From Darkness to Light

Written by: Rose Talbot, Photography by: Lara Arkinstall

Adama was five months pregnant when the world around her started to flicker and fade.

Months passed as her vision continued to dwindle. Because of the clouded, disc-like cataracts in her eyes, soon all she could see were shadows and shapes.

Maybe it will clear up after I give birth, she told herself, hoping that the loss of sight was somehow linked to her pregnancy.

But once she’d delivered her twin babies – a boy and a girl – 30-year-old Adama had to face the truth. She was blind. Her babies were faceless. And she could do nothing to fix it.

“I held my babies after they were born, and I couldn’t see their faces. I thought this would last forever; that I would never know what they look like. I was very desperate. I didn’t have any hope.”

Adama – along with her newborns and four other children – moved in with her older sister, Aissatou, who became their caretaker. Aissatou welcomed them in lovingly, but with her own children to take care of as well, the burden was heavy: “It’s been a very hard year,” Aissatou, in tears, reflected.

For Adama, the reliance on her sister was challenging in a different way. The sudden inability to take care of her own children left her feeling like a bad mother. “Since my eyes are dark, I can’t walk alone, go to the market, cook, do laundry… I can’t do anything without help.”

Adama’s blindness stretched on for almost a year. The twins were six months old, their faces still a mystery to their mother, when her husband first heard about Mercy Ships.

For this family, the opportunity to access a state of the art hospital ship meant more than just being able to have free surgery.

It meant giving Adama the chance to step out of the darkness.

It meant being able to take care of her family instead of depending on others for help.

It meant being able to see her loved ones again.

It meant hope.

The day after her operation, Adama sat on a wooden bench waiting for her eye patch to be removed. It was the moment she’d learn whether or not her eyesight had returned.

As the patch was peeled back, Adama remained with her eyes closed for a few moments. Gradually, she blinked them open. A smile slowly spread across her face.

Her family members, gathered nearby, were some of the first sights to welcome Adama back into the world of the seeing.

She walked by herself to greet them, no guiding hand needed – “When I die and go to paradise and meet my own people there… that’s what the moment was like.”

She reached for the twins, drinking in the details of their faces for the first time. Tiny noses; long eyelashes; round cheeks. Adama cradled them both in her arms at the same time, eyes dancing between the two.

“I never expected that my babies would be so beautiful,” she murmured.

The cataract surgery Adama received took less than half an hour. The impact of her restored sight will reverberate throughout the rest of her life. There will likely be countless moments where Adama is freed because of the ability to see again – but it’s hard to imagine one more meaningful than a mother’s patient love being rewarded with this sight.