought it to share with us. We got to sit down sometimes. We cleaned and organized. It was glorious. When we did rounds the CMO kept saying, “thank God for a day like this.” Thanking God is exactly what we did. He knows us. He knows when we need a day to sit and eat M&Ms.  Nom nom nom, Hallelujah!

Reminder

Like I just said, Wednesday was a chaotic storm of insanity and I was all over the place trying to help people out as they received the new babies. In the afternoon I was down in the NICU helping one of the Haitian nurses by doing some gavage feedings while she was getting blood from the septic shock baby for labs. A clump of gentlemen were being given a tour around the hospital and came through the unit, ending up down in the NICU as well. I’m not exactly sure what group or organization the men were with. People are coming through all the time, since the hospital works with loads of other organizations and is great about showing them the work that we do there. The men came down the stairs and were about to walk out the door when one of the men said that he wanted to pray over the children. The group stopped and joined hands and someone prayed in Kreyol- over the children, the hospital, and us- the workers.

As much as the goodness of God knocks me over every day here, it is remarkably hard to take a pause in the middle of a busy day with never ending tasks. It’s amazing how, even when fighting to keep a baby alive, it is easy to feel too busy to call on the Lord. As if the tasks were saving the child, not it’s Maker. I was so thankful that when I was lost in the frenzy, someone came through and paused, unknowingly reminding me of my foremost duty to those kids- asking God for them. I needed the reminder. We all have days when we do. And other days we need to be the reminder for someone else. We are all one body after all. Let’s keep the body on its knees.


Praise- I feel awesome again! Thanks for praying!

Love yall! BTHO Arkansas! Whoop!

Do-over

Do-over

But You, O Lord, are a God full of compassion, and gracious, longsuffering and abundant in mercy and truth. Psalm 86:15

This week has been quite the opposite of last week in terms of chaos and busyness. I have been trying to recover from the sinus infection I obtained last week and therefore only went to the hospital one day. I was mistaken in thinking I was improved enough to go to work on Wednesday. There’s nothing like a commute down a significant change in elevation to show you just how much congestion is still in your head. My brain was in a bubble for several hours and it sounded like I was underwater when people talked to me all day. A curious sensation to say the least, and one that led me to re-evaluate my wellness and spend the rest of the week hammocking and reading Mere Christianity.

But it doesn’t take a week for the Lord to work and, little though I expected it, that one day at the hospital was enough for the Lord to show me even more of His goodness and mercy towards me. If you recall at the end of my post “Nursing Shortage” I talked about how I had failed to love on my patient’s moms in my stressful busyness. I had been particularly sad about my brusqueness towards the mom of the little boy who I cared for several days, the one we intubated on Friday. I was eager to see how he was doing. He was still there, so that in itself was a pleasant surprise. Heart still beating, lungs still filling and emptying. In fact, he had extubated himself- not exactly what you intend with someone who is supposed to be sedated, but it showed he was much stronger. I don’t know if his brain lesion was responding to any of the treatment. They have probably since done another CT scan to check, but I don’t know anything about it. I hope that I will see him next week and see evidence of answered prayers in his healing.

But God wanted to answer a different prayer of mine on Wednesday. He wanted to show me grace that I cannot deserve. When I was caring for the little boy his mom came over. I told her in Kreyol that he looked much better than last week. She lit up like a suburban house in a Christmas light competition. She agreed with me and commented on my being able to speak in Kreyol to her. I replied that I don’t know much but I’m learning (a statement that applies as much to the state of my soul as to my language ability). I went on to ask her how she was (okay), if she was tired (she was), how many kids she has (four), and whatever little questions I could muster. I helped her change his sheets. I smiled at her and she smiled back. Our interaction lasted for not even five minutes of the day.

