Chepntich Ominia
I walked into the room and every bed was full. It was a room given to all the pediatric children that had been discharged. She was the first child I noticed, but not the first one that I talked with. As Reika was asking another mama about her child’s situation, I was making faces and smiling at little Chepnatich. Every time I made eye contact with her she would giggle and throw the blanket over her head. Once we had made our way around the room we finally got to Mr. Ominia.
I was very interested in what had happened to her because she had a massive cast that covered her hips and legs. She was not able to move at all. The father told us, “She fell backwards and slid on her back.” After hearing the story I knew that the father was hiding something from us, but there was no way of finding out what that was. In Kenya, there aren’t investigators that go to the homes to assess the situation and stories, even if they don’t match up. The father was asking us if we could assist him in paying his bill. He had been discharged for over a week, but could not leave because he had no money to pa. At one point he actually told us that he had money, but when his wife was going to bring it to the hospital his brother went to her and stole it. He said that he was a drinker, and took it to the pub. This is a story that we hear very often.
We informed him that we would talk to the legal officer about his situation, but that he would have to pay at least half of his bill. For the next two weeks we continually pestered the father to some how come up with some money, because his bill was only getting higher. He told us day after day that someone was supposed to be bringing money. Every time we would visit with the father, little 5- year-old Chepntich would just smile, throw the covers over her head, and laugh. I never saw her cry or complain. I couldn’t help but laugh every time I saw her. She always seemed to warm up my heart. I found myself looking for her every time I walked through pediatrics.
When we left for the village we figured they would be gone when we returned, but we were very wrong. Upon getting back to the hospital we were told that Mr. Ominia, the father, had left her in the hospital the same day we went to the village. She was alone in the hospital for a total of two weeks. We did everything we could to locate the father, but he didn’t have any phone number or contact. He also lived in the Bush, which really made it impossible to find him. We also really wanted to talk to him because we had received new information about Chepntich’s injury. The mothers that had children, located in the same room as Chepnitch , had started caring for her. They were being Good Samaritan’s. They were not only buying her food, but bathed her, wheeled her around in her chair, and loved on her. These mothers informed us that Chepntich had just started talking for the first time, and that Chepnitch informed them that her very own mother had “thrown her out.” Her mother had gotten into a fight with the father, and out of anger, she took a giant wooden beam and threw it at little Chepntich. My heart crumbled upon hearing this story.
On Friday that father of Chepnatich finally returned. We had sent word all around the area that he lived that if he didn’t show up soon Chepntich would be considered abandoned, and she would be taken to a children’s home. When he returned he informed us that he had also found money through world vision that would pay for her bill, because she is being sponsored through them. After figuring out the financial details we started asking more questions about her injury. We informed him of the allegations that we had been told, and he got very angry. He said, “This is the first time that I’ve even heard such a story. I was not home when she was hurt, but my wife told me she fell.” This is all that we were able to get out of the father.
After talking to the father we went to Chepntich to see if she would talk to us. We asked her to tell us what had happened and again she told us that her mother had hurt her. She said, “I don’t want to go home.” This was the first time that I could see fear in her eyes. As we were talking to Chepntich we could see the father, in the distance, having someone translate what we were asking her. The last thing that Chepnatich said to us was, “Can I go home with you. Please.” I squatted down to her level, and held out my hand. She grabbed it and held onto it. She held onto it so tightly.
After assessing the situation I felt like I had hit a wall. We called Amy, our supervisor, and she told us that there was nothing more that we could do. We had to let him take her. It was so hard for me to just walk away. We informed the father that we were going to take Chepntichs allegation very seriously, and we were going to inform the children’s officer so that he could check up on her situation. He said that he understood. In reality though, her situation wont ever be followed up on. Child abuse is such a huge problem, and there are so many other problems that people consider more important. I really believe that child abuse is one of the most corrupt things in the world.
After we did all that we could for Chepntich we had to deal with four other indescribable child abuse cases. For example, we were referred to talk with a mother who was being accused of putting her two year old girl in a pot of boiling water. Her baby was unconscious and in the ICU. Or our third case was a child that had been paralyzed from the waist down because he had “fallen” and had been extremely neglected since. We were informed that he was brought in for bedsores. We had not seen the bedsores until we referred the physical therapist to come and look at them. I will never be able to put into words what I saw. His entire buttox was gone. The sore went straight to his bone and it was filled with infection and puss. Not only was his buttox gone, but also the both sides of his knees, his heals, hips, and even elbows. I thank God that he could not feel any of the pain. The physical therapist greatly apologized when she realized we had never seen anything like that before. She actually had to talk us out of shock. Reika and I both thought that we were going to faint.
It is only be the power and grace of God that we are able to go back to the hospital day after day. These are just a few stories of a small number of our clients. Some of them have happy endings, but so many of them have tragic ones. Reika and I have really grown to love our work here. We are already talking about how we can’t imagine working anywhere else, because this has been so good for us. Never in our lives did we think that we would be doing Social work in a hospital. We have learned so much about poverty, child abuse, learned helplessness, and international social work issues. It’s been so good. And it is going to be so hard to leave.
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