A tug on my strings

Last night was my first of 4 night shifts. The night went well for the most part. We have started ortho surgery so we have a row of beds that all of little children in cast, each with their mama. It is so funny because each cast is different. One is pink, one is camo, and one is blue. Each one telling a little about the personality of the child wearing it.

On night shift the busiest part of the shift is at 6am. we hang the IV fluids, clean up a little, pass meds, and make sure all our charting is done. I was doing vital sings when I felt a little tug on my scrubs (well the strings that tie in the back to make them a little cuter). I turned around and saw the biggest, cutest (Sunday-boy, 2 years old) eyes starring back at me still holding onto my strings. So for the next 20 minutes held onto my strings as I went on with my nursing duties. I had to walk a bit slower, due to his 2 year old lenght of legs, but it was worth it.

Problem of the attitude

We have been on the ship for 3 months, I have worked on the ward for 29 shifts, I have had many wonderful meals, and basically experienced life changing things.... but right now I am tired and annoyed.

It would be nice to be able to to go a meal and not hear someone complain about the abundant food that is on the line (hello look out the window, we are in AFRICA. We eat more in one week than most families eat in a month). It would be nice to work one shift on the ward with our thinking how nice it would be to transfer to the Starbucks Cafe.

In reality nothing on the ship has changed, nothing has gotten any worse, it is just me. I am tired and obviously having an attitude problem. So today I went to the ward to pick up something that I left there last night and they were having worship. Man, it gets me everytime. I was quite content wallowing in my own self pitty, but when you see the Liberians worship the self pitty somes to a skreeching hault. Some are patients that had life changing surgery and others are translaters, but they all are Liberians that worship the Lord with such Joy. So for now, I will stop with the pity party and move on and try to have some perspective.

Easter Brunch & Eggs

We planned and experimented with slow cooking a 'dry air' or coddled/poached egg 'if you will' for you this morning for brunch.  We pre-tested it and the process worked.  The process is not really new, just new here...its another one of my lovely food science things that I make everybody in the galley participate in.

I started the warmers in the dining room early at about 65 degrees Celsius, Tim went down to start the eggs in 2 inch pans and turn the temperature down to 60 degrees Celsius.  That was at 8:45am, warmers were on, and hot.

Now about 10am Peter came up stairs to tell us the eggs were completely raw!  What? HOW?

I guess that will remain a mystery...somebody turned both warmers off probably almost immediately after we left the eggs in there, yes, both sides.

So who was it?  Was it sabotage? (certainly not, right?) Was it dining room staff? (they'll never admit it now) Or could it have been the duty officer when he comes thru and tends to turn things off? (certainly they would not come thru and do that on Easter Morning Brunch!)

Ahhh, such is life.  Maybe we will try it again one day for a regular breakfast...oh they looked so good peaking up at us like a daisy the day we tested them, cooked so slow the whites where solid but not rubbery, the yolk shiny like the sun a vibrant yellow orange...

We might have been able to recoup a loss but unfortunately our clock stopped at 9:25 and we were putting along thinking all was making good time and we could pull off some more eggs in time...but no, it was really about 9:55am!  I wear a watch but I hadn't really looked at it since I sent Tim down to put eggs in the warmers.

And just when I thought I could live with myself, one of my Hollandaise Sauce 'broke' (separated) and I was afraid it would be took for cheese sauce (and I think it was).

So I thank you all for your standing ovation and hope you thoroughly enjoyed yourselves on the Lord's day, celebrating Jesus Resurrection.

Local Workers

This is Ophelia, one of our ward cooks...she always has a great smile. I don't think she understands my English most of the time so she just nods and laughs.

 

Daniel works in Salads and he too has a great smile, I caught him not paying attention while eating his lunch in the galley.

By my side, By my side

Tyrone and I have both blogged about the VVF ladies but this week I have worked with them on A ward. When you first walk into the ward the smell of urine is very obvious. The women that are on the ward right now all are on their second or 3rd surgery due to unsuccessful surgeries in the past. Some of the women are hopeful that their surgery will work this time, some are joyful that their surgery was successful, and some are terribly depressed because their surgery did not work. The problem is that some of the ladies are so damaged that there is just no tissue to fix the fistula (a whole that is caused by prolonged child labor).

