A Pink Post for Valentine's Day!

Photo by Debra Bell

Meet Hasanatou from the hinterlands of Guinea. 

I first saw her a few weeks ago in our maxillofacial ward. I was there to visit a patient in an adjacent bed, but couldn't help noticing those beautifully painted pink nails!  

You might be wondering what causes a giant tumor such as this? But where Hasanatou comes from, the question is not what caused her tumor, but rather, who caused it?  Here, suspicion, distrust and fear are the constant companions of those suffering from disfiguring disease. Was she cursed? Were the ancestors unhappy with her behaviour? What terrible act did she commit to bring such a thing  about? Over time, as the tumor grew, Hasanatou felt herself pushed further and further towards the fringes of her community, until one day it seemed as if she were no longer human.  

Which brings me back to the pink painted nails. 

Hasanatou spent a couple of days, prior to being admitted, at our Hope Center about a mile down the road from the ship.  The Hope Center is something like a youth hostel for our patients who come from outside the capital city of Conakry, where we're docked. The Hope Center was renovated and is staffed by our crew -- so that patients who arrive early for surgery, or need to stay post operatively for physiotherapy or further healing will have a safe and clean environment in which to wait.

It seems that one of our crew members at the Hope Center had painted Hasantou's nails bright pink while she waited for her surgical date.  Someone thought she was in need of a little nail polish.  Someone thought she was worth it. 

I remember when I was first married I read an article about Mother Teresa in a British newspaper. The column had a hard, cynical edge to it. In essence the reporter wanted the reader to know that Mother Teresa was wasting her time picking up half-dead beggars from Calcutta's streets and providing them with a clean and safe environment in which to die.  "What good is she doing?" he asked.  "She doesn't have a medical degree.  She can't make them well.  She isn't involved in training or development or capacity building of any kind.  The world is no better for the work she does.  What difference does it make?"

What difference does it make?  Ask Hasanatou.

Because sometimes the difference between being shunned and feeling human is found in a bottle of bright pink nail polish.

Story by Susan Parker

60 Minutes!

Just before Matt and i joined the Africa Mercy in Lome, Togo, last summer 60 Minutes had been there!  Here's the promo:

 

On Sunday, February 17, the CBS television program 60 Minutes will air a segment about Mercy Ships and our mission to bring hope and healing to the world’s forgotten poor. The feature on 60 Minutes allows us to share our story with a national audience. It also gives you an opportunity to share your Mercy Ships experience with those in your own circle of influence.

The hour-long program begins at 7 p.m. Eastern & Pacific Time and 6 p.m. Central Time on your local CBS station.

The best thing to do . . .

when bed head is bad!

Dishwashers are . . .

So overrated when you have a dog!

Binta's Journey

What could possibly compel a poor woman in West Africa to travel over 1000 kilometers – a journey that would take six months and exhaust all of her resources and ingenuity – to get to a hospital ship? The answer is stark in its simplicity – the journey was born out of a desperate, fragile hope that she could find healing and restoration.

Binta lives in southeast Guinea. Six months ago, a man in her village told her about news he had heard on the radio – a hospital ship was coming to the nation’s capital, Conakry. “The ship has doctors that can help you,” the man said.

Binta is in her late thirties and has suffered from vesicovaginal fistula (VVF), a devastating childbirth injury, since she was a teenager. During several days of prolonged, obstructed labor, Binta’s baby was stillborn during a traumatizing delivery. The injury to her birth canal made Binta incontinent; she has been continuously leaking urine for years. Her condition made her an outcast within her own remote village. But now there was news that she could be “fixed” and she dared to hope.

With the little money she had, Binta set out on her journey.

She traveled from her village in the dense rainforest region to the city of Senko. Once there, she used what little money she had to pay for transportation to the next city – Beyla. It was her first time to ever ride in a car.