I can hardly keep from crying even know as I think back on it days later. That I should be given the chance to try again where I had failed before. That I should have not only that chance, but the reward of that mom’s smile, of bringing her a moment of happiness, to show her love. I am so unworthy of the privilege, the great honor, of being the one to brighten her day. So undeserving of being a friend to her. It is such a beautiful and personal picture of God’s patience, his longsuffering towards me. His giving of a second chance, a do-over. There are infinite examples of this in each of our lives. Infinite gifts we are unworthy of. Infinite opportunities to discover the unending, unfailing, unfathomable love of God. But today I want to cherish this one. This one small moment in which God showed me He loves me enough to let me try again, to communicate that He will always let me try again, to try to be more like Him. In my Father’s heart there will always be room for one more do-over.

to dazzle us

I'm not a city-soul. I'm just not. My sanctuary is on my horse's back under the night sky, or toes in the sand, or rain on my face, or flower in my hand, or trees overhead, or ocean underneath. On Saturday we got out of the city. My soul breathed. We enjoyed fellowship and the best of God's creation.

 Here is a taste for you and some more thoughts from Donald Miller in Through Painted Deserts. I hope it refreshes your soul too.

“And maybe when a person doesn’t buy the lies anymore, when a human stops long  enough to realize the stuff people say to get us to part with our money often isn’t true, we can finally see the sunrise, smell the wetness in a Gulf Breeze, stand in awe at a downpour no less magnificent that a twenty-thousand-foot waterfall, ten square miles wide, wonder at the physics of a duck paddling itself across the surface of a pond, enjoy the reflection of the sun on the face of the moon, and know, This is what I was made to do. This is who I was made to be, that life is being given to me as a gift, that light is a metaphor, and God is doing these things to dazzle us.” 

“I wonder at what Paul said back in Portland, how God is good, how it doesn’t do any good to run from Him because what He has is good and who He is, is good. Even if I want to run, it isn’t really what I want—what I want is Him, even if I don’t believe it. If He made all this existence, you would think He would know what He is doing, and you would think He could be trusted. Everything I want is just Him, to get lost in Him, to feel His love and more and more of this dazzling that He does. I wonder at His beautiful system and how it feels better than anything I could choose or invent for myself.”

“Life is not a story about me, but it is being told to me, and I can be glad of that. I think that is the why of life and, in fact, the why of this ancient faith I am caught up in: to enjoy God. The stars were created to dazzle us, like a love letter; light itself is a metaphor, something that exists outside of time, made up of what seems like nothing, infinite in its power, something that can be experienced but not understood, like God. Relationships between men and women indicate something of the nature of God—that He is relational, that He feels love and loss. It’s all metaphor, and the story is about us; it’s about all of us who God made, and God himself, just enjoying each other.”

Nursing Shortage

Nursing Shortage

This week I stayed at the hospital from Monday morning until Friday afternoon. Both of the long-term American pediatric nurses that I have been working with were gone this week and there weren’t any nurses coming with the short-term team this week. It was trial-by-fire time, for sure. To contrast the lack of nursing power there were four American pediatricians here this week. That was awesome. It was an exhausting week, but one of the best learning experiences I’ve ever had. Instead of having another nurse to turn to, I had doctors always at hand. I followed them as they made their rounds and discussed the plan of care for each patient, they wrote orders and progress notes in my same language, and they were super friendly and willing to discuss patient care with me at any time. Since I was the only American nurse they came to me anytime they had a nursing question or needed something done for a patient, so I got to do everything under the sun. They had to jump in and help with nursing care several times, and it was crazy to me when they asked me how to do something. I couldn’t have asked for a nicer or more patient group of MDs to work with and I had a great time hanging out with them in our rare off times. We had a cook-out one night and went to the UN base to eat a couple nights. Other times we just sat and talked about how our perspective was being changed. I was deeply blessed by them.

Monday and Tuesday I was the third nurse on duty, which meant I had to take a full patient load myself since three nurses is the minimum needed to cover the unit. I’m getting more confident about managing patients myself. I make a plan in the morning, review all my charts and orders, make notes about what needs to be done, what meds need to be given, and I get to work. Monday I took care of four babies. Tuesday I had four 6-8 year olds. It was refreshing to have bigger kids that I could actually talk to after having babies so much of the time; although the term “talk to” in this case is very loosely applied, since I speak very little of their language.

