"Today...you deliver a baby!"

Ok, get ready for this long post. Because it has been a LONG week. And so much has happened…I will attempt to put into words what I have experienced and learned this week. Last Sunday we spent the day in Jembo at the Wesleyan Bible College. Jembo is a small village about 75 min or so from Choma. About 25 minutes on a beautifully paved road and the rest of the way on a very bumpy one. This was a great day for all of us. We got to enjoy a youth rally at a church that is run by graduates of the bible school. I could listen them sing praises forever…their singing and dancing was, by far, much better than ours. 

This is a picture of some of them. They loved taking pictures with us! 

 

On Monday and Tuesday, half of us spent the day in Zimba, a town about an hour from Choma. I spent the day in pediatrics and maternity. You all know I love the babies and kids. But this was SO hard. Night and day difference from the pediatrics unit I worked on at Spectrum Health this summer.

This is a picture of the pediatric ward. The mothers of the children loved having us there and loved having their pictures taken!

But the most exciting part about Monday was that I GOT TO DELIVER A BABY!!!!!!! I have always wanted to but didn’t know I was going to be able to on my first day at the hospital! A pregnant mother came in to deliver and the nurse midwife asked Meg and I if we had ever delivered a baby before. Well, no. “That’s ok,” she says… “Today,... you deliver a baby!” Um, OK! And we did, about a half hour later. Crazy. If you are interested in hearing the medical/nursing details about it, just ask me and I will have plenty to tell you! It was SO different from typical American deliveries...but still an amazing and beautiful thing to be a part of!

This is the BEAUTIFUL baby boy I helped deliver! 

Tuesday, I spent the day in the village. I was supposed to be in the ART (Anti Retroviral Therapy) with the HIV/AIDS patients but instead went to a village to be a part of a community education on AIDS transmission and prevention. While waiting several hours to start, I got to play with the kids…of course I didn’t enjoy it one bit…;)

Here they are…they loved us. And copied everything we did!  

Wednesday we spent the day delivering food in the villages. We went to 7 different villages and distributed Mealie Meal and Cabbage. Each 10 lb. bag represented an orphaned or vulnerable child with AIDS. And even though I didn’t feel particularly helpful, it was important that those bags were delivered. It great to see the different villages but also hard to see as well because we knew that each village held multiple sick, orphaned or vulnerable children.

This is a picture of one of the churches in the villages…what better place could there be to worship the Lord in than this?! 

Today, Thursday, we spent the day at a clinic. We thought we were going to be doing immunizations all day but ended up doing prenatal education and monthly assessments of pregnant mothers. We also got to spend time with the doctors and a PA student while they saw patient after patient. We have been going nonstop all week and I have been exhausted but have enjoyed every minute of it!!