La Sonya

I am well on my way to my wrangler-hood! Sarah, the daughter of the visiting Doctors from Cameroon, and I have been ridding a lot more, going in the afternoon on Wednesday and early morning on Saturday. She has been ridding Bob, the horse that broke his hip at a very young age and I rode Pepper, the horse of the same age who has only two speeds—fast and then beaucoup fast. When we went for our ride last Wednesday it was great fun. We took the Australian couple most of the way ridding double to the market, and then we took off the other way. On the way we decided to see if we could get them to trot some. Off course they wanted too, the only problem was Pepper thought that we were headed home . . . which we weren’t. Since I haven’t ridden him a whole bunch we aren’t too used to working together, and he wanted to go home—fast. I don’t like it when he chooses the speed, so I tried to stop him which is hard at times. He didn’t stop and all of the sudden he turns right, which I wasn’t expect...

Do you know for sure if your rinse cycle really rinses?? How often do you check your spin cycle?? How gentle is your gentle cycle?? Here in Africa Liz and me know each and every step of the process. This last Sunday we carefully watched how it was done. We so carefully observed the process that lasted all morning. It started at 7:30 and ended around 11:30. We made sure the soap was properly applied to each and every article of clothing as well as making sure each article was getting the proper attention it required for difficult spots. We made sure the water was always warm, not hot, and not cold. We even paid special attention to see if it needed to be rinsed extra. How many people back in the states know for sure if their clothes have been properly rinsed? Ours took several rounds to make sure. We even took notice of properly drying each article making sure not to shrink burn or over heat them. Shoot, how many people take that much care with their clothing? I sure never thought I w...

Today I wanted to cry again. Why? Because I ate the very last guava off the tree next to my hut. It’ll be the last fresh guava I may ever eat here in Tchad. And I love guavas from the tree next to my hut, they are extra sweet! I guess co-existing with my series of new things is a series of lasts. My last guava. But don’t be sad, the mango tree is starting to bloom! :o)

I arrived at home ready to eat. After watering my flowers I plop down in my regular wooden folding chair and start to eat my yummy black-eyed peas cooked in tasty peanut oil. As I was eating I decided to watch some TV. So turning on my High Definition TV with surround sound, I flipped between my two favorite networks—Modern Bible times and the livestock network. Today I decided to settle on the livestock network, after all I am from Texas and I am wearing my pretty, pink sparkly Texas girl shirt (thanks mom!) So on the livestock network they are vaccinating the sheep. Using anywhere from 3-10 kids, some regulars on the show and others from nearby, to keep the sheep inside the compound/court yard as well as grabbing the sheep to gently lay them on their sides so the injection could be given in their back hips. This whole show without commercials! One of the sheep was really funny because he acted really funny afterwards, he walked funny and talked a lot and kept trying to lie down then ...

At 5amish on October 22, 2007 we had two new arrivals to my hut famil. Our mamma sheep gave birth to two healthy little babies, one girl and one boy. They are so cute, they look just like baby sheep, imagine that. There little cords haven't fallen off yet and they are all wobbly when they walk. It only takes 5 months for the little guys to develop inside the mamma sheep. Then poof you've got baby sheep! We have another little sheep that is now 6 months old, same mamma, it only takes 1 month till you can have another batch, it also takes only a year till that baby sheep can now be an adult and have sheep. I've learned a lot about sheep! And I'm not sheepish about that either! Hehe.

Anyone out there who knows me knows that I love to celebrate life. One way I have found to celebrate is by celebrating half birthdays. My half birthday was yesterday, October 22. Six months exactly until April 22 the day of my birth. So in typical Sonya fashion we celebrated. Liz and Ester had worked the night shift so they had the day time off. Around 1ish we started making some what was going to be yummy granola. We cut up guava, almonds, and mixed it up with some dry milk, honey, oats, Uncle Sam's cereal, seedy things from the market, peanut flour, peanuts and peanut oil (they are popular here). Things were going great with the mixture until we tasted the first round of finished granola . . . then we realized NO this was not good. We didn't ever finish it, we hoped that someone else would like it and finish it, we were too dejected to finish. But never fear the festivities were not over, they continued into the afternoon. We four SM's were going to hang out at Hans' ...

