Sandra

Wednesday, July 22. On Monday before I even got to the clinic AM had taken a baby home with here, a 1mo named Sandra. Sandra’s mom had died, and also her twin sister. Her father was unable to care for her. We found out that our patient with HIV and the leg wound died on Sunday at home. Yesterday, was not a good day. It started off well. Our TB patients who came into the clinic were doing well. Also, during surgery I had the task of removing a man’s testicle, it was not pretty. It is all women working in the clinic, and unfortunately the number one reason for surgery is a male problem. AM does a lot of vasectomies, and hydroceles. Needless to say as ladies we have had multiple situations that have caused us to laugh, so we had some fun during the surgery. After the surgery I went out to feed the cow. The cow proceeded to head butt me, in which my skirt got caught on his head and he basically caused me to flash a few people. I did not find it funny. Then we had another malnourished child come to the clinic. 11mo, girl. I took her to the hospital gave all 3 children milk, and then went to pick up the baby. I forgot to mention that AM argued(in a loving way) for a while over who would care for the baby. Anyway, we are sharing custody, so Monday night she stayed with AM. And Tuesday was my night with her. I picked up the baby and on the way to my house she vomited all over me. I got home ate dinner, and then got a call from AM that our 4yo malnourished boy Davenson had died, suddenly. I am literally numb at this point. I do not know what is going on, but things have just been very bad the past two weeks. I thought he was doing better, his swelling had decreased, he was talking, and I had just seen him 2hrs before he died. I don’t really have words to describe his death. I do have two positives. One the baby only woke up 3x last night. Of course one of the times was for over 2hrs, but it is an improvement from the other baby I took in April. Secondly, I majorly obliterated a tarantula which was gratifying.

Thursday, one of patients who has HIV and a huge wound on his leg, and penis went into a coma. He had been at the hospital for a month, and we kept telling the family to take him to get medicine for his HIV which they never did. Thursday, he went into a coma and they took him home to die. I was sad but he was so miserable, most of all I was frustrated that he did not go and get medicine for his HIV. That reminds me the 27yo who I was afraid was going to die, is ok. He has HIV and TB, he has started treatment and is feeling much better. He feels so good that one day I came with some milk for the malnourished babies, I left it on his bed and went into another room, when I came back he had drank the milk. I think he has a little too much energy! Yesterday, I got to the beach, and it was so fun to get away. We took the motorcycles which I really enjoy, except we were trying to fit three adults onto one motorcycle. It was a little too tight for comfort. I did not understand because the Haitians do it all the time, but then I remembered that all of us girls had at least 15lbs on every Haitian. Then at the end I got bounced and burnt my leg on the muffler, which actually really hurt. So I am now thinking that a tap tap with 30 people crammed in is much better! This morning I was woken up and called to the hospital, Mervens the malnourished baby died before I got there. AM and I are like what is going on? People at the hospital seem to be much sicker, and we just have had a lot of people die lately. Keep us in your prayers please!!
Also, an animal update. Um first of all the cow is back! I am not happy about this. He now likes to nibble on my hand or leg, which kinda tickles but is very scary because he has large teeth. On the plus side two tarantulas are dead, and a rat!! The rat was killed by a guy at the hospital who hit is on the head with a rock, which is pretty impressive!! .

To finish off my week as Doctor, I posted my blogs and then went to the hospital where a 4yo malnourished boy named Davenson was waiting for me. I was like are you kidding me right now?? He is a fighter, he does not like me, and really does not like it when I force feed him the milk. Tuesday and Wednesday morning I was greeted with bodily fluids from Dieselmet. Tuesday he had diarrhea everywhere, Wednesday he threw up everywhere. Both days I had to give him a bath which he did not appreciate, and it wasn’t that fun for me either. Did I mention that both days that was the first room I went into when I started my day. I am so thankful I get to drink coffee here! Then Wednesday afternoon we had an 11mo malnourished baby come in, named Mervens. I placed a tube in his nose and was giving him milk through the tube. So this has definitely been a week of force feeding children, the malnourished babies are ruling my life right now. I feel that all I do is make milk, and then force feed it; which is pretty much my least favorite thing ever, it is pretty horrible but I keep reminding myself this will save their life!

