dry

One of our hospital chaplains caught me walking through the hallway last night as I was on my way back to my cabin after a long day.  Laura, do you have a moment?  I want you to witness something.  I cannot hear this testimony alone.

I was a little confused but intrigued.  Of course I had a few minutes to spare!  So we walked together into C ward, greeted Senay and her brother, and pulled up a few stools in a circle with them.  Senay smiled at me, then dropped her eyes to the pastel hospital-gown patterns in her lap and said, every night I wet the bed before I came to the ship.

Vesicovaginal Fistula (VVF) is dry medical terminology for a condition that is anything but dry.  For small women who live days walk away from any kind of professional health care, an initially joyous childbirth can turn into up to 10 days of obstructed labor with no hope of a cesarean section, resulting in a dead baby and no way to stop the constant flow of urine through a newly-created hole.
It's a outcast sisterhood of over 2 million women worldwide leaking infected urine, living abandoned on the outskirts of their villages so no one will have to touch their uncleanness or put up with the foul smell.  It's a condition of poor medical access, of hard work and not enough food to grow tall and strong, of pregnancy at an early age, of poverty and loss.

For the last three months on ship our surgeons have been screening these ladies and performing fistula repair surgeries.  The fistula patients stay for weeks or months, loving on us as we care for them, pouring out hugs and kisses and scoldings from overfull cups.  Many of the surgeries are successful, and we rejoice with the tiny women, newly dry, who dance exuberantly in their new dresses and share stories of what God has done.

But some, too many, are too complicated for our surgeons.  Repairs have been tried and tried again at other hospitals, leaving only scar tissue and tiny bladders for the surgeons to work with.  Diseases and sickness make it unsafe to operate.  Even modern medicine has limitations, and not all holes can be closed.  What is wet cannot always be made dry.  This too was Senay's truth, and she would be going home to her village today still leaking and smelly, still outcast.  Except for this new testimony she shared with me last night:

It is a miracle.  Before I came I wet the bed every night, but since I have come to the ship I am dry.

I am dry.

We prayed there in our small circle in the middle of C ward, hands outstretched and overlapping, cupped to receive the blessing.  All I understood of the prayer was the repeated phrase nom de Jesu...in the name of Jesus.  It didn't matter that I couldn't understand the rest or pray in French together with them, because healing in the name of Jesus was the life-giving message we saw in our cupped hands, and the truth in the fingertips we touched to our faces.

As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him.  And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her.  She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped.  But Jesus said, “Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.”  When they all denied it, Peter said, “Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.”Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. Then he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you.  Go in peace.” ^~ Luke 8:43-48

I have not greeted Senay as she wakes up in the morning or held her dry sheets in my hands.  I cannot say if her testimony is a desperate hope for normalcy or the beginnings of healing for a damaged body and discouraged spirit.  But I pray that Senay and her brother will see truth.  I pray that she will know an unconditional love and acceptance.  And I pray she will remain dry and live a testimony of love and power, hope and forgiveness in her home so far from Conakry...that others will see, and know, and believe in a God who heals the outcasts when no one else can.

Yourself again

I can still count your ribs under my fingers, prominent beneath the thin patient gown.  It's all you wear now, besides the bold headwrap and clean white bandages.  You weren't yourself yet when you woke up after surgery, eyes confused and sad, and a wrinkled insistent finger pointing to the well-taped NG tube.  This does not belong here...remove it.

You tell us you are on a ship, but do you know which ship that is?  Do you remember that this is the hospital that promised to remove your tumor?  Do you recognize that you are Halima when you look in the mirror and see a face that is so much smaller now?  I watch you struggle to swallow around a mass that is no longer there, and sometimes I see you reaching up past the bandages to touch the thin air in wonder.  Does it surprise you every time?

Who were you before this lump appeared on your face...do you remember what life was like when you were only yourself?

I brought my own warm blood while you slept in the operating room and I prayed it would make you strong.  After you woke up after surgery I tried the little Pular I knew but you struggled to reply.  You sat still on your bed and did not stroke the soft hairs on my arm or hug me tight.  Did you remember you were looking for us?

This morning I came in to work and you hugged me and hugged me again as you passed by, thin fingers stroking my arm hairs and a sparkle in your tired eyes.  The chaplains came with their guitar and drums and the joyful steady beat of African praise, and you shuffled into the center of the circle with your arms raised and then clasped tight around me as we danced together in rhythm with the djembes.

Your face and your throat have begun to heal, but it will take time to fill in where the tumor has been.

Will it take that long to fill your heart?  I think not.  Already you are becoming yourself again.