When the surgery is over and they wake up from their pain meds, we ask them "Are you dry?". As a nurse, this is such a hard question to ask, because so often the answer is not what we ant to hear. When they shake their head and say " I am wet", my mind starts to think about how they will have to go home once again to their village and potentially be shunned because of their problem. But, when the answer is "Yes I am dry", we all rejoice. Actually, the Liberians tend to jump up and praise the Lord with a song, when they have been blessed by Him. Yesterday when the answer to that fateful question was "dry, dry, dry", she jumped out of her bed and sang " I have a big, big God-O and He's always by my side. By my side, by my side."

On Tuesday I went to the Dress Ceremony, which is a time of celebration and commitment for the ladies that have had successful surgery. They each get a new dress that represents their new life. They each talk about their journey and each lead (by lead I mean sing at the top of their lungs and dance around) us in a song that is relevant to them. One of the things that stuck out the most is one of the ladies was talking about how she stopped going to church because she would leak all over the bench and would start to smell. She then looked at Dr. Steve and said "Thank you Dr. Steve for giving me the gift of being Dry. Now I can go back to Church. Your God will be my God." 

Baby

Her name is Baby, yes that is her real name. She is a shy, small, 15-year-old young lady. She came into our hospital early this week for surgery on her jaw. Most of the left side of her face has disappeared over the last 2 years due to a disease called Noma. 

'Noma is a type of gangrene that destroys mucous membranes of the mouth and other tissues. It occurs in malnourished children in areas of poor cleanliness. The exact cause is unknown but may be due to bacteria called fusospirochetal organisms. This disorder most often occurs in young, severely malnourished children between the ages of 2 and 5. Often they have had an illness such as measles, scarlet fever, tuberculosis, cancer, or immunodeficiency. Risk factors include Kwashiorkorand other forms of severe protein malnutrition, poor sanitation and poor cleanliness, disorders such as measles or leukemia, and living in an underdeveloped country. Noma causes sudden, rapidly worsening tissue destruction. The gums and lining of the cheeks become inflamed and develop ulcers. The ulcers develop foul-smelling drainage, causing breath odor and an odor to the skin.'

When Baby entered into D ward she held her head down, her shoulders were slumped, and did not make eye contact. My first interaction did not make us fast friends. I had to start an IV and she later told me we were not friends because friends don't stab each other. SO I spent the rest of the evening trying to win her friendship. I brought her crayons and we colored together, but she lost interest. So I brought her a slinky and she played with it for about 5 minutes then she again lost interest. So as my last-ditch effort I brought her an etch a sketch. As I showed her how it works she smiled and said "Thanks my friend".

Baby went to surgery and they made her a new left side of her face. It is quite remarkable actually. She came in with no confidence and left with her shoulders straight, her head held high, and a beautiful symmetrical face, and I... gained a friend. 

Lasagna

Well, I thought I might give you a little insight into the Lasagna just in case you might have a few questions rumbling around in the back of your head.

We don't currently have any ricotta or cottage cheese to use in our lasagna so I use a bechamel sauce with parmesan cheese added. Also, we use the standard Mozzarella cheese.

Sometimes the 'white' layer tends to disappear altogether when cooking the lasagna except for maybe seeing some stretchy white stuff here and there. You would probably be interested to know the classic lasagna has ricotta and bechamel sauce for the 'white' part and later people used what they liked best like cottage cheese. I prefer ricotta, but alas there is none of either.

Hope you enjoy it anyway...and zucchini was in the veggie one that was offered.

NO FOOD? NOT TRUE!!!

[to all the faithfull people that eat what we serve, the ones that compliment & encourage the food service crew even when they hated the menu, the ones that carry on with life even if the food wasn't what they wanted that day or the next...keep it up!  and disregard this post]

I have tried to be political correct, humble, organization conscience, and a little removed when maintaining this blog...it really is my own personal blog that is linked to the AFM intranet for those of you who enjoy being able to actually look at a dinner(supper) menu for the week.