From Beyla to Nzerekore to Macenta to Gueckedou to Kissidougou to Conakry – a blur of new sights and sounds. She stopped when she had to, staying in one city for up to two months where she worked doing laundry to save enough money for the next leg of her journey. She paid people with cars or motorbikes to give her a lift. Binta traveled more than 661 miles (1063 km) in 6 months to seek help from Mercy Ships.

Finally, she arrived on the dock – with no money and only the clothes on her back. “It was something inside of me that told me, ‘Do it!’” Binta said. The Africa Mercy is the first ship she has ever seen.

 

Last week, Mercy Ships volunteer surgeon Dr. Steve Arrowsmith repaired Binta’s fistula. Today she is dry. She no longer leaks urine; she no longer smells. And now, Binta longs to return home to her sister’s children, triplets, whom she has cared for since her sister passed away in 2011. Because there are no phones there, Binta hasn’t spoken with her family since she left. Fortunately, she will get home to them soon – a much simpler journey this time, with assistance from Mercy Ships.

And Binta will return home with a dry skirt, a full heart and a new life.

Happy Groundhog's Day!

Wouldn't it be wonderful . . .

To experience what Laura had experienced?  Read on . . .

One of our hospital chaplains caught me walking through the hallway last night as I was on my way back to my cabin after a long day.  Laura, do you have a moment?  I want you to witness something.  I cannot hear this testimony alone.
I was a little confused but intrigued.  Of course I had a few minutes to spare!  So we walked together into C ward, greeted Senay and her brother, and pulled up a few stools in a circle with them.  Senay smiled at me, then dropped her eyes to the pastel hospital-gown patterns in her lap and said, every night I wet the bed before I came to the ship.
Vesicovaginal Fistula (VVF) is dry medical terminology for a condition that is anything but dry.  For small women who live days walk away from any kind of professional health care, an initially joyous childbirth can turn into up to 10 days of obstructed labor with no hope of a cesarean section, resulting in a dead baby and no way to stop the constant flow of urine through a newly-created hole.
It's a outcast sisterhood of over 2 million women worldwide leaking infected urine, living abandoned on the outskirts of their villages so no one will have to touch their uncleanness or put up with the foul smell.  It's a condition of poor medical access, of hard work and not enough food to grow tall and strong, of pregnancy at an early age, of poverty and loss.
For the last three months on ship our surgeons have been screening these ladies and performing fistula repair surgeries.  The fistula patients stay for weeks or months, loving on us as we care for them, pouring out hugs and kisses and scoldings from overfull cups.  Many of the surgeries are successful, and we rejoice with the tiny women, newly dry, who dance exuberantly in their new dresses and share stories of what God has done.
But some, too many, are too complicated for our surgeons.  Repairs have been tried and tried again, leaving only scar tissue and tiny bladders for the doctors to work with.  Diseases and sickness make it unsafe to operate.  Even modern medicine has limitations, and not all holes can be closed.  What is wet cannot always be made dry.  This too was Senay's truth, and she would be going home to her village today still leaking and smelly, still outcast.  Except for this new truth in her life:
It is a miracle.  Before I came I wet the bed every night, but since I have come to the ship I am dry.
I am dry.
We prayed there in our small circle in the middle of C ward, hands outstretched and overlapping, cupped to receive the blessing.  All I understood of the prayer was the repeated phrase nom de Jesu...in the name of Jesus.  It didn't matter that I couldn't understand the rest or pray in French together with them, because healing in the name of Jesus was the life-giving message we saw in our cupped hands, and the truth in the fingertips we touched to our faces.
As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him.  And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her.  She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped.  But Jesus said, “Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.”  When they all denied it, Peter said, “Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.”Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. Then he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you.  Go in peace.” ^~ Luke 8:43-48
I pray that Senay and her brother will see this truth.  That Senay will remain dry and live a testimony of love and power, hope and forgiveness in her home so far from Conakry...that others will see, and know, and believe in a God who heals the outcasts when no one else can.