A rough week

Friday and Saturday. This is gonna be long. AM is out of town. I go to work Friday morning, and see an entire family of 5 for consultations which I am not supposed to be doing but there was an old man who could not pee, and I had to help him. Then I go to the hospital to do my morning rounds. At noon a man is brought in who is having trouble breathing. He is 27yo and is very weak. I have him stay at the hospital. Then off to force feed the Dieselmet After that I go back to check on the man who is now not making sense, and is very out of it. I tell them they need to go to the hospital now. But they want to wait till the morning, Rob tells them they have to go but then they can’t catch a tap tap. Rob says he will get them on a tap tap first thing in the morning. I then start to head home, and get called to the clinic where I have to stitch a wound on a 3yo boy. I get home at 8 at night. Then return to the hospital with the girls who are at the house to pray for the 27yo man. Thinking that he is going to die in the night, he is cold, having fevers, and not making sense.
I arrive Sat morning and the man is there, alive, but he is not going to go to the hospital he wants to wait for AM who is returning Sunday. I start to tell him he has to go, but then I get called in another room to help Robenchley the baby with HIV whose dad has three wives. He looks like death, his cheeks and eyes are sunken in. I try not to completely freak out. Every time I get an IV in him the vein blows, he is vomiting black stuff. I put a NG tube in and give him fluids that way, and pay for them to take a motorcycle to the hospital in the city. I then try to put an IV in the 27yo man, and figure out what medicine I can give him. I can’t start an IV, so I take a break, it is 4 in the afternoon I have not eaten or sat down all day. While I am at home on my break eating, AM calls me and tells me that Robenchley died 30min after getting there. AM stayed with Bennet the mom, and comforted her. Then I get called back to the clinic to help another elderly man who cannot pee. Followed by putting the IV in the 27yo and starting him on some medicine. I got home at 10 pm. These two days have been hell. I am so heartbroken. I could not feel more helpless than I do right now. I feel like this place fell to pieces the second I was put in charge. I feel like this 27yo is going to die and I can’t do anything. I feel like the baby died because of me, I could not get the IV going, and I waited too long I should have sent him to the hospital right away. This was a baby I have seen every day for the last three months, I loved this baby and I loved his family, and I failed them.
To end on a brighter note, Dieselmet swelling has started to go down, and he is talking. He does my rounds with me, he seeks me out which is the sweetest thing. Next week will be better, hopefully more stories involving tarantulas dying! By the way, since the girls have been here 2 more tarantulas have been killed! Yippee! Also, the baby cow is gone!!!!!!!!

Dieselmet

Monday was a horrible day. A malnourished boy c Kwash came in to the clinic. His whole body was swollen. He is 2yo, named Dieselmet, his mom came with him, she is pregnant and her husband just died about 4mo ago. AM was not sure if we should even keep him at the hospital or send him home to die b/c he was so swollen. It did not look good, but AM and I talked and I really wanted to try and give him this special Unicef milk. While I was running around in the 1000 degree weather trying to make milk for the boy and admit him to the hospital with a new TB patient. I had a woman come up and start telling people that her son was just as sick as Dieselmet and that we did not help him. Even though I have been seeing her son every two weeks and he is gaining weight, I also give him milk and usually money when I see them. She then camped outside my house demanding I help her. I seriously almost lost my mind. I was so frustrated that she would start telling other people that we weren’t taking care of her, and be so demanding after seeing that severely malnourished boy. Then I got to go and force feed the malnourished boy, which was horrifying. He was screaming and crying for his mom, who was threatening to beat him or leave him so that he would take the milk. How do you reason with a 2yo, how do you explain that if you don’t drink this milk you will die. Staring at him makes me want to cry, scream, break something, and then throw up. How do I tell him that this is an injustice, that he doesn’t deserve this, that he lovable, and that it’s not his fault he got dealt a shitty life.