I've realized yet again that we are never far from home. We were sitting in worship the other day (actually on a regular basis) at the hospital and there was a nifty little jingle, someone's phone. Ahhh, what a gentle annoying reminder that technology is very present in my Bible land of Tchad. There is also the world wide titti-twister for the male gender. I saw some boys giving each other one reminds me of being at camp with the silly boy staff. We also have our fair share of fart-ers. Sometimes when I am playing with the kids at home, Swari, the littlest will just fart. Then all the other kids will bust out laughing. Then sometimes we'll be sitting on the mat and out another one will come. It's true you are never all that far from home. The best of them all is when Hans and I were coming home from the capital last month one of the passengers in the van with us was wearing jeans, and on his jeans they said, " Welcome to the Hood". See I'm in the hood, I ...

I've seen quite a few feet recently. Whenever I help out in the bloc (OR) I usually stand at the foot of the patient. Sometimes I look down at the feet of out patient and I think about them. Their feet show a lot. Just by looking at them I can tell if they work out in the champ, field, or if they wear closed toed shoes or not. I look at the bottoms and wow! They are thick skinned they have gone their whole lives without really wearing shoes. Their toes are thick on the bottom as well from all the walking over hot sand, rice, water and who knows all the different types of roads. The toe-nails are quite thick as well, they don't really trim them. They are often crackly and thick. There are a few, a rare few whose feet don't look like that. I wonder what kind of life they live, they aren't the ones who are in for a hernia, they are usually in for a lobotomy, a bowl obstruction usually. Either way, I've seen my fair share of feet. But that's okay I've always lik...

Being here is teaching me about prayer. I feel like prayer is becoming more real to me. How often when I was at Southern was I able to pray so hard for someone like I did for that woman? I was so real-raw, I cried out-I wanted to literally, but instead I talked silently and moved my lips under my mask and cried with my eyes. I know that God's not some magical spell that can be turned on and off to do my bidding. But come on! God's sent us-Yes, each and every one of us the Holy Spirit. We've been given the power to set people free. We should be able to have such a relationship with God that we would do His bidding. Like when you've been friends with someone so long you just know what they want. I want that! I want to be able to say-honestly that I desire You (God) more than anything on earth-Psalms 73. I long to see someone set free not by medicine but by pure power of God covering our shortcomings with Christ's blood. Oh to see that power at work here in Beré.

I wanted the power of the Holy Spirit today so bad. I prayed, I did I prayed to God. I claimed His love and sacrifice for this woman. I prayed that He not look at me because I am very unclean but with the blood of Jesus He look at this woman and heal because I know He wanted to. He answered Job, Peter, John, Paul so many people. I want that kind of relationship with God. So I can so very boldly approach the throne of God and call on His power to heal. By no medical means-straight up power of our Heavenly Father. This beautiful woman shouldn't have died. There was absolutely nothing medically I could do. In fact the only reason I was in there for as long as I was the simple fact that I didn't know how to do anything so I could hold the IV fluid. Because I couldn't do anything medical I called on my Heavenly Father. I called and called. I know He heard me, He hears all of His children. Just for some reason He couldn't bring her out of the code. Why? I don't...

I just got back from "visiting" as they put it. I went with Mature (which I found out means Mathew in French) to visit people. We go every now and then, always after we have eaten. I didn't really want to go tonight because I was tired and had a headache. But I don't really feel like I can say no to going and doing the cultural thing and visiting. Besides how often do some of these people get to see a real live Nasara, Arabic for white person, in there house. We went to this one guy's house first. Didn't know him but guess Mature did. Anyway turns out he's been sick for the last two days with some itchy thing in his armpit and two on his butt. I asked him if he had been to the hospital yet and he said no. I sure hope he goes. We didn't stay long there. As we were leaving the house we saw one of his kids on the mat, they said he was the sick one, the handicapped one. He had a large growth on his back. I don't understand why they haven't taken hi...

