Transformation

First week: Screening & Fistula Camp planning

Second week: Ward Nurse Supervisor

Third week: Screening & Fistula Camp meetings

This week will mark my first month here at AWC and I will be back to ward supervisor for the next two weeks. Bernadette, the national ward supervisor will be on screening up-country so I’m the lucky (or maybe blessed is a better word) to cover her job while she is away. I love being a nurse, but this has been a stretch for me to be on the ward. You might have noticed, I have not mentioned the OR in my list of duties since I’ve been back. I am truly homesick for the theatre because that is where I’m most comfortable and I know things without asking hundred questions. I love being an operating room nurse ever since I stepped foot in the OR in Guatemala. I want to be there to hold my patients hands as they are receiving a spinal, to assist the surgeon, or when the ladies are waking up from surgery. I want to be part of the transformation in their lives and it’s hard to do that when I’m in front of a computer or in meetings all day.

One day sitting in the office, I take my eyes off of my current project on the computer screen and gaze out the window.  I see the patients at their table- they are just girls at heart that want to color and do each other’s hair. I hear them singing, learning the alphabet & numbers, and then enjoying the afternoon coloring with the crayons I brought from home.  At that point, I realized I could be part of the transformation in whatever role I am in- I just have to look for it. The time I’m in meetings about fistula camp- that is 60 lives we hope to change in just two weeks in March. The week I was ward supervisor, I went on rounds with our surgeons, spending a few minutes with each lady. I learned their names quickly this way and how to get each one of them to smile. Hawa & Kadiatu, both from Guinea, I would greet them in their native tongue- “Ja ramma”. Two smiles would form as they would converse on how silly it is to hear a white woman speak Fullah. Aminata always had a frown on, but slowly its becoming a smile when I make eye contact with her. Korea, is a quiet fourteen year-old, but always makes a point to greet me when I walk by her bed. Mama Ramatou, grasps my hands in hers, and before I even say “How d’body?”, she tells me “Tell God tenki.” When I see these ladies transforming before my eyes as they are recovering from an awful condition, I have to give thanks allowing me to be a part of it. Whether, I’m in meetings, restocking supplies in the wards, being a pharmacist or dietitian, helping put an IV in or making copies, this is exactly where God wants me to be as He is transforming my heart as well. 

Kadiatu & Hawa leaving to go home to Guinea.