DR day 4

Originally, today was planned to be out completely free day. However, plans changed. On day two, our clinic site got moved at the last moment. The people of the community we were supposed to go to were devastated and begged us to find a way to come to them, so this morning we sent a team of people who had the most experience and who spoke Spanish to do a half-day clinic. The other half of the group stayed behind at the monastery and inventoried all the remaining medical supplies and medicines. This trip is very well organized and planned out. Apparently we had over $60,000 in medicines to give out. Some of the supplies we donated to the Abad foundation, the local foundation we were working with.  Some we placed in a closet for a trip that’s coming in March. We ate lunch at the monastery and then we headed out to Santa Domingo.

            We didn’t get to the resort to 5:30, but the drive was so worth it. It was so beautiful. The resort was all-inclusive. We ate dinner in an open-air buffet 20 feet from the ocean. The restaurant was beautiful, so fancy. Then we went down to the ocean for a night swim. I had never done that before. I was a little nervous at first, but it was amazing. The stars were so clear; I even saw a shooting star. I went up to the room around 10 and took an amazing shower. It was such a beautiful and relaxing way to end a week of hard work. I fell sleep thinking that I had to be the happiest and most blessed person alive.

DR day 3

Today was an amazing day! Our clinic site was absolutely crazy.  We were sent to a place called San Jose. We held the clinic in a community building, I think it may have been a church and the pharmacy set up in a house across the street. And by street I mean 8-foot wide alleyway, crowded with at least 200 people ALL DAY LONG. Unfortunately, we were only able to see 128 pts. When we had to close triage there were at least 30 people still in line, a lot of people were very angry. It was very difficult to turn people away.

One thing I learned from this trip is the value of incorporating community leaders into running the clinic. We had a man who from my limited Spanish, I think was a pastor, or some sort of bible teacher who made a list of patients as they showed up an served as bouncer and door keeper to the triage room. He was so helpful and it was good to work with him.

This evening was a blast. After dinner I ended up playing soccer on the patio with three other students. It was so much fun. Unfortunately, one of the guys cut open his foot pretty badly so that ended the game. Then I got to be nurse Sarah in action bandaging it all up. After that we had a huge bonfire. I ended up staying out talking till 1 am.  Getting the bonfire lit was 30 minutes of entertainment in and off itself. Who ever had set it up did it all wrong, they had all big sticks and no kindling or tender, so of course the fire was not getting anywhere. I’m telling you there’s nothing like watching a bunch of med students figure out how to start a fire. We ended up using old gauzes and class notes as tender! We even had marshmallows and chocolate to make smores.  

This trip so far has been amazing! Everyone treats everyone else with respect. No one talks down to me because I am an undergrad. Everyone works together as a team.

DR day 2

Hello again from the DR. As I write this I am sitting in a rocking chair on the second floor balcony of the monastery watching the rain come pouring down over the mountains.  Storms always make me pause and consider the greatness of God. Us humans we are so helpless against the forces of nature. It’s only by God’s powerful hand that we are sustained.

Today was a great day. I was assigned to clinic #1 in a little village about 15 minutes from the monastery. Another bonus for today was that I got the Internet to work enough to talk to my mom briefly in the morning. I was so tired I went to bed at 8pm last night and didn’t wake up till 7am.  Needless to say, I had a lot more energy today then yesterday. Today we held the clinic in someone’s house, literally. This woman was gracious enough to open her home to the entire community. I ran triage again. Today was a bit smoother because we were outside and had more space. We saw around 120 Pts. We worked straight from 9:30-5:00 with only at 15 break at 1:40 for lunch. There were so many babies! Every adult had at least one kid with them and some had as many as four. They were so cute.

One thing I was really thinking about one of the principles from the book I was reading. Avoid paternalism. The book also discusses how poverty is more then just lack of material things. Poverty also involves emotions such as shame, hopelessness, and inferiority.  All day long I was asking myself “ Do I see these people as inferior?” Am I treating them as if they are inferior?”

Dinner tonight was amazing. Salad, white rice, meatballs, corn fritters and avocado. At first I wasn’t sure exactly what to do with the avocado, but someone suggested smashing it up in the rice. Let me tell you, best decision I’ve made in a while. It tasted so good. I love trying new food. It’s one of my favorite things about traveling. 

Tonight was amazing. After dinner I played a couple rounds of dominos, then I went over to hang out with the students who were doing a little dancing under the patio. I love dancing, but I never feel as culturally awkward as when I’m around latin styles of dance. To be perfectly honest, I just can’t get my body to move correctly to make it look natural.