Okay for those of you who are ADD and can't sit still to read all of this here's the bio. New Doctor-Sonya helps visiting doctor. Visiting Doctor gets Sonya to help in the OR. Social worker Sonya gets sterile compresses/gauze for the surgeon as well as helping to tie into their gowns, open sterile things and all sorts of stuff. Sonya see's and helps with a bi-lateral hernia, hydrocile, mastectomy, c-section birth, stab wound, regular and strangulated hernias, double mastectomy and bone scrape and much much more.

Liz was on the schedule for the night so I had secretly planned on coming back to work with her the night to keep her company and to get a better idea of what they have to go through as the work. So I came back after eating a bit at home. I was only home for a bit because the surgeries took sooooo long and I finished after 4pm. I had been back with Liz for a bit (around 7:30 pm) when we had to go over to get Dr. Bond for him to look a patient. Come to find out there was a woman who needed to have a cesarean section birth that night. So since I had already been in the bloc all day they let me help in the OR again! It was my first birth, the baby was great, very healthy and all. Right away even as they were suturing up the woman we started the baby breast feeding. It was a whole new situation for me. A birth. A miracle of life. I helped move the woman after the C-section to her bed and making sure the family knew to breast feed the baby and not give him water but breast milk, everyone kn...

Bi-lateral hernia wasn't to bad. It takes a while but not too long. It was nice to have the air-conditioned on me :o) we use it in the OR because of all the lights and long gowns and heat. With this patient there were no complications or anything dodgy. Just get in on the right side right above the groin area, then switch to the left side and do the same. Second man down was for a hydrosol, an enlarged testicle filled with fluid. Sometimes they get so large the man can't walk because his testicle is so large! I mean bigger than a bowling ball!!! Sometimes they think it's manly. . . Anyway he was down on the table and we were opening his testicle and Dr Bond said it wasn't a hydrosol after all, it was a bad hernia that had gone down into his testicle and so we ended up operating on him for a hernia, cutting just above his groin and pulling his intestines back up into the correct abdominal area. Things went smoothly and I wasn't board yet. There is so much to watch an...

Dr Bond-surgeon Abel-assisting Simion-Anastasia Me-circulator -meaning I get compresses (gauze) out with sterile tongs and put them very carefully with out touching anything on the table. I also help tie up the doctor and assistant in their gowns as well as make sure they have the right size gloves. If they want anything during the surgery from around the room or outside I also get it for them. Basically I am their dirty hands, their sterile and can't touch anything, so I do it for them.

Dressed in my scrubs I head to work. Quickly give my TB meds so I and suit up to help in the blog while of course trying to look like I do this all the time and I'm not terrified. By the time I get there to help they've already got the first patient on the table and they're getting ready to administer the Anastasia. The first guy in the line up of the day is a bi-lateral hernia; we had seen him yesterday in consultations. I've got my Viagra surgery hat on and my re-used facial mask. Luckily I've found Liz's surgical mask so at lest I knew it wasn't too old. (Just one of the many things we reuse at the hospital.) I've also taken off my crocs to put on the crocs specifically set aside for the bloc; it's those shoes or no shoes in there.

On wed the 3rd of October we were going to have our evening Bible study and it was taking forever to get started mainly because I was very aware of the time as I was waiting for Andrea to call me from the land of porcelain toilets. One of the interruptions was the arrival of another last min short term volunteer, Dr Bond, Dr James Bond. Clearly not his real mane-who would name there child that? It's just a name he chooses to go by, you'd understand if you met him. Well with the arrival of the short term surgeon things changed. On Thursday after I did my TM med rounds I headed over to the house to try and work on the programming. I was met b Dr Bond and soon drafted into the army of medicine. He wanted me to go with him to do consultations at the hospital to see if any of the patients in the waiting room were surgery cases and if they were we put them on the schedule for the following day. Should have known then I'd be busy. I saw more patients then I really have in the enti...

I don't know if I am so tired because of working 11 hours yesterday or from the third round of malaria. Sorry I haven't written in a few days the phone company, Tigo is currently a Nogo company. Word on the street is there's a tower down or something. Anyway email comes and goes like the wind theses days. Sometimes one of us 4, SMs check it can receive but by the time we've written something we can't send because the "wind" has shifted again so once again we must wait till we can send again. So much has happened to me in the last 5 days. I'll try to remember it all as I start at the beginning.

the stupid tigo phone company is currently a nogo company. the generator is on the blink. hope to make contact someday again soon. i am still alive. don't stop praying, amazing things are happening here. more later. pray and send email. thank you.

