blessed

Thursday night, I realized how blessed we are in Michigan. I went to the dirtiest place I have seen in Lesotho yet. As I walked along, I watched every step I took and hoped not to step in something that I didn't want to. The place was the hospital in Maseru.

I had to take 6 month old baby boy there because he was very sick. The nurse from BG went with and did all the talking. When we walked into the waiting room, I saw every one's eye look me up and down. They thoughts were not silent because every time I walked past another person I heard the Lesotho word for "white woman". When we were waited on right away, they all got made. I just wanted to disappear. My lap became the exam table. I sat their holding the baby as they drew blood, check his vitals and went over his symptoms. The same eyes that look at me everyday as I feed him his bottle turned from love to fear. They gave him an IV, bandaged his whole hand so he won't pull it out, wrapped him up and told us to go to the children's ward. As I walked across 2 parking lots holding a baby that was partially treated on I prayed for his safety. When we walked in to the children's ward, I felt like I walked in to an old movie. The children there were VERY skinny with IV coming out of their heads. Most beds had 2 or 3 children in them and the loud cries echoed through the big room. We were brought to a room about 7 feet by 10 feet and given a tiny bed. I was glad to see he would have his own bed, but then I looked around the room. There were 6 other children in the same room and no place for me to sit down. The other children were peeing in pop bottles and most had witchcraft beads around their waist. Right away they put him on oxygen and gave him some meds. He just laid there and cried and all I could do was rub his head and pray. Then the news came, he has pneumonia.

The BG nurse left to go pick someone up who could stay the night with the child. I sat there all alone with this baby and began to wish I was with him in Michigan. My niece has had pneumonia many times and is fine, but the sad thing is pneumonia in Africa isn't good, in fact it is really bad. At one point in time I just looked up at the wall and counted 40 cockroaches climbing all over. When it came time that I had to go I really didn't want to leave him, but I knew that the language barrier would be too much and I couldn't do anything.

When I got to BG and laid in bed the tears began to follow, because things got personal. What if my nephew Jake was born in Africa and not in Michigan, would he be the amazing 5 year old boy that he is today without the work of the DeVos Children's Hospital? I thought of a friend's daughter who has had a kidney issue her whole life, would she be here?

Please pray for the baby. He is still in the hospital and when I asked about him on Friday, he was getting worse.

We are so blessed in America with great health care!!!