I left that about 10 to go to bed. However, As I was walking I ran into two of the guys on our trip and we ended up talking about God until Midnight. It was the most fun I had in a while.

Most of the time these days, I exist in a little bubble. I go to school, I go to work, I go to church. I tend to interact with the same people everyday. It was so nice to talk about God with new people. After awhile, one of the guy left and was replaced by a reformed Jewish girl. We had a great conversation. I feel like I really learned a lot about her perspective.

Dominican Republic Day 1

Hello from the Dominican Republic! We arrived here in the DR last night at 9pm. The trip here was fairly uneventful.  Originally, we planned on arriving at 3pm, but there was a flight cancelation in Tampa and a delay in Miami.  By God’s grace, we made it through customs without a problem. After landing in Santa Domingo, we had a three-hour drive to the city Jarabacoa. We arrived in Jarabacoa at midnight and then the real fun began. On Friday, we had sorted all the meds by kind in their original bottles and packed them into suitcases. Now we had to sort it all out into the clinic bags because in the morning we were going to two different clinical sites.  We were up till 2am counting vitamins and certain medicines. Personally, I sorted about 3,000 vitamins into 30 count bags! Today they let us “sleep in” till 7:30.  We left for the clinic at 9am and ran clinic from 10-5. At our clinic site we saw a total of 83 pts and gave hygiene products and vitamins to a few dozen more. As the nursing student, I was paired with an ARNP student and we were put in charge of triage and vitals. The clinic took place in a little three room building in a rural village about 30 minutes from the Monastery. Did I mention I’m staying in a monastery? Well, it used to be a monastery. Now it’s used primarily to house groups like ours.

As far as interesting patients goes, I did see a child with polydactyly (an extra digit), He had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. I also saw two patients with systolic BP’s over 180 and neither weighed over 100 lbs! For my non-medical friends, basically when your blood pressure gets that high you are at a high risk for stroke and cardiovascular complications.  

We got back to the monastery at 5:30 and had dinner at 6. We had to resort the meds again to make sure that both clinics tomorrow got enough. 

It’s so funny how quickly the extreme become the familiar. I still remember the wonder and excitement of my first international trip. I wrote pages and pages about my experiences detailing every new sight and sound. Now I can summarize my whole day in a few paragraphs.  I like that this is becoming the new normal for me.

Also, the things that were strange and bothersome when I first started traveling internationally aren’t so strange and bothersome any more. It’s just the way things are. You change your expectations. Don’t except air conditioning, don’t expect to be comfortable, and don’t expect to eat on any kind of regular schedule. Don’t expect to not be tired; don’t expect to ‘have it your way’.

I bought a book specifically for this trip. It’s called When Helping Hurts. I heard about it a few years ago, but I never got around to reading it.  The big point of the book is the difference between relief work and development work. Many of the concepts were things I had considered before. But it’s given me a lot of food for thought.  I used to just assume that these international medical brigades were a good idea. But now I’m really looking into the effects of trips like these.

I'm done feeling sorry for myself

So I haven't posted anything for awhile. Mostly because I've been busy with school, but also because everything I've sat down to write has ended up sounding like the musings of a whiny spoiled brat.

So as of today, I'm done with feeling sorry for myself. Yes, my body is still malfunctioning, but No, I'm not going to let that ruin my day. I've spent eight weeks in a pit of self-pity, I think that's more than enough time. It's time to pull myself together and get on with life.

In other news,
I finally made it to the endocrinologist today. No news. Surprise, surprise, they have to run more tests.

An exercize in futility

Most days if you asked me about how I like nursing, I'll tell you 'I love it!'. I will go on and on about how much I love teaching people about their bodies and serving them in their time of need. I'll tell you that I know that God made me to be a nurse. I'll talk about how great it is to be able to do the work I do. I will be all smiles and excitement. 

However, I think that my general tendency to be positive masks the pain that my profession often brings. I don't bring this up to complain. I think it's important to talk about the painful parts of our life, because more often then not, these are the areas that God is using to make us like his Son. Don't get me wrong, nursing is a job -no, a calling- that brings great joy. But, it will break your heart too.

Some people respond by saying that you shouldn't get emotionally involved, that if your heart breaks, you are doing something wrong. I ardently dissagree with that sentiment. What kind of person would I be if I didn't grieve with the mother of a stillborn child, or with the patient who just found out their cancer is inoperable? Caring hurts, but I want it to hurt. I never want to be numb to the pain of the world.