Over my head

“It turns out the droplet of our knowledge is a bit lost in the ocean of our unknowing.” –Donald Miller

Wednesday I was the fourth nurse on, so I was the float nurse and didn’t take a patient load. I hoped it would be a chill day of feeding babies and running to pharmacy since I was pretty exhausted. That was so not the case. Around 10:00 a kid was brought in who was having almost continuous seizure activity. The vast majority of my focus and energy for the next three days was devoted to this three year old little boy.

That first day one of the MDs and I stayed at the bedside and tried everything we could to bring the little guy out of his seizures. I would give him some anti-seizure medication and we would watch him and wait. He would seize some more and I would give him more medication.  I gave him enough anti-seizure medications to knock out an elephant. We couldn’t take our eyes off of him, since we fully expected him to stop breathing at any moment from the drugs we were pumping into him. But still he kept seizing and still we gave him more medication. I carried his little body to CT scan, X-Ray, back to CT scan. I assisted the doctor in doing a lumbar puncture on him. The MDs identified a brain lesion that was causing the seizures, which looked infectious but could have several possible causes. By Wednesday evening he was not seizing and still breathing, so I sat down and breathed a little too.

Thursday I was a float nurse again, and once again I spent most of my time giving the little boy anti-seizure medication. The pediatrician team brainstormed possible causes of the brain lesion, because ultimately without fixing the cause of the seizures they won’t stop and the boy won’t live. We started treating him for a couple of different infections. It was hard to believe that only a few days before this had been a normal little kid- running, playing, laughing. We were starting to feel frustrated and discouraged that we couldn’t keep him out of his seizures, we couldn’t figure out the cause, we couldn’t fix him. The pediatricians were consulting other MDs, emailing neurologists in the States, we even had a neurosurgeon from the US come in this week who was consulted. It is amazing how one little kid can take a dozen doctor’s worth of brainpower and make it not seem very powerful at all. In all of our knowledge we know so little, are so little in control.

On Friday I was the third nurse again, so I had four patients, one of whom was the little boy. It was crazy from the very start. The boy was having seizures from the time I walked in, so instead of being able to slowly get my bearings and make my plan for the day I had to just jump straight into action. Then I discovered that the night nurse had missed several medications and let some IV fluids run out, so I was playing catch up right from the beginning. I cut my finger when I broke open a glass ampule, rushed to get caught up on medications, and felt my mental state become less and less composed.

Then the little boy started gasping. He had impressed us by continuing to breathe despite all the meds we had been giving him for days, so by all means it should have happened much sooner than it did, but mid-morning Friday the Peds team decided we would have to support the boy’s respiratory system with a ventilator. Knowing this would be far beyond my ability level, I recruited the CNO (chief nursing officer) for help, so the MDs would have a nurse helping who had a clue what they were doing. But I was still front row, hands on for the whole thing and I was scared out of my mind. “If I ever needed you Lord, it’s now.” For you lay persons, intubation involves completely sedating the patient, putting a tube in their trachea, and letting a machine breathe for them. Nursing folks- I’d like you to appreciate that here, in order to verify tube placement, I had to carry the intubated kid, while someone else walked along bagging him, another person carried the O2 tank, over to another building where the X-ray is, then parade back in the same manner. Just keep in mind to be thankful every time you call x-ray and they show up at your patient’s room and take the image right there in their bed.

Once the little boy was on the vent, we could increase the anti-seizure meds as much as needed to stop his seizures and keep him totally sedated. I successfully started a new IV on him, which was my first one on a little dark-skinned kid, so holla! When he was settled and stable on the vent I went to assess my other patients and make sure they were still okay. I literally turned around and looked at one of my other patients, post-op hydrocephalus kid, and he is having a seizure. You are freakin kidding me. So I draw up yet another dose of anti-seizure meds and as I’m giving them to him I say, “okay you, I can only handle one person having a crisis at a time, and it is NOT your turn!! So you better straighten up!” I’m happy to report that his talking-to had the desired effect and he was seizure-free for the rest of the day. It took the rest of the day just to catch up. I was stressed that I gave meds an hour late and didn’t change a diaper for far too many hours. I’m still learning to take things as they come, to not stress the little things. I’m learning that I can’t do it all and that’s okay.

