Tag: before and after

Walter

So many tears have been shed these past couple days— tears of worry, tears of sadness, and plenty of tears of happiness! Today, I sat and wept with Walter’s mother who was so thankful for the cleft palate surgery he received at Hope of Life today.

As she wept, she shared the story of how many children in her village have died from complications due to cleft lip/palate. She wept as she remembered that 10 years ago, she was one of those very mamas who had lost a baby for this very reason. She wept as she reminisced of the day four years ago when she handed her one month old malnourished baby over to me. She couldn’t come with her baby because her husband wouldn’t allow it. When she ultimately refused to abandon her baby, he left.


When sleepy post-op Walter opened his mouth and she saw the new little palate, she wept again.

Today was all of the feelings.

In these remote areas of Guatemala, health issues are common and healthcare access is rare. On this #WorldHealthDay, I’m so proud of the work being done at Hope of Life to provide this basic human right to families who are unable to afford it but more than deserve it.

And more than ever, I am in awe at the beauty, the bravery, and the strength of these Guatemalan mamás. Providing what is a very basic service (in our eyes), is literally the life-changing help that keeps children alive and in their own families.

Thank You, God… for putting Your goodness on display through sweet little ones like Walter. 😭💞🙌🏻

Dulce

When I think of strength, I think of Dulce. A young girl from Guatemala’s Corredor Seco, her father didn’t have the financial means to provide dire medical care for her.

4 years ago when we brought her to Hope of Life, I would have never guessed how resilient, intelligent, and sociable she was! Diabetes and malnutrition robbed her of many things in her life— her vision, her joy, her strength, and even her own mother were lost to these difficult diagnoses.

Through Hope of Life, she has received surgery to restore her vision, training to learn to manage type 1 diabetes all on her own, and dental care to restore her beautiful smile.

When I asked her if I could share these pictures, she latched onto me with the biggest hug. Somewhere between giggling and sobbing, she agreed and thanked me… but it occurred to me that her thankfulness needed to be directed to all of you, too.

To those who support us, pray for us, and encourage us… thank you for letting us do the work God has called us to. You generosity is part of Dulce’s story, too. Truly, stories aren’t always as hope-filled as this one, but God’s hands are always ever-present over us and the amazingly strong Guatemalans we get to work with. As we enter into 2022, we are so deeply thankful for our friends, family, supporters, and encouragers for keeping us afloat in this crazy world!

Yolanda

She was a real life sour patch kid and the closest thing I would ever have to a little sister.

It’s ironic, really… when I moved to Guatemala I didn’t speak one word of Spanish. Yet the person I understood better than anyone else was Yolanda. A deaf teenager growing up in an extremely remote and extremely poor village in the mountains of Guatemala, she spoke her own unique sign language. Her family didn’t have the resources to care for her diabetes, so finding a school to teach her to sign was so far out of the picture that I doubt they even thought of it. It wasn’t until Hope of Life started sending her to a deaf school that she began to speak some Guatemalan sign language. Even still, she spoke her own way and it’s remarkable how well we understood each other. She wasn’t completely nonverbal though… her laughter was boisterous, the way she shouted my name was precious, and she would say (rather loudly) some pretty obnoxious things at inappropriate times… this unfortunately always seemed to happen whenever I was responsible for her and of course always in a public setting. These memories crack me up but also make me want to cry knowing I will never experience them again.

Typing this out is painful. I don’t want to put it in writing because I don’t want to believe it’s real… and I don’t know HOW to put in writing a relationship that ran 8 years deep. We weathered many storms “through sickness and in health” and I was privileged to see a side of her that not many got to see.

My selfie queen, my shadow, my sidekick, my sweet girl. I only wish I had gotten to hold your hand, braid your hair one last time, and say goodbye. I will love you and think of you forever.

Faithful

“Don’t forget to be faithful to do the thing you’ve been called to do. It’s easy to get distracted, much harder to stay focused. Nothing lasting is built without steadfast endurance, wisdom, & the ability to press through the unglamorous, unrecognized, unseen, & laborious middle.” Christine Caine

Today, and really just lately in general, have not been days that I want to place on the highlight reel of my life. Maybe it’s this season of being temporarily uprooted from our home and our work in Guatemala, maybe it’s the weird season we’re all in and all of the changes due to “the” virus, maybe it’s a little bit of a lot of different things… but today it all came crashing down on how I’m in this weird unseen middle. In my stubbornness and consternation, I sent myself to my room twice today until my attitude would improve– but that didn’t really happen until I stumbled across this quote from Christina Caine.

And I realized– I might not be where or who or what I want to be at this very moment, yet I am still called to be faithful.

For the past month, I have been grieving over sweet Brenda in the above photos. I was so worried about her returning home. Is she getting enough to eat? Is her mama doing therapy on her arm? Is she safe? I seriously thought of this precious girl ALL the time, and would whisper prayers for her safety throughout each passing day. At 3 1/2 years and only 13 pounds, her frail little body was shutting down when we received her. Could she survive the damaging effects of severe malnutrition? Miraculously, she nearly tripled her weight… but we had to discharge her to go home during a government shutdown and with the uncertainty of when we’d see or hear from her again. When I received word this evening that she doing well at home, nothing else mattered… not the things that I was mad about… nor the fact that I’ve experienced a lot of change lately and I’m just not good with changes. Knowing she was okay all of a sudden made everything with me okay.

Tonight was a beautiful reminder that when we are faithless, He is still faithful. In the anxiety and stress and confusion of this season, may we all be gently reminded of this.

You are loved.
-Whitney

On Earth as it is In Heaven

She hadn’t been in for a follow up appointment, so we were all worried. We were already reeling from the difficult news of another patient who passed away, so we were naturally guarding our hearts and expecting the worst. We travelled for hours, climbed down a steep mountainside, crawled through a dangerous rocky ravine, and limbo’d through rusty barb wired fences to get to her.

