mud huts and HIV clinic

The first week we arrived in Kenya someone asked us, “What is the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about Africa?” After telling them that “Well, I think of Safaris, lions, and tribes”, I later asked Reika if anything else came to her mind. I don’t know if this is a bad thing, but one of the first words that actually came into our heads was AIDS. This past week Reika and I got the chance to work in an HIV clinic. Amy Bemm’s Husband is a doctor at Tenwek and asked if we would do some counseling with his patients. He asked us to assess the clients and figure out the most common needs.

Our first client that we talked with was a mother and her nine-year-old twins. We asked how she was doing, and if there was anything that she was in great need of. She looked at her twins and said, “We need food. We are supposed to be eating nutrient filled meals, and I can’t even afford meals for my daughters. I can’t find work, and I’m so scared.” She then told us how she didn’t know that she was HIV+ until she was in the hospital giving birth to her twins. She was devastated upon finding out, but she was even more devastated when she found out her daughters were HIV+ as well. When she told her husband he denied it, left her, and then proceeded to marry another woman. She has not seen her husband since the day she told him. She now lives with her parents who are very sick, old, and poor. Her parents are the only ones who know about her health. She informed us that if she told any of her nine other siblings they would disown her and humiliate her. She was in tears from the moment she told us she had no food left to when she walked out the door. It felt so sorry for her. All I could really do was ask if I could pray for her and her daughters. Reika and I don't have extra resources here to help people like we did in America. They don’t have food banks, homeless shelters, government funding, etc… All they have are their families.

The last client that we talked with was the hardest on me emotionally. It was a four-year-old boy and his father. I would NEVER have guessed that the child was four years old. I would have guessed one. He was so small, dirty, sick, and covered in scabies. The father looked just as thin as well. He told us that he and his child were both HIV+. As he started telling us about his situation the child started scratching his skin raw, crying, and had tears constantly rolling down his cheeks. We asked what was wrong with the child and the father said, “He is so hungry because he has not eaten in days, and his skin hurts all over his body.” We immediately called down to the kitchen to get the child some food, and continued talking to the father. The longer the child cried the more my heart broke. He kept burying his head into his father’s chest and would look into his eyes just asking him to make it all stop. I had to stop what I was doing and, in my head, count to ten. Tears were on the tip of my eyelashes just waiting to fall. I knew that I could not let that child just leave the hospital, because I knew he would not live long enough to come back for help if he got sick. After talking to the father we were able to get him some bags of food, and made a follow-up appointment for next week. We told him that if his son had lost any weight we would have to admit him into the hospital. Malnutrition is such a HUGE problem in Kemya. I really think that every child I see when we go on our walks has signs of malnutrition. We saw so many patients that day, and they were all pleading in their eyes for help, the most powerful thing that we could do for them was to lay our hands on them and pray for them. Aids is such a catastrophic problem in Kenya, and it is so looked down upon.

This child has not left my mind all week. I finally went to the Lord and asked why? I didn't understand because the more I thought about their situation the more helpless I felt. I started to pray and ask God what he was trying to show me. This is what I heard in response, "Caitlyn, you know the picture of the child and his father that you can't get out of your head? That is what it looks like when you, my children, look to everything but me to satisfy your needs. You tend to go to the very source that caused your problems to fix your problems. The father was the reason that the child was sick. He was the one that infected his own son, yet the child did not see that. All the child wanted was for his earthly father to make him better, but he can't and he wont." So many times we go to others to fix our problems before going to the Lord. We expect so much from people that are only destined to fail us. We become so distracted of what matters in life by all the stuff in our lives. People, especially in America, make themselves so busy that they do not have time to just stop and think. They don't give themselves time at the end of the day to go back and ask God why this happened, or why that happened. We are missing huge opportunities of letting God show us who he really is. God is our teacher and we must ask him questions in order for him to give us answers.

On an upper note…we were able to help discharge three mothers from the maternity ward. They were all so thankful, and a few of them were in tears when we brought them their discharge papers, and we informed them that they did not have to worry about paying their bills, because the hospitals “needy patient fund” was going to cover it. We were also able to help an orphaned baby from being sent to a terrible orphan home. We convinced the Uncle to take the baby to another home, even though it was a little more expensive, and after about a week of talking to him he agreed. There are also a lot of orphaned babies in the ICU, so we have been going in and feeding them.

This afternoon Reika and I got to mud a hut. It was such a wonderful experience. Upon getting there we took off our shoes, were given huge buckets, and told to go all the way down the mountain to fetch the water. I really mean all the way down the mountain. We made I don’t know how many trips, but it was a lot. I’m sure we are going to hurt tomorrow. After fetching all the water we mixed the mud with our hands and feet. We then rolled the mud in huge clumps and squished it between the branches, which were the frame of the house. We had a blast. We stepped on a million

thorns, got rocks stuck in our fingernails, and got a little sun burned, but we enjoyed every minute of it. Everyone in the family helped to make it, including the two and three year olds. They were right by our side walking back up the mountain with a smaller bottle of water. It was amazing to see their work ethics compared to the children in the US. I can just see myself telling my kids one day “Well, you know when I lived in Africa the children had to carry bottles of water up the mountain just to have something to drink…and they were half your age.” Hahaha. It was beautiful and I can’t wait to help another needy family make one. It was like Habitat for Humanity Kenyan style.