CLICK HERE FOR THOUSANDS OF FREE BLOGGER TEMPLATES »

Sunday, October 18, 2009

AOnce again, I am somewhat exasperated to realize that I have fallen into having to do "catch-up" blogs every time I blog! But, that's just how things are around here! So here you are:what's been happening since the last time i blogged! (I started this post on Oct 18th....here I am finishing it the 1st of November....thus updates since I started this post are in this color!)



1. I got really sick with some crazy mix of malaria and this fever bug that has been going all throughout Haiti. It was NOT fun. I have NEVER been that sick, nor do I wish to feel that way again! I experienced every symptom in the book:fever, chills/shaking, profuse sweating, swelling, diarrhea, vomiting, insomina, nausea, aching all over, sore eyes, poor blood circulation resulting in purple toenails(well, under my toenails), inability to eat or drink, shortness of breath, etc etc etc. I was on IV's for 7 days, oxygen for 2, a crazy mix of IV antibiotics, anti-malarials, anti-nauseants, etc etc etc. I wish I had gotten a picture of how swollen my hands and feet were! That was a really weird thing that accompanied all of this! It all started with feeling sore and really exhausted and realizing I had a fever on Tuesday night. I felt a bit better the next day, though I was still feverish. Then by Thursday it was obvious that I was quite sick. I spent the first few days at the orphanage being cared for by Melinda, but by the time I was at the needing oxygen stage(Monday), they promptly loaded me into the truck(I could not even walk there myself) and took me off to Port. There we found a gem of a doctor named Dr.B(I nicknamed him myself) who promptly admitted me into the French hosital in Canape-Vert where I recieved really good care and spent 4 days getting better. I ate for the first time on Thursday morning, and my teeth hurt as it had been almost a week since I'd eaten! I was really blessed to recieve such great care both from Melinda and everyone at HCH, and then at the hospital in Port-au-Prince! I also had a great group of people all over the place praying for me, and I am so thankful! It was really a comfort knowing I had that backing!


I was definitely shocked at the price tag! Coming from Canada where our healthcare is basically free, having to pay a doctor and a fancy French hospital carried a good sized price tag let me tell you!


I feel pretty much back to normal for about 2 days now. It was hard the first few days being back as I quickly realized how weak I was from being so sick, and really had to slow down and not feel bad about sleeping all the time and jsut not really doing anything! So thankful to feel like a normal person again! God is so good and I know that He really carried me and everyone who was caring and worring about me through that crazy week!





2. The day after I first started feeling sick, Pat and Melinda had to go to Port for something, and of course, wouldn't someone show up needing help. A father with a set of newborn twin boys showed up, having just lost his wife and not knowing what to do with his two little boys. I felt quite yucky and didn't want to touch them and make them sick too, so between looking at them and getting Minnie to come and help me out, we talked to Melinda and then called Mathieu over to come and talk the dad about what his options were as far as HCH is concerned. He had already decided he needed to give them up as he had no way to care for them. The father was not a young man, already having some adult children, and I felt bad for him as he looked so lost with these little babies. It was a bit difficult to get things sorted out as the dad had no form of identification whatsoever! Thankfully, Mathieu, our adoption guy and Haitian director for HCH, deals with this stuff all the time and came and took care of it all. We got the twins bathed and cleaned up as they were a little dirty, and thankfully they latched right onto a bottle and drank it all down! Their names are Monel and Moliere and they are quite cute! They are about a month (almost 2 now I guesss!!) old now and are quite cute!



3. Remember Loner? The little guy that came down to us from Lori and Licia up in Cazale? He's doing really great...still has some problems with chronic pneumonia and has a reflux problem, but he is getting quite fat and has everyone in the house in love with him!



4. The one year olds that moved downstairs over a month ago are loving being downstairs, and Kervens and Kendy are now walking all over the place, while Jolanda has just realized how fast she can crawl and that standing up is actually kind of fun! Adam is happy to stand up, but any attempt to get him to stand unaided ends up with him on the floor upset and just wanting to scoot instead! Just a couple days ago Adam decided he needed to catch up with me..and there he was hot on my heels looking so very cute as he concentrated so hard not to fall down.



5. Minnie started school with the kids and they were so excited as a volunteer that just came brought in their new school books. So, they have all been talking for the last week about how they have "bel liv" (pretty books)! Minnie has been quite happy to see that they had not forgotten near as much as she was afraid they would, and they are all well on their way into this years schooling! Gerald and Robinson have joined the ranks full time in the classroom, and are so pleased with their big-kid books and are quite industrious. Golson-3, has decided that he too thinks school is pretty fun and does his best to sneak up there whenever possible, so Minnie has taken to bringing him up on Fridays when it's more of a relaxed day in the classroom, and he is so proud that he gets to go to school too! Last Friday Minnie gave them all mini notebook and a pencil crayon to call their own, and my afternoon was spent drawing cars and boats and houses and trees and flowers and bikes, and well....what I drew kind of looked liked those things I suppose! But the kids were happy!