When I got to the hospital for worship at 7am, little Ramadan, one of my little TB guys sat with me for worship, and he and I had a lot of fun I received the full amount of personal contact for the day. We looked at our hands, veins in our hands and tried not to giggle to loudly when we tickled each other. In the afternoon I didn’t worry about working on our math skills like I normally do. Normally I sit with my peds boys and we go over math stuff. We play a round of Uno and then work on numbers. With Climont, I work on going over basic numbers and recognizing them and then with Kumabus, I help him with multiplying and simple addition, which he is good at. With Ramada I go over addition. But yesterday I gave it all a break and we colored pictures. We just sat there and I sang and let them color whatever they wanted to. There was a nice breeze and a bag fluttered over to me so I took it and made it into a kite. I just sat there with the kids and tried to fly my kite. Soon it was time fo...

Once upon a time in a land just outside of my hut there was a place that had lions and giraffes roaming the forests, there was a forest stuffed full of all sorts of African animals. Finally at one point in time the people of this land decided they would rather try and make things to live with using the wood from this lovely forest. So down went the trees, down went all the animals living in the tree. Once all the trees were gone, the people decided to put in fields of rice so that they could eat more. Once all the fields of rice came and the lions were killed so that they wouldn’t attack people working in the fields of rice people felt safer. They killed the giraffes so that they wouldn’t feel small and tiny. Now in a time much more recent, people can walk millions of kilometers to a river during the afternoon and return in the evening and not have any fears about being attacked by a stalking lion or a crazed giraffe. Once upon a time in a land far away there was a girl who walked safe...

Have you ever seen it? It’s really just dirt. It’s kinda funny because worms eat dirt and so they just poop dirt, it doesn’t even stink or look funny. It is just little organized chunks of dirt. But yet somehow I can’t bring myself to touch it, simply because I know its poo. It’s funny to put water on because it gets bigger, like just add water to make dirt. It’s funny to step on, I step on it all the time because I think they like to poo right in front of my hut door. So next time you go fishing take the time to put out the worm out and feed him a lot of mud so he can poo and you can see it to!

Simba. I know, I know, that’s not even one of the suggestions. But come on, I’m in Africa what better a name. Plus, he does look a bit like a lion cub. I think that it fits nicely. He kinda stalks like a lion too. So Sorry Ben, Thomas, and Andrew—Simba wins.

We are the body of Christ. That was the topic of my sermon I preached on Saturday. Yup, I preached a sermon. I was asked during the song service between SS and church to pray for church service; so I went back to the back room to prep with the rest. While we were back there it became obvious that the person who was going to preach wasn’t there. I looked around me and thought rather impulsively, I’ll preach. I really was afraid that if someone else did it would be a long boring scattered sermon. So in reality the offer to preach was a selfish one. After I realized that I had offered to preach in front of my new church family, I got nervous. Shoot, God, did I run ahead of you again? Well no backing out of this now, so what will I preach on? I opened my Bible and thought about the love chapter in 1 Cor, but didn’t know how to present it then I guess God opened my eyes to chap 12. Practically a sermon ready to go. So that’s how I chose it. I had quickly come up with an outline back in the ...

On Friday nights I usually get to bed later because we have the missionary group vespers at the house that ends with the generator being turned off around 8ish. By the time I get back to my hut and all settled it it’s later than my normal 8:30pm bed time. This week it was even later because the big generator (that gives the house and hospital power) wasn’t on so we went longer than normal in worship. When I did get back to my hut I wanted to read a bit so I ended up in bed at 10:30pm, and as I went to bed I heard the generator on at the hospital and as I drifted off to sleep my thoughts were prayers being sent up to God for James and whoever else must have been working on the surgery. Then the next thing I knew was I heard Liz calling to me and a bright light coming in my door. It was Liz dressed up in surgery gear coming to get me. They needed me to give blood to the woman who was in the surgery. I was up in a flash trying to find something to put on to go to the hospital ...