Jesus did not turn His face away from the reality of suffering, He did not run, He did not hide. For thirty-three years He walked among the broken, the lame and the blind. During his earthly ministry He healed thousands that had no hope. He healed them because he felt compassion on them. Then at his crucifixion Jesus felt the weight of the sin of His elect, He bore their pain, their sorrow. He did not turn away but faced the reality of suffering the full cup of God's wrath.

And now as God's servant, I too share in His sufferings. I walk the halls of this hospital and I hear their cries. And friends, some days it hurts. Some days it hurts a lot. To know that there are so many souls within these walls on the brink of death, unready for eternity. And I feel so burdened. And then I remember what the Scripture says.

"Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” 

~Matthew 11:28-19~

 ^"Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.  Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need"

~Hebrews 4:14-16~

In reflecting over everything that has occurred this past month, I have come see that the practice of medicine is, at best, a practice in futility. It's like bailing water in a ship full of holes, I'm only delaying the inevitable. This is a hard reality face, to feel unable to help in the face of immense suffering.

Every nurse has to find a way to deal with the emotional drain of nursing. Some can't, they leave the profession (the turn over rate in nursing is very high), some drink, some smoke, a lot eat. I write blogs about Jesus and sing hymns to Him with my guitar.

Father, I do not ask that you remove this burden from my back, but simply that you strengthen my back to bear it.

This is life

 So it looks like I won't be having surgery for awhile. Unfortunately, my doctor found some other abnormalities in my blood work that I need to get checked out by a specialist first. What I thought would be the end has turned out to be just the beginning.

In some ways, the news was a little devastating. For the first time since the diagnosis, I couldn't keep it together. I sat down and cried like a little girl. All the the painful procedures, all the money we spent, was a waste. To make matters worse, I'm probably going to have to redo all the procedures when we get close to the new surgery date.

Now I have to locate yet another doctor. Then it's time to get back on the tilt-a-whirl of tests and procedures to try and figure out what else is wrong with me. 

I don't want anything else to be wrong. I just want to be normal. I'm 21, the problems I'm having are the kinds of problems that you aren't supposed to have to deal with till you're 50.

I feel like my body is rebelling against me. Most days I feel perfectly fine and then out of nowhere I start bleeding so heavily I debate with myself if I need to go to the hospital. It's been really hard to figure out what causes me to start bleeding. I've pretty much figured out that I can't do any lifting. I don't want to sit around like an invalid for the next three months. Besides being bored out of my mind, it would be really bad for me to be that physically inactive. The healthier I am for surgery, the faster I will recover and the less complications I will have. So it's really important for me to exersize.

Being sick has caused a radical shift in my perspective on a a variety of issues. For one, I'm pretty much in favor of the U.S. implementing some sort of socialized medicine reform. I couldn't imagine what I would do if I had this problem and didn't have insurance. One of the biggest reasons my family and I were trying to get my surgery done asap is insurance worries. My insurance is through my Dad, which is through his work. My dad could loose his job at any point in time, which would leave me out of luck until I got a job after graduation. Furthermore, dealing with insurance companies is akin to getting your wisdom teeth removed....without anesthesia. Luckily, I have the most amazing mother in the world and she gets it figured out. Every time I have to call them, it stresses me out so much I just end up crying. and not solving my problem. It's crazy, if a college educated women can't figure out how to navigate insurance, that's a problem.

On the spiritual side of things, it is difficult to see how weak your faith is until you face a trial. Then once you see how weak it is, you wish you couldn't see. This illness has exposed so many deep rooted sins of my heart. Nevertheless, despite how lost I feel, I know that God is with me. I'm not lost.

If God has chosen that this would be the way that I would know Him better, then so be it. If God has desired to answer my prayers through crosses, then who am I to challenge God?

God did not promise that life would be easy and pain free. In fact the opposite is what is guaranteed. We are called to suffer, as our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ suffered.

I know these truths in my heart. But sometimes it's hard to live like they are true. I wish I had more insights to share. I wish I could see clearer through this fog. I feel like a small child walking through a deep fog in an unfamiliar area. I can feel my father's hand, but I can't see him. Things that in daylight would be familiar, seem menacing in the shadow. I know where I'm going, but I don't know the path. Even though my Father is there, I'm still scared. The uncertainty is frightening. I call out "I'm so afraid!" And the Father says "rest assured My child, we will get there in time. Rest easy"

 

"For I, the Lord your God, will hold your right hand,
Saying to you, ‘Fear not, I will help you"  

~Isaiah 41:13~