Baby Aisata

Today was a very exciting day, as it marked the first day of surgery for the patients of Guinea. Although I am technically an "outpatient nurse," I had the privilege of helping out on the ward to train the new nurses who have not worked on the ship before.

Amidst the chaos of the new nurses training and morning rounds with the doctors, one momma was tucked away in the corner with her crying baby girl. I walked over and tried to help her momma calm her down. I pulled out some toys and distracted her for a bit, but her hungry tummy started rumbling again and the crying started back up. She was the first patient on the list for surgery and hadn't eaten for several hours (for anesthesia purposes), so she was not so easy to console. A few minutes later, we got a call from the operating room to take Bed D15 down for her clept lip surgery. I showed the nurse in training where to go and we escorted the baby and her momma down to the OR entrance. As we got her chart ready, I looked down at the name and suddenly realized I knew this patient! I turned to her momma and asked "Did I meet you at screening?" She nodded excitedly and I realized why they had looked so familiar to me...I had registered baby Aisata for surgery at our big screening day earlier that week!

We said a prayer for baby Aisata and the OR nurses gently took her out of her momma's arms and carried her to the operating room. Aisata's mother turned to me with a huge smile lighting up her face and said "merci beaucoup" (thank you so much). She couldn't stop smiling and as I thought about the new lip that baby Aisata was going to have in just a few short hours, I caught her contagious smile as well. Aisata's mother put her arm around me and told me in French "You are my friend now." Her joy and excitement was so radiant and carried over to my own heart. Within a couple of hours, Aisata was sleeping peacefully in her mother's arms, her beautiful new lip held together with sutures and steri-strips. Her mother still had a huge smile on her face as she looked down lovingly at her baby girl. "Thank you so much," she told me over and over again.

A few hours later, I was sent to A Ward to help the new nurses with their post-operative patients. Patricia, one of the first patients to have surgery, had come from Sierra Leone and spoke English. She began to share her story with me. "I have had this large bump on my forehead for a long time now and people always ask me what's wrong with my head. I try to cover it up with my head wraps, but I am ashamed. Last year, when the ship was in Sierra Leone, I tried to come for surgery, but I came too late. My friend told me not to worry. She told me the ship would come back someday and I just had to pray and trust God that I would be able to have the surgery. So I prayed and God heard my cry!" It was amazing to meet Patricia and hear her story of God's faithfulness and provision for her surgery. "Now I feel free and I don't have to be ashamed anymore," she said with a smile on her face.

As I sat there listening to Patricia's story, I thought of Aisata and all the others who were having surgery that day. And in the midst of training new nurses on paperwork and medications, I was reminded of why I am really here. It is all about bringing hope...the hope for a young mother who can now see her little girl grow up without feeding problems or criticism because of her cleft lip. It is hope for a little boy who will never be able to walk on his own unless his legs are surgically straightened and hope for a woman who thought she was too late to get help. And as I look around at the ward and see the smiles and the hope on so many faces, the words of Psalm 40:1 resonate in my own heart: "I waited patiently for the Lord, he inclined to me and heard my cry."