Cool Breezes from the East.
It’s a race against the clock starting at 6 a.m. A full complement of patients as usual, but the need to break clinic no later than 3 p.m. so that our equipment, furniture, supplies, kitchen, and our generators and computers can be on the truck and heading back to Antigua before darkness hits. Night-time driving can be a tad risky here, and minimizing such risk with our personnel and equipment is a “prime directive” for the local Faith in Practice team.
Today, our Mobility Clinic saw another moving case: a young patient with cerebral palsy. Her name, Dolce Maria. She is twenty-seven years old and for her entire life she has been crawling on the ground to get around or carried with the help of her mom and friends. According to Dr. Phil Filbrandt who works with this population extensively in the US, Dolce is well cared for by her family but they have limited resources: “It is an astounding site to see her crawl,’ he notes, “but my hope is she will now have access to the universe; she is going to have mobility.”
How did you learn about today’s clinic, I ask Dolce?
“A month ago today, a family friend referred me to a social services place, and that system reached out to my family to see if they were interested in coming here. So we ended up here by word of mouth. I am twenty-seven years old, and I traveled five hours to this village with my mom and grandma who also needs a wheelchair because of her age. We waited three hours to get on the bus that would take us here,” a total of eight hours of traveling.” (our translator Sylvia Alvarez from Washington helped Dolce get her story across to us).
For the first time in her twenty-seven years, Dolce will be truly mobile. When she professed that she’ll be happy to move herself around now and doesn’t need her friend’s help anymore because she always felt like a burden, the realization made her burst into sobs, and nearby patients and physicians alike were brought to tears. She was so relieved her life no longer required her to crawl. “I plan to take care of it so it doesn’t break down,” says Dolce proudly of her wheelchair.
Dolce loves to be as independent as possible when she can. She loves to wash her own clothes and won’t allow mom to help her. She loves taking ownership of her needs if she can. She’s extremely grateful. The pharmacy prescribed her vitamins, baclofen, and a thermometer before leaving the clinic.
Hurray: we left the clinic on time today, exactly at 4 pm. We organized a short formal ceremony in the massive village space we had used to thank our village hosts and the fabulous volunteers who worked long hours alongside us and who helped all of our patients get to their designated clinics. I was amazed at their organization, helpfulness, and unflagging kindness. Pictures, hugs and handshakes, congratulations between team members of a job well done, and we pull out of Las Cabezas for the last time.
Our day ends in a celebratory dinner at the hotel. All of our core team members—locals and those from the States—had dinner together, applauded each other as they were awarded certificates, and affirmed that this had been a great experience. Julia Oseida and MarieCarmen Palacios, our local organizers and leads, and Joel Zimbelman, our organizer from the States, reminded our group how each of these wonderful people contributed to our success (including me as Blogger)! What a special evening.
Eleanor, Blogger