Around 2:00 I was caught back up on all the tasks I had missed during the intubation excitement. The pediatricians practically pushed me out of the unit to go eat since I hadn’t had a morsel all day. Did I mention that I had a sinus infection and felt like crap this whole time? Somehow I made it through the day, through the week. I learned and did so much. I was poured out, all my energy, all my brainpower. And as I left the hospital Friday afternoon I was doubtful if the little boy I had worked so hard for was even going to make it. We give it all we have and it might not change anything. I prayed and prayed over that boy and didn’t see him get better. It’s a beat down. But ultimately it makes me have to cling to the Father even more. Because I can’t give any more or less than everything I have to give, and at the end of the day I just want His will to be done, whatever that means. I’m ready for Jesus to come back. I’m sick of babies dying. I hate babies dying.

Failing

Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is your faithfulness. –Lamentations 3:22-23

As I’m learning and doing more each day than I ever have before, it’s exciting to know I’m growing. I’m getting incredible experience. But I’m also realizing my shortcomings which, although difficult, I’m grateful for. This weekend I’m broken by the ways I failed this week. On Friday I was a stress ball. I was thrown in the way deep end and half drowning. During my flustered hyperactivity, patient’s moms would come up to me and ask for a diaper or ask me to address the malfunctioning AC unit. In my stress, several times I just waved them off and was totally unable to come up with a single kreyol word other than “later.” I was so rude to them. To these moms that spend 24-hours a day on a plastic chair next to their suffering, maybe dying kids. Not having time, not having composure, not having the language ability to be polite is no excuse for me. I feel rotten.

The mom of the little boy having seizures asked me to change his diaper all the time. Usually at the most inopportune times, too. Or she would change it herself, which would invariably cause him to have seizures since he was so hyperirritable. I found myself annoyed by her at times, and even waved her off once when I was doing something else and couldn’t think of how to tell her I couldn’t help her right then. I have a heavy heart when I think about that now. This lady traveled from three hours away. She has nowhere to go sleep, no ability to go check on her other kids, no ability to understand just how grave her son’s condition is. And most likely, her precious son is about to die. And even if just for a moment, I was rude and uncompassionate towards her. I want to be a good nurse. I want to be good at my skills and smart in my treatment. But more than anything I never want to be that person again. Before skills and knowledge, I want God’s love to come out of me. I want to be compassionate. I never want stress to get in the way of kindness. I know that I’ll probably fail at this again and again. I’m so thankful that I’m forgiven. I’ll never stop needing forgiveness.

Pray

Pray for my body. I’m recovered from the GI distress from a couple weeks ago, but since then I’ve had a small bout of food poisoning and now I have a sinus infection. I was pretty worn down last week. I’m going to take a few days to rest this week and hopefully recover from all that.

Pray for my babies. If there are happy, healthy babies and kids in your life, give thanks every moment. Pray for healing and health for my kids. Pray for Jesus to make everything new. Pray for the day to come when no more babies will die.

Pray for my growth, that I would be more like Jesus in my interactions. That I would show Christ’s love to my patients and their families. Pray for me to learn Kreyol so I can communicate love to Haitians and that boundary would be broken. Pray for me to be patient and forgiving towards myself.

I love y’all. Thanks for loving me.

Making Room and other stories

Floating
This week at the hospital I worked M-F, 630-4ish each day. There were several volunteers in Peds this week, so I was not given a full patient load so that I could be available to float and help out with the kids having surgery. There was a visiting pediatric surgeon here who did 2-3 procedures each day. So this week I did a lot of monitoring kiddos coming out of anesthesia. That looks something like this:

-Strap a bunch of monitors on the little body to make sure they are in fact bringing you a sedated child and not a dead one. Take vital signs. Record vital signs. The OR is a meat locker, so start defrosting the child.
-If necessary, apply an oxygen delivery device to the child’s face in some manner. Note: if the anesthesiologist tells you to put some O2 on the kid and it takes four people to hold the crazed munchkin down so you can even get the nasal cannula within 5 feet of their face- kid don’t need oxygen. They breathin just fine.
-Wait 15 minutes. Record vital signs. Wait 15 minutes. Record vital signs. Wait 15 minutes. Record vital signs. Wait 15 minutes. Record vital signs.
-In the meantime, make sure said crazed munchkin is closely supervised during the waking up period. The loopy little characters are prone to thrashing, which can easily lead to carefully placed tubes in their bodies getting ripped out. We put lots of tubes in children when they have procedures, down their nose, out their chest, in their vein, out their wound, out their, well, other stuff. Having any of the aforementioned tubes prematurely evicted by the little drunken looney toon leads to much gnashing of teeth and other unpleasantries on my part.
-Make sure nothing is leaking out of the child that should be staying in. Make sure things start coming out that are supposed to come out.

That is essentially the quick and dirty post-anesthesia care that I learned this week. The Lord took care of me and my kids. No one had any bad reactions or complications from their surgeries.


Dust
I saw my first dead body this week. And then another one a few days later. They were both small, newborn babies and I didn’t see or care for either of them while they were alive, so it was very unemotional. It was so strange to see their bodies laying there on the bed, waiting to be taken away to who knows where. They were so grey and dusky. You don’t really realize how much color our blood gives us until you see a body without it flowing through. Seeing a lifeless body makes me even more unable to understand how anyone can think this life is all there is. A body is such a vacant thing without its soul. From dust we came and that is really all that is left behind, dust.

We also had a baby born at the hospital this week. Which was actually a real surprise, since we don’t do labor and delivery there. I do love the birthday parties. It was good to see the beautiful, healthy baby girl, since we only get the really sick ones usually. It makes me realize even more how alive we are. The light behind our eyes. The warmth in our bodies. The breath in the lungs and the beating hearts. Life is beautiful. But there is SO MUCH MORE than this. Because whether you are hours or decades or a century on earth, still all that is left behind is dust.

Sometimes I long to know what heaven will be like. When we don’t need these fragile, weak, broken dust-bodies. When we are made new by the God who is making all things new. I’m a dancer, and when you’re a dancer everything in life really becomes a dance of sorts. And to me, heaven is dancing. Oh, how we’ll dance and dance. When I dance, here and now, in this fragile dust-body, I dream of heaven. And I almost touch it sometimes. Because one day, this body will just be a grey shell of dust too. And that is when I’ll be truly alive.


Making room
On Friday we had two emergencies come in. One was a premature baby brought from another hospital. As I mentioned earlier, our hospital doesn’t do labor and delivery. However, we have a pediatric unit and one of the only NICUs in the country. Most hospitals that deliver babies don’t have the ability to care for the babies. Welcome to Haiti. So what happens if someone has a baby at another hospital and it is premature or not thriving and needs further care, is the dad or aunt or someone takes the baby, wraps it up, and gets in the car, or tap-tap, or motorcycle and goes from hospital to hospital trying to find someone who will take the baby and care for it. If the hospital is full they will get turned away. As you can probably imagine, these babies don’t have great chances. But if they make it to us and we have a place to keep them, we will do all we can for them. We admitted the baby into our only open bed.

About an hour later someone steps into the unit and hands the doctor a newborn with a cleft palate that was brought in to see the doctor in the day clinic. “Something’s wrong,” they say. In this particular case, “something’s wrong” meant “not breathing.” Commence flurry of activity. Five nurses and a pediatrician can in fact somehow all fit around one tiny little body. Somebody doing chest compressions, somebody giving breaths with the ambu bag, somebody starting an IV, somebody giving epinephrine. I darted around grabbing supplies, mostly, after reaching over people to get the monitors on the baby. Did I mention that we just put the baby down on top of a cabinet in the unit that’s full of broken equipment because we didn’t have a bed? So all this excitement was happening in a very small space with people just climbing all over each other. You know, just to make it fun. Somehow we got the baby stabilized. Wow, God. Part of the problem was the baby’s blood sugar was next to nothing because it couldn’t eat. The best part is that it was seen at another hospital the day before and given vaccinations and just sent home like nothing was wrong, like this baby with no upper lip and no ability to eat in any way would be just fine. I don’t know if the baby will make it ultimately, but God was certainly looking out for it in that moment by getting it to us.

