Today we witnessed many blessings and many answers to our prayers...and yours! Thank you for praying for the malnourished children that we have been treating. This morning when Vicki and I arrived in B. at the clinic, 2 of our precious little patients were there waiting for us--4 year old Martina with her grandmother and 5 year old Omo with her mother. Both girls looked more alert and interested in their surroundings than the last time I had seen them and Martina walked into the room for the first time--the other times she was too weak and was carried in.
We set both girls on the scales and found that they had both gained over 1 kg! Omo's mid-upper arm circumference, a measurement of the severity of malnutrition, had increased by several millimeters in just one week although Martina's was the same. We and the translators couldn't hold back our excitement over what we were seeing and the girls' care-givers were very pleased. Martina's grandmother has been giving her the liter of goat's milk with oil and sugar per day that we showed her how to mix up on Monday in addition to frequent small feeds and Omo's mother has been doing what she could--giving her goat's milk in the morning and increasing her food. Today we told her how to make the high energy formula for Omo also and suggested they go home to their village for 3 weeks where they have access to more goat's milk and then return for re-assessment. Their village is at least 4 hours' walk away!
This was such an encouraging boost to start our day and we believe that God has had His hand on these children and their families in a special way. However, there were more blessings to come--the day was just beginning!
The day started out cool and then became very hot while we were in B. By the time we got home and had some lunch and cleaned up, I was exhausted and went to my tukul to have a little rest before it was time to leave for G. village for the Creation to Christ Bible teaching. As I was trying to muster the strength to get up and get ready 10 minutes before we were due to leave, I heard Amos, one of our watchmen calling my name. I went out to see what was up and he asked me to come out to the gate. I followed him out to find an older, very familiar-looking lady with a boy about 7 or 8 years old, who was crying and furiously scratching his body. His grandmother showed me that he was covered in an allergic rash which she said had appeared "Acca!" (now) and "Warda" (all over). I thought quickly--we had no anti-histamines in our medicine stores-- but I knew I had some in my personal medicine kit that I had been required to put together before I came to Sudan. I couldn't give him my Promethazine because the tablets are too tiny and coated to break and one of those had knocked me flat on my back for most of a day a couple weeks ago after I took one following a nasty insect bite to my toe! Then I remembered that I had several Chlorpheniramine anti-histamine tablets that Grace and I had bought in Loki to sedate our cats on the airplane. There were several left over and they were easy to break so I gave him half. We also gave him some baking soda to take home and have a bath with to ease the itching.
We sent him home and headed to G. and I just prayed his body would respond to that anti-histamine. We sure don't have anything to treat anaphylactic shock our here! In all the excitement I didn't have a chance to find out why the grandmother looked so familiar. I found out later that it really was a "God-thing".
We had an interesting time in G. As we arrived in the village it started to sprinkle with rain and some of the adults in this family who normally come were busy and didn't show up. However about 20 children came and a few women, including little Issa, the 2 year old with Kwashiokor malnutrition, and his mother. Another miracle--the swelling in Issa's face and body had gone down so much that we nearly didn't recognize him and had to ask his mother if it was really him! Praise the Lord--this is a sign that increased nutrition has re-balanced his electrolytes some and reduced the fluid leaking into his tissues. He still has a long road ahead of him--the reduced swelling reveals his thinness--but this is progress! It was also wonderful to see a smile on his mother's face today. The other times we had seen her she looked very depressed and beaten-down. Perhaps she had given up hope that this child could survive? Please keep praying for Issa. His family is struggling to have enough food.
Pretty soon the sprinkling rain turned into a torrential down-pour and Vicki's Bible lesson was cut short. However, we and several adults plus a crowd of children crammed into a little tukul to get out of the rain and pretty soon the lesson was being discussed informally by Titus our translator and several of the adults, with the children all sitting quietly and listening, which was cool. We also had the opportunity to pray for one of the ladies, suffering from joint pain. The the rain stopped, the sun came out again and we headed back to D., after greeting and stopping to talk to many people as we walked through the village. It's such a friendly place!
When we got to the compound, I asked Titus where the elderly lady and boy with the itchy rash lived. He pointed and said it was just "over there" on the other side of the airstrip. I asked him to walk over with me to make sure the boy was recovering from his allergic reaction. When we got there, we found the boy happily playing with his cousins, completely recovered from his ordeal! They asked us to sit down and the grandmother was in the process of roasting coffee beans for the evening coffee so I knew what was coming! (The coffee comes from Ethiopia and is absolutely delicious--it has some sort of spices mixed with it--yummy!) I kept thinking how familiar she looked and the thought had crossed my mind as soon as I saw her at the compound that she was a grandmother with 2 orphaned grandchildren that we had treated at the clinic. The father was gone to Darfur as a soldier and the mother had passed away just a couple weeks ago suddenly in a town on the Nile. When I saw the children, both were sick and had just lost their mother less than a week before. However I wasn't sure if this was them and I didn't want to ask if it wasn't.
I didn't have to wait long to find out--the lady confirmed that they were indeed the same family in short order. I had sensed her sorrow and love for her grandchildren at the clinic and had prayed for them there. I found out she was from D., where I live, so I told her to come and visit sometime. I reminded her of this today and told her "Now I'm visiting you instead!"
The sun started to dip in the sky and bathed the huts in the pretty clearing surrounded by trees and palms with golden light. It was a beautiful, peaceful evening and I was content to sit there and listen to the M. language around me, watch the children playing, and talk to the ladies there through Titus' translation and my limited M.! I've said it before and I'm sure I'll say it many times again--I LOVE being out in the villages, getting in on village life. She did ask us to stay for coffee and I got to watch the whole process--the roasting, the pounding, the steeping in a clay pot, the addition of generous amounts of sugar! It's then poured into little glasses and is well worth the wait. Oh so yummy!
It was such a pleasant hour there and as we left, she told me to come back and visit them any time and I told her to come and visit me also. Yeah, it was a God-thing, one of those encounters that you know is not a coincidence. I've been praying for more freedom to visit people around here and now I have an opportunity to return to this collection of huts on the outskirts of the village and get to know this family better.
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