This has been a great week. I am back to my hospital rounds, I was able to do some stitches again, help deliver some babies, killed a major tarantula, same old same old. I have found my rhythm in this oppressive heat, and with being the only nurse. It has been hard trying to live up to my friend Ryna, supernurse, but I am at least getting the work done. We have had a couple of rough baby deliveries, but everyone has been ok. We had two 16yo’s admitted this week for TB, one of them weighing 73lbs. The group at the hospital is very fun, and I am enjoying their company a lot. Friday, three girls came from the states to host a kids camp for the summer. I am excited to have some company. Except when I went to clean their room before they came, lurking in the corner of the room under the bed was a huge tarantula. I killed it, but nearly had stroke in the process. It was pretty horrifying, this huge hairy spider hiding under the bed. But he is dead now. We also have another animal hanging around. AM is helping a woman take care of her baby calf. The calf’s mother died, so we are now giving the calf some milk. I never thought I would be feeding a calf in Haiti, but here I am. It sounds cute, but really it is not. The calf thinks me and AM are his moms so he follows us around, and likes to head butt us. Today he stepped on both of us multiple times, so I am officially over this cow. All I can say is the adventures never end here.

Updates

Now for some updates. The hospital has mostly TB patients. It is a really good group. We had one dehydrated baby, and a set of twin boys who weigh 3.5lbs. I still have a still of my old friend in the hospital so that has been fun. I had quite the upset with Robenchly. One day his dad came, and he brought his two other kids that he had with with his other wife. He wanted Benette (Robenchlys mom) to watch the kids b/c their mom had died. So now she has a 6mo, 12mo, and two 4yrs. He left them to go work and spend time with his third woman. Also, we just sent them to the other hospital and the 12mo baby has HIV too. There are not words as to how upsetting this is for me. Fortunately he has not been back. Even more fortunately for him I don’t speak Creole well enough to say what I want to say to him. Last Tuesday we had a pregnant woman come in with a diabetic coma. Of course we don’t have insulin in Haiti. We gave her an NG tube and crushed up some oral diabetic medication. The baby had already died during the night, then the family decided to take the patient home to die, and she died on the way home. Once again could have been an easy fix if we had supplies. Then Sat. morning I helped AM deliver a baby. Afterwards the mom had a HA and we realized she had high BP. We gave her a shot c BP medicine and had her lie down. 12hrs later she had a seizure and went comatose. She is still in the hospital in the city, we don’t really know how she is doing. The pregnant ladies are giving us problems so keep us and them in your prayers!

Family

Ok the dream of having internet is officially over. It will not happen. Back in Haiti. I came with my mom and sister which I knew would be an adventure and is was. Unfortunately it started off with a lot of obstacles like one bag not making it to Haiti, and none of the other bags making it to the house until 4days after we had been there. Fortunately the bags came b/c my mom was able to show AM some lab work she can do which will be so helpful. We had a fun week, we got to go to river, the market, on some walks etc. I would like to point out that this was my moms first trip outside of the US and she came to Haiti, she needs major props for that!! She only had one major spider freak out. My mom and I had twin beds pushed together sharing one mosquito net. In the middle of the night I had to pee so I went to grab my headlamp and accidently grabbed my mom’s back. She started screaming that there was a spider on her and tried to physically claw her way out of the mosquito net. It was really funny. By the end of the week she was killing spiders for me which was nice. My sister did a super good job of not puking when she saw blood or other gross things. I was very worried about that! But she loved it, and she also was the baby whisperer. I have to admit I found this annoying b/c Robenchly always cries when I hold him but with her he didn’t. And all the babies loved her. Not fair! I’m so glad I got to share this experience with them! Now my whole family has spent time in Haiti!!