Sandy's revenge

Those of you who have been following my blog since last year will remember Aimee, our love starved little girl with noma, an opportunistic infection that strikes the weak and malnourished following a serious illness.  It's a disease that eats away the face, marking victims who could not afford good nutrition, penicillin, or the basic wound care that would have easily treated the infection.

Meet Sandy (not her real name), another Noma victim.  Aimee and Sandy are the strong ones, part of the debatably lucky 10% who survive the disease only to live the rest of their lives scarred and outcast.

It's been a rough few weeks for Sandy.  Her surgery almost three weeks ago was extensive, with her tongue sutured to the roof of her mouth to help grow back a palate, and skin flaps here and there to help replace the other missing tissue.  It's a delicate work of art; we'll get to see the results soon when she heads back to surgery to have the flaps released.  Meanwhile, she's been slowly shedding her plethora of oral and nasal airways, tubes, and IVs as she gets used to breathing and eating on her own again.

Communication has been a challenge as well.  Sandy arrived with a large group from Guinea, and is fluent in a tribal language none of our translators or staff speak (even if we did, it's really difficult to talk with your tongue sewed to your palate and your mouth sewed partly shut).  We got creative, rotating through other Guinean patients in an elaborate puzzle of who-speaks-what, using basic French which she seems to understand some of, and relying on our fluent pantomime to get us through.  Now that the rest of the Guinean patients have left, we're down to just pantomime, and she is a master.  Still, I was a bit concerned about the social aspects of living in a community where no one speaks your language, wondering if she would start to pull back into herself.

I wish that you could have seen her last night.  

Armed with a colored pencil and a small piece of cardboard, Sandy began following one of our nurses around like a duckling, mimicking each chart notation and assessment on her own scrap of paper.  Helping herself to an extra stethoscope from the hook on the door, she listened to each of our breath sounds in turn, front and back, demonstrating for us the deep breaths we were supposed to be taking during our exam.  Each nurse working was then bodily hauled over to the monitor and sternly instructed to stand still while she checked a full set of vital signs and properly sanitized the thermometer in between "patients."  A few of us even got medicated.

Through it all there was a little twinkle in Sandy's eye, a gleam of fun at this chance to get back at each of the nurses who had repeatedly checked vital signs and assessed, nebulized and medicated and suctioned and tube-fed her over the last few weeks.  Now it's her turn for revenge.

I printed off a patient assignment sheet for her at shift change, and presented it to her on a clipboard with each of the nurses names written in.  She joined us for prayer, sat proudly in the charge nurse chair and indicated that this was her place, here in the circle of nurses, and then very seriously jotted notes on her sheet as we "gave her report" on each of her patients.  My favorite moment was when I introduced her as our new charge nurse: she giggled and blushed as she tucked her head down and peeked out at us, her new friends, laughing and clapping encouragement.  

She'll be here with us for a few weeks yet, to surgery and back again before making the long trip home to Guinea.  But I'm not concerned about her psychosocially anymore.  Sandy has made herself right at home.  God has done what none of us could do, reached out and touched a soul, and given Sandy back her smile.