A Mother’s Heart

I am ashamed to admit that I did not really want to go on the recent trip with Aid For Haiti.  I have been before and knew full well what I was getting into.

Long days of travel over rocky terrain, steep mountain passes and endless days seeing patients in between sleeping on the floor and using a smelly outhouse.  To be honest, I would have rather stayed at my parents’ house sleeping in a warm bed and going Christmas shopping.  And what about my two boys, ages 2 and 4?  What kind of mother would I be to leave them for a whole week?  But God had other plans for me, and despite my excuses, God’s word assured me, “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work (2 Corinthians 9:8).  The confirmation is clear and I answer God’s call to serve in Haiti with a “Yes”.

So while my boys happily play with their grandparents for the week, I embark on a long journey into the rural Haitian mountains with my husband Caleb (yes, this whole thing was his idea!).  So this physician -pharmacist couple joined a fantastic Aid For Haiti support staff and translators, settled into our grass hut with dirt floor, separated into our consultation rooms divided by a thin curtain, and began a 4 day mission of medicine and ministry.

My prayer for this trip was that God would open my eyes to the hearts and lives of these impoverished people.  The vision He revealed to me centered around the hearts of the women and the burdens they bear in life.  Mothers know a universal language.  In the consultation room I saw their concern first hand, and the evidence in their children of infections, worms, and malnutrition.  I had a conversation in Spanish with a woman from the Dominican Republic whose greatest desire is to have a child, but is struggling with infertility.  A Haitian woman has had seven children, but lost three of them to starvation.  “They just got skinner and skinnier and then they died,” she explained.  Now a fourth child is sick and she has brought her to us.  I prescribe her nutritional supplementation in the form of vitamins and formula, but how can I heal this woman’s heart?  I cannot begin to imagine the grief she has experienced, the helplessness of watching her children suffer and die, over and over again.

Another woman brought her 4 month old son to us who could not urinate without screaming and crying in pain.  Caleb was able to perform a simple procedure to alleviate his problem while I sat outside with the mother.  Despite the language barrier, I could sense her agony and she waited through the procedure, not really understanding and grieving for her suffering son.  All mothers weep in the same language.

The next day started early and I could tell the emotional burden of this experience was weighing on me.  I sat in my consultation chair as the translator ushered in an elderly woman with an infant son.  A grandmother with her grandson.  The mother is 15 years old and wants nothing to do with the baby.  The grandmother has no money to take care of him.  She sold the tin roof off her house to make money to care for the child.  She has nothing left to give.  She asks me plainly, “Will I take her precious grandson?”