So recall that we didn’t have any open beds. None. And we needed to put the new baby somewhere. We did have one baby in the NICU who was ready to go home. He is now a whopping 3 ½ pounds and loves to eat. He is the cutest thing I have ever seen. He looks like he’s made out of chocolate and belongs in an Easter basket. I said I’d take him home with me, but they said no. His parents were coming to get him later on, but we needed the bed now. So our little friend got relocated to a small plastic laundry basket on the nurse’s desk. That’s right, laundry basket. Yep, that’s how we do.

Here is chocolate baby’s little hand on my pinky finger. Crazy freakin’ cute, right? But more than that, he’s a picture of life. Of overcoming. Because there are probably dozens of babies that die for every one that has a chance. Because he could have been another grey, dusky shell on the bed. But he lived. He got strong and got to move into a laundry basket on the nurse’s desk. He went home. We joked that he is going to be the future president of Haiti, because he’s such a tenacious little guy. It’s kids like him that remind me not to give up, to keep making room in my heart even if I have to use a laundry basket.


Pray:
Next week there aren’t enough volunteer nurses coming in, so I am going to stay at the hospital overnight so I can work full shifts Monday- Thursday and most of Friday. That’s a lot. Pray that I depend totally on the Lord for it and not myself. Pray that I have patience and peace. Please continue to pray for my body to be strong and healthy.
Pray for me in building relationships with the Haitian staff, I don’t feel like I have been doing a great job at it. It’s really tempting to spend all my energy getting to know the American volunteers that are only there for a week at a time, but I want to invest more in the people that are here all the time. A lot of them speak English so I have no excuse.
This is small, but I’m missing my people back home. Pray for comfort for my heart.

Love y'all. 

Haitian Style

So, I thought I'd share a few fun pictures from around the house, so you can enjoy some of the unique things that I appreciate about living in Haiti...

Well, in Haiti there is not actually enough power (electricity) for everyone to have it all the time... naturally. We are spoiled because we have back up power (aka- a little hut outside with about 16 car-sized batteries) for when the city power is out. City power comes and goes, but at our house is on more than not. 

Sometimes, like after the tropical storm, the batteries died before the city power came back (took about 4 days that time). So if need be, we can fire up the generator to re-charge the batteries. Generator=diesel guzzler so we try not to awaken the beast unless absolutely necessary. 

There is a little pink light downstairs that is only on when there is city or generator power. This is an important feature in our lives, because there are a few things the batteries cannot power, such as the water pump. So the little pink light on means we get to take showers!! See how excited that makes us!!

The green monster in the background is the generator. On a different note, doesn't the baby palm tree look like a truffula tree? The Lorax would have some harsh words for this country. Deforestation, tsk, tsk.

Laundry alters our view on life a little bit around here too....

We also find ourselves pitted in battle against new enemies... mosquitoes.

Fortunately this is the 21st century and we are way too advanced for measly old flyswatters. Say hello to the bug zapper. And trust me, we know how to use them. Look at those hunters. The mosquitoes shudder around here. 

We also hunt rats... but I can't pretend that is a uniquely Haitian pass time. Just ask my dad how many rats he has taken down with a pellet gun at my old barn. He used to go out there at night and hunt them with a flashlight held on top of his pellet gun sniper-style. I'm my father's daughter. 

Now I don't want you to think we hate all the creepy, crawly things. We do a lot of lizard hunting too. They get named, appreciated, sequestered in the tub of despair for a few days and lovingly set free. 

There are a lot of fun new things that come along with living in Haiti. There are hard things, too. But the good things are crazy good. On the other side of one of our walls there is a Haitian church and we get to listen to them singing hymns all the time. And we get a view like this. Haitian life is good.

Haitian life is good. 

Life is good.

We are blessed, all of us.

Pray:

Praise! I feel way better! At the end of last week/this weekend my insides decided to go all civil war on me. Glad that's over. Thanks for your prayers. 

I'm back in the hospital this week. Settling into going everyday. Trying to get a routine. There's not much that is "routine" about working there, so I guess pray for flexibility and a willing heart to accept whatever comes each day. 

Love y'all! Thanks for being on my team!!