Miracles❤

She slipped into my hands with a shower of miconium staining and amniotic fluid. Her lips were tinged blue and her chest lay still. The minutes seemed like hours as we rubbed her and blew air into her tiny mouth, willing her to breathe. With the aid of breaths and oxygen, her chest began to rise and fall all by itself. And she broke the silence with the most beautiful cry ever. Miracles happen to those that believe. And our miracle came in the form of a tiny little girl that Mis Emma named Nevaeh.
A bit of background on this baby and her parents. She is the 7th and only living child. All the other babies died between 5-7 months of gestation. Cause of death isn't exactly known. Quite possibly the mother had preeclampsia, as she did with this baby as well. It was exciting to see her get past 7 months and still have her baby. She was afraid though and we worked to keep her blood pressure at a safe level. In the end, everything turned out ok. I felt honored to have been able to deliver that little girl and help to give her breath. God gave us a miracle right before our eyes, and we're so thankful to him for giving us wisdom through the whole experience. We couldn't have done it on our own. Everytime I see a birth, I'm struck again by how amazing a new life is. There's nothing quite like holding a slippery perfect little human in your hands and listening to them cry. It's all so worth it. Every sleepless night. The days when your hair stands on end, your eyes are red rimmed and basically crossed, and your brain just gave up on trying to understand the language. Nursing can be hard and heartbreaking. But I wouldn't trade my blood splattered flipflops and sweaty days for the cleanest, coolest medical facility in the states. Haiti and its people have stolen my heart. And I'm proud to call this tiny island home.
As a side note, I'm Autumn🤗 I was down here for 2 months and worked in the pharmacy. My gallbladder decided to give up on me and I was in the states for 4 months having it removed and recovering. Now I'm back working in the prenatal program. And I honestly couldn't be happier 😊❤
Until next time.
Bondye beni ou💙
Mis Autumn💊

“Ding ding ding” -it’s a very familiar sound around here. Its the sound that could mean basically anything. It could mean that there’s a neighbor kiddo at our gate asking for the same thing he’s been asking for all afternoon and the afternoon before, or it could be someone alerting us of an emergency at clinic. It’s often the sound that makes us mentally groan...ok yes, I’ll admit it, I have audibly groaned. 

 We’ve been staying pleasantly busy at clinic. We’ve been delivering lots of babies and none of us are sad about it. In fact, just knock on our gate and tell us there’s a laboring mother on the way and you’ll make any one of us happy. :-) While you’re at it, check your clock to make sure it’s not supper time and you’ll make us even happier. We’re not picky, it’s just a thought. :-) 

The miracle of each new birth never ceases to amaze me and being able to help brand new, slippery, and hopefully screaming babies into this world is highly exhilarating. I’ve learned to LOVE the sound of a new-borns cry-especially if I don’t hear it right away. We’ve had a couple of those in the last couple weeks (check out the last post if you haven’t already) and God’s faithfulness and strength is those times is beyond amazing. We serve an awesome miracle-working God. 

We like suturing too so if you ever need sewn up, those gate knocks are welcomed too...just make sure it’s a nice clean cut, those are funnest (I AM aware that that’s not a word). Again, not picky at all.  

 

Here’s a pic of the 3 other nurses besides myself with a baby they had just delivered. 

This is our ‘lil burn guy. I wish I had a pic of his burn when he first came in to show you all. Someone apparently accidentally dumped a boiling pot of soup on him and the side of his face, neck and down the side of his trunk were burned badly. He’s a brave ‘lil trooper and comes every day to get rebandages. His burn is healing up beautifully and we may or may not be getting attached to him. :-)

And this is me...and I think it’s self explanatory. 

Once again, pray for us and thanks for praying. Until next time. -Mis Emma 

It’s me again and to be perfectly honest, I haven’t the foggiest idea what to write about. Life here can hardly ever be considered “normal” but when the unusual, unexpected, and abnormal happens consistently enough it basically becomes normal and I don’t know which thing to write about. 
 We closed clinic for a ‘lil over two weeks for “vacation” and spent most of it scrubbing and getting everything re-organized and ready for 2018. I think everyone is really enjoying being back in clinic life and working in a newly cleaned and organized facility.
We’ve been having very nice-sized days here at clinic which gives us a ‘lil time on some afternoons to go visit friends or invite friends over to play ball or make food together.
I’m still loving working with my dear blood pressure patients. Mr Chocolate, from my last blog post brought me his promised chocolate and today I was promised a beautiful chicken. :-)
I’m gonna throw a few random photos on here and hope that they’ll upload for me this time. I’ll  let them speak for themselves. :) 

Thanks for praying for us! -Mis Emma

Surgeries

Hi everyone my name is Ben, I've been living here in Haiti for just over two months. First off I'll be blogging about some surgeries that we're done at our clinic close to a month ago now. We were blessed to have Dr Phil Sutherland come and do some surgery at our clinic. With having a clinic here in Haiti we have people come that needs surgery done and we don't have a regular doctor here that can perform surgeries, so it's a real blessing to have Phil come about once a year and catch up on surgeries that need done. Most all the surgeries where removing lumps and tumors of various sizes there was also a lady that needed a small toe removed so he cut it off and repaired her foot. This was a very good experience for all of us I feel we learned a lot being able to work with the doctor as he performed the surgeries. For most of us this was a first time experience helping with surgeries but the doctor had lots of patience and work with us. These surgeries took place on the 8th and 9th of December. Since then quite a lot has happened life is busy and full of surprises I really like it here in Haiti! Today was our first normal clinic day since we had been closed for 2 weeks over the holidays feels very good to be back at clinic again. God bless you all, until next time Ben.