We approached their home carefully, the whole time praying she would be healthy and safe. When her grandparents saw us, they burst into smiles. “Just wait til you see Santos!” her grandmother grinned. Immediately, all my fears subsided.

Her mamá walked out of their house made of palm fronds. Santos Cecilia was in her arms with the biggest smile on her chubby face and her little belly spilling out of the bottom of her shirt! She looked absolutely perfect! We got them set up with a follow up appointment, but I was so at peace seeing how she is thriving at home.

I wish all stories were this successful.  My heart longs for a world where poverty and malnutrition don’t exist. But until we see things “on earth as it is in heaven” we will continue doing whatever it takes to bring help to the physically and spiritually starving. God, protect these children until help can arrive.💛🙏🏻

May 2019 – the first photo we received of Santos Cecilia asking us to help. She was a month old and weighed under 5 pounds.
    January 2020! Santos (mamá) and baby Santos Cecilia
    May 2019 – Santos Cecilia’s family
    Dr Kyon Hood, his wife Victoria, and their family sponsored Santos Cecilia’s rescue
    What a difference several months can make!
    it was all worth it.💛
    vale la pena💛

    Measuring Malnutrition

    “How sweet!  She looks so healthy with her chubby cheeks!”

    Sometimes malnutrition is easy to spot– a three month old clocking in at only 3 pounds, her ribs prominent, her crying only consoled by a bottle of milk that she quickly consumes.

    But in other cases, malnutrition can be very difficult to detect to the untrained eye.  Clothed and standing on a scale, a child can sometimes meet all the criteria to be deemed ‘healthy’, but through skillful assessment and observation, you can gain a more accurate picture of what is going on ‘beneath the surface.’  This type of malnutrition is silent and insidious and is claiming the lives of many children here in remote Guatemala.  Hope of Life is fighting daily to reverse the statistics.

    So, heads up… NERD ALERT.  This purpose of this blog post is to give a little bit of medical perspective to what we see and treat daily here in Guatemala.  Today, I am only focusing on the two types of acute malnutrition we treat most often here in rural Guatemala– Marasmus and Kwashiorkor.

     

    Continue reading Measuring Malnutrition

    How to Save the World

    Spoiler alert : you can’t do it alone.

    We’ve all heard the cheesy story about the starfish, right?  Here’s a condensed version — a father and son are walking along the beach, and there are hundreds of starfish that have washed ashore.  The starfish are dying because they are out of water.  The kid begins throwing them in one by one, the dad makes a remark about how ‘you can’t save all of them’ and the kid replies ‘yeah, but I saved that one.’

    I’ve come to realize how true that really is.  A few weeks ago, I shared on my instagram a story of the ripple effect that helping others has.  I’ll share it below:

    Several months ago, Hope of Life rescued a little baby girl named Estefani. She was malnourished due to feeding problems related to a birth defect. Months later, she is healthy and now awaiting a surgery date to repair her double cleft lip and palate.
    Her precious mama told us about her neighbors who just gave birth to two tiny, precious twin girls. “They are chiquititas, como Estefani!” she reflected on when Estefani was first admitted into our care. Yesterday, Hope of Life arranged for the little 4lb babies to be brought in. They are our third set of twin girls this year, and I’m so proud of Estefani’s mama for making us aware of them.
    This is why you do for one what you wish you could do for everyone. Helping others is not some sort of debilitating crutch that leads them into a life of dependancy… Rather, giving help is an extension of your hand to lift them out of their current situation. If it is done in grace, love, and with some education, it can truly change future generations. Empowered people empower people. [Acts 20:35]
    Continue reading How to Save the World

    This is rural Guatemala.

    “You may choose to look the other way, but you can never say again that you did not know.” -William Wilberforce

    Today was Yennifer’s “going home” day.  As morbid as this may sound, I never thought we would see this day.

    I remember vividly the day she was brought in.  I wasn’t even sure she was alive at first.  She was 6 years old and only weighed 9 pounds.  “How is this even possible?” I thought to myself.

    Her skin was dry and flaking off in areas, her pulse was thready and beating at 38 beats per minute, her breathing slow and still.  I choked back my own tears as we undressed her to do a full assessment.  She didn’t stir, she didn’t fight, she didn’t even wince.  She was much too weak for any of that. Continue reading This is rural Guatemala.

    My Lucky Pizza Socks

    In everything, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” Acts 20:35

    I got out of bed and fumbled around in the darkness to get dressed for the day. I grabbed Bryan’s sweatshirt since mine was somewhere buried beneath two weeks of scrubs in my clothes hamper. Reaching into my drawer, I grabbed a pair of socks from the pile. As I sat down to put my socks on, I couldn’t contain my happiness. “My lucky pizza socks!” I thought to myself. These weren’t any ordinary socks, they were MY pizza socks that I once won $300 while wearing them. I happily wiggled my feet into the socks more than certain that it was going to be a good day. Continue reading My Lucky Pizza Socks

    Update

    This picture brings me to tears.  Sweet William continues to grow and thrive. Although I so loved his precious cleft lipped smile, I love even more the world of potential that is contained in this precious miracle baby.

    He gives power to the weak, and strength to the powerless.  Isaiah 40:29

    William’s story is just starting to be written, but you can read about where it began HERE.

    I am thankful he was in my arms when his heart slowed to a barely perfusing 20 beats per minute.  However, make no mistake, the glory is not mine.  The glory belongs to God for having His hand over William’s life and every doctor and nurse that was present during his care.

    I have started two other blog posts that I want to share with you all, but could not move forward without showing this little miracle first.  More to come later this week… 🙂

    You are loved,
    Whitney