6. There are two great volunteers here right now. Two friends, Melissa from LaCrete,Alberta and Rachel from somewhere in Virginia. They are both jsut great and have jumped right into things which was so wonderul with things being so crazy here when I was sick...and of course there were sick kids in the midst of all of it!



7. Speaking of sick kids, please keep Derson in your prayers. He's a little boy, 9 years old, with inoperable hydrocephali(water on the brain). He has been holding his own for a long time, but lately he started refusing to eat, and was on IV's for a while, and is currenlty being tube fed and needing a catheter as his bladder is not working properly. We moved him upstairs where we could keep an eye on him. He is doing better than he was a week ago, but it's so hard to know how he really is doing, and what extremes to go to as it is quite possible that his body is shutting down. Please keep him and us in your prayers as we wait and see that the future brings for this little boy. As of Oct 27th Derson is doing much better and is once again feeding himself and giggling at the antics of the other children. He was able to go back to his room downstairs and we are thankful for his fill recovery!



8. As most of you know, Melinda is getting married November 27th! Please keep her in your prayers as she plans a wedding in the midst of the normal chaos around here!



9. I have decided that if I do get into nursing school for January, I will be going home in December. I have been thinking about this for a long time(since I was in physio school) and it seems that it's now or never. I am not at all happy thinking about leaving, but I know that this is something God has laid on my heart, and that though the timing seems so not great, in reality the timing would never be great as far as leaving here is concerned. There are a lot of details to work out and I am quite attached to being here....love a lot of people I would love to stick in my suitcase and just bring along. Please pray for me as I wait and figure out all the details!



10. Yestarday I met a Haitian family from Germany here visiting Haiti. Their two girls speak French, Creole, English and German...all fluently! Amazing! SO-o-o jealous!



11. We've gotten a couple more adoption files and there are a couple more on the way! Exciting to see more kids find families! PLease keep the throng of little boys we have in your prayers...there are currently 13 little boys between 1 month and 3 years, as well as a 5 year old, two 8 year olds and a 14 year old all needing families! We have a lot of boys in this house!



12. Lately I have been having this hate relationship with beans. No love, all hate. I have never been a big fan of beans..the kidney, pinto, black, lima, yucky kinds. And here in Haiti, the main staple is rice and beans and beans and rice and rice and beans and beans and rice. And if it's not beans and rice, it's rice with bean sauce! No joke! 2 years of this very mundane diet have started to take a toll on me, and there are times when I see that bowl of rice and beans that I literally just want to pick up the whole thing and throw it off the porch! We do eat N.American style foods for supper, but the main meal of the day is very Haitian, and while there are Haitian foods that I really do love to eat, my tolerance for beans has run very thin! I feel kind of shallow and picky, but this is a reality for me...mom, I think I now dislike beans even more than you know! They are a wonderful source of protein and such, and provide a simple healthy way for Haitians to eat! But, I do not like black beans and rice. I do not like them in a house. I do not like them with a mouse. I do not like black beans and rice. I do not like them. Lori I am. (courtesy of Dr.Suess...I really feel a deep sense of comraderie with Sam)



13. It has been ridiculoulsy hot here. It's October now...well into October, and it's supposed to be cooling down. But no!! Instead it's hot and muggy and discgusting! And they keep taking the power! You know it's bad when a two year old suddenly stands up in his bed and starts dancing and chanting "yo by kouran, whey!" (They gave the power, yay!!). The last week or so it has started cooling down and you can actually feel a little cool in the evenings! Makes for a really great sleep!



14. I recently had a delivery of After Eights, Hawkins CHeezies, supplies to make seafood spread, and a lovely spread of other things via some volunteers that arrived. I believe I have eaten half a box of after eights since I turned my computer on an hour ago. Gotta get them before the ants do!



15. I cooked onions in the microwave last night. We ran out of gas for the stove, and were just about done making supper....it worked pretty well actually! I have learned all kinds of tricks since being in Haiti! Not to mention I can now whip up a batch up really fluffy biscuits for 40 in minutes!



16. Please pray for our milk situation. For the past few months we have been very thankfully blessed to have a huge supply of milk in storage provided to us from our friends at CAM(Christian AId Ministries). However, our supply is almost out, and they don't have any shipments coming that they know of, so we may be back to having to buy milk once again. With 31 kids under 3 needing milk at least 3 times a day, plus babies on bottles, that's a whole lot of milk! Plus the older kids who get milk once a day!





17. We had some very sad news come our way a week or so ago. Remember Yvenson, the little preemie that came last September about the same time as the hurricane? Well, he turned a year old just a few weeks ago, and I am not sure of all the details, but there are some rumours about meningitus. We were all very shocked and saddened to hear this, and can't imagine how his mother must feel as she was so happy with her little boy that made it despite being such a fragile preemie. Please pray for his mother Wilda as she is grieving.



18. I am tarantula hunter! I used to be so terribly scared of these critters, until I learned all you have to do us get a stick and swipe across the ground and hit their legs which are incredibly fragile, which then break and they die! Haha! So now when the kids find one, I no longer run after a guy to come and deal with it, I find a stick and send that little critter to gloryland! Though I wil admit if I woke up with one on my leg or something, I might very quickly turn back into a wimpy screaming girl!