What an amazing week of ministry! Today our group of 19 headed back home and all of us here feel a little sad! Every team is always unique and leaves a lasting impression with both the Haitians and our staff. This team was no exception! They have found a way into our hearts!

Today the girls  were looking through the things the group had left. They found everything they needed to do a VBS! I heard a bunch of kids singing and looked out my window. The girls were hosting their own Street VBS with songs, lessons, crafts, and snacks! Malaya said it was hard work to put it all together but they just have to tell the kids about Jesus! Mikela said she was responsible for the lesson, Malaya did crafts, and Rosie did snacks!

They found snacks from the team but they wanted to give the kids something to drink too. This week they colored paper plates for “charity” and sold them at the market. (Thanks Lisa Morgan for the suggestion!!) They asked if they could use their money to buy the children drinks! They got cups out and poured each of them a little coke!(Yes I’m smiling and so very proud!).

This week little Asher was jumping on our bed and hit our  wooden footboard. He was immediately covered in blood. We weren’t sure if he busted his head or cut his chest. When we cleaned him all up – we realized he had a deep cut on his chin. We knew he’d need stitches – there was no way around it. But here we are in the Mole – not in St. Louis where the hospital is. Our “first emergency” and we were overwhelmed.

It was 8pm and the clinic down the street wasn’t open. We walked in the dark – a few blocks up the street –  to the doctor’s home and showed her Asher’s chin. She said he’d need 3 stitches. So we then went to the clinic and waited 10 minutes for a guard to open it up. The clinic was hot and sweaty and full of bugs. We waited another 10 minutes for the generator to be turned on. After she gathered what she needed she had us lay Asher on a metal table. It took Pierre, Jose, myself, and another team member (Bill) to hold him down. Asher was so sweaty it was hard to even hold him. My eyes filled with tears as he screamed for 20 minutes straight. We paid  30.00 for the visit and carried him in the dark back to our house.

On the walk back home I thought this must be what it’s like to be Haitian. You walk around in the dark looking for help.  No ambulance or ER. You pray that the doctor will think your child is sick enough to see them so late at night – – yet not too sick that they can’t be saved. If you have no money there is little hope. Most of the Haiti hospitals can’t function by billing poor people for their services. You pay upfront for the IV or antibiotics you need. So what if we didn’t have the money to stitch up our son? His wound would probably become infected and his face forever scarred.

Something so simple as a child needing stitches turned our night upside down. As Americans we would never take our children to the clinic I went to and if we did we’d spend the next few weeks worrying about infection. But I felt like for just a moment I got a tiny glimpse of the reality that parents here go through….only I left with my healthy child that night…….while many of them aren’t as lucky.