But today multiple complaints were aired about food running out at 12:30 for lunch today...to which I say is UNTRUE!  Really I don't want to beat this dead topic into the ground but it is way past the limit of times it should have ever happened.

Hot food is never guaranteed for lunch, and I covered this quite well in an earlier post.  And because there is food you may not personally want to eat, does not by any means translate to being out of food.  If we have a lot of leftovers, then you have a lot of hot food for lunch.

AT 1pm, after the food was down in the dining room for 1 1/2 hours I received rice, snow peas, and soup back from the dining room.  Cold cuts and cheese were out for lunch along with options from salads, and the minimum of peanut butter and bread is always out!  And that my friend is what I have been conveying to crew since Mercy Ships has set this standard (it has been the same practice on the CBM, ANA, & here on the AFM).  The only place that it may be different is at the IOC.

I have also noticed that the dining room staff are the recipients of most of the complaints & criticism.  This is unfair to them and it is not right.

Please adjust the condition of your heart to the reason you came to serve and move forward from there...so somebody else can get to the peanut butter!

Ciatta went home....

Let's be honest, not many patients that come back from the OR on a ventilator, on the ship, have happy endings to their story. Ciatta came into the ship very sick, but yesterday she went home with her family and she looks wonderful. I had the privilege to get to know her and her 4 children and husband over the past week, and they really are lovely people. Today she came back to the ship to have her dressing changed and her wound looked at (which is fine-o) and she brought me an African dress, skirt, shirt, and head wrap. When she told me she wanted to buy me a suit I cried and she wiped my tears and told me she loved me. When she introduces me to people she says I am her white daughter. When she took my "measurements" she told me to stand up and turn around and told her husband to buy a dress and my size is "plenty, plenty". Which apparently is very large. Pretty much it just made me laugh.

Put your hands on your hips....

Today I was on D ward and it was a great day. The ward is filling up with the cutest kids in the world. Oh my they are just precious and they love to be loved on. After the shift we took them up to deck 7 and 2 of the girls were trying to teach me how to dance African style. They said "Put your hands on hips and shake your hips". It was so fun to see Fatu (12 that had cleft palate surgery) and Baby (15 jaw reconstruction due to Noma) dance, laugh, blow bubbles, and really enjoy life. The VVF women were learning how to crochet and the young boys Abraham and Emmett blew bubbles, pretty much it was great.

Multi-purpose tubs

I stole a few pictures from Michelle Zeller (her blog is mzellerafrica.blogspot.com she does palliative care).  Just because the pictures were so cute.  (yes, this is still Tyrone talking).

   

We have several of these tubs that we use in the galley, colored just like the one you see here...we use them for defrosting meats, marinating meats, making salads in bulk (coleslaw, macaroni, tuna... those kinds of salads), and a myriad of other things.  Here in Liberia, well as you can plainly see it works as a good bathtub for babies!

I am sure this is what I would have looked like as a child if I was west African and grew up in Liberia~ (pssst, I still eat like that)

This is baby George eating his rice.  How cute is that?

The Liberian Handshake

An example of the Liberian handshake. This is used whenever greeting or meeting people. Mostly a simple handshake and the snapping of fingers is what I use.

1 - grasp the hand of your counterpart:
2 - slide into a thumb-to-thumb grip:

 

 

 

 

3 - pull back to clutch the finger tips of your counterpart:
4 - release with a loud snap of the middle fingers:
Note that the handshake can be abbreviated by jumping straight from the quick hand shake to the snap.

 

Reminds me of a couple of handshakes in my old neighborhood...

Pictures of Henry

Henry is still here on the ward. His wounds (from a severe dental infection that almost took his life) are healing and he looks so much better than the first day I received him in the ICU almost 3 weeks ago.

Henry spends most of the day just sitting around waiting for the day to pass, but during the week he goes up to deck seven and plays football (soccer) as his Occupational Therapy. I went up the other day and we were teammates and pretty much won by a lot.