One of the early recipeants of the Pillowcase Dress Project.

This is Magdola about 7 years ago. She was living in the school at that time as part of the children’s home here. She touched my heart the first time I met her and it has been a privilege to watch her grow up over the years. She now lives up the road at the Rev home (the children named their home and Rev means Hope in Creole). I finally got a picture with her after all my trips up there to take care of Octaline. She just turned 9 on February 4th!

I continue to be busy in the school clinic. I just got my exam table last Friday!! I am excited to not only have a place, besides the floor, to lay sick kids down, but also don’t have to hurt my back working on kids setting in a metal folding chair or try to examine someone with abdominal pain that is setting in a chair. It also makes a nice desk/work station in my little clinic where up until now I only had the floor to lay things out when organizing shelves. Thanks to my neighbor Troy Price for making my exam table for me and my clinic!!

There were many sick children at the clinic on Monday. There were 2 Hydrocephaly kids. This little girl lives out on the big island of La Gonave. She just had surgery to put a shunt in so she is staying with Karen at her facility until she is well enough to make the boat trip home.

There was also 1 little girl with Microcephaly (Possible a Zika Baby). She is having seizures frequently. Unfortunately, a treatment regimen to manage her is out of the scope of our little clinic.

This is dry season and there are lots of kids with colds, coughs, and sinus problems. Some of these turn into pneumonia. This little one was not feeling well and was treated for pneumonia at the clinic.

I don’t remember what this little girl was sick with but she was such a cutie and I took advantage for the opportunity to love on this little one for just a few minutes.

I have been working with this little one and her mother since I arrived in Haiti back in November. It has been a struggle. Her mother seems to be clueless on raising a child. Even though she is her 4th baby. She keeps coming in with complaints of crazy things and when I tell her that I will take her to the hospital for treatment if I can confirm her reports she can never provide proof of her symptoms. She has taken her to the hospital many times in the last couple months. They always give her prescriptions but I don’t believe a lot of what she says and she can’t ever answer half of my questions. I have only seen her awake twice so I wonder if she isn’t drugging her so she can leave her at home unattended (this happens in Haiti). So, this is a very difficult situation to say the least. I don’t think she takes very good care of her even when she is with her. When she was 2 months old she brought her to me for diarrhea and I found out she was only feeding her cookies and dirty water. She said that doctor told her that her breast milk was bad and to stop nursing her baby. Despite my lectures, she is not feeding her very well and I can’t get her to understand that you don’t feed babies the same thing you eat. She brought her to my clinic again a few days ago. She said she is sick again. She was very light and has lost weight since the last time I seen her. She is 4 months old (maybe, mom is unsure of her birthday) and weighs 7 pounds 6 oz. I stood in my clinic holding her and thought long and hard about taking her from her mom for a week or so. I know how much harder my schedule would be there with a 4-month-old. I settled for having her bring her to the malnutrition clinic on Tuesday. I told her that she will follow the program to the letter or there would be repercussions. I honestly believe that she has Munchausen’s by Proxy. A condition in which parents make their children sick so they can rush them to the hospital and be involved in all the activity that is involved in that. She actually showed up today for the malnutrition program. She is a little too young for the Medika Mamba (peanut butter) that we use according to the protocols, even though she has been eating who knows what at home. So, we put her under the contract of the clinic but with formula. I again threatened to take her away if she doesn’t follow the rules. Please pray that I make the right decisions and that we can make Rosedena healthy again and that her mother is not trying to let her die, and if so, we intervein before it’s too late.

I was out taking pictures the other day and caught the neighbor boy playing on the porch. They sit on their second story porch and watch all the activity in the school yard and probably hope someday they will be able to go to school.

Sunday afternoon I got a call from HERO for a baby transport. It was a sick child at an inpatient malnutrition center. She had been brought in before when she was very sick and malnourished. She lives in Cite soleil, which is the largest slum in the western Hemisphere. Besides not being able to feed her baby she had been getting her babies water from the cannel. Which would be as bad or worse than drinking from the Ravine where I work (see pictures from earlier posts). When she got sick again her mom brought her back to the malnutrition center because she didn’t know where else to go. She wasn’t actually malnourished but was very sick. She had been having diarrhea and vomiting for several days. She had been giving her clean water as she was taught in the program. They rehydrated her but she seemed to be getting sicker. Her Oxygen level had dropped into the 70’s and her heart rate was over 200 and her respiratory rate was in the 80’s. When we got to her she responded well to oxygen and in a few minutes her Oxygen level was up to 98% but the rest of her vitals were unchanged. She had apparently aspirated at some point from all the vomiting and had a very bad case on Pneumonia. We took her to Hospital Espoir. It was the best hospital experience that I have had so far in Haiti in the last 10 weeks! I just got word that she is not doing very well tonight. Please pray for little Akanabelle. It would be a blessing if she could make it to her first birthday on Saturday February 18th and many more.

After we arrived at the hospital on Sunday night it was so sad to see this mother kneel down next to her daughter’s ER bed and break down in desperation for her daughter. She knows the reality of life in Haiti where 1 in 5 children dies before the age of 5.

I hope you have enjoyed the extra pictures in this post. I decided I should share a few more of the many pictures I take every day. It is such a blessing to work with so many children here in Haiti. It makes my heart happy to know that through OUR help, WE are making a difference in the lives of children every day. Helping to change those statistics one child at a time. If you have not yet partnered with Kelby’s Kids, what better day than Valentine’s Day, to say I love you to a child by helping to save their life!

They say a picture is worth a thousand words… But the content of these pictures are priceless. Because Kelby’s Kids are God’s Kids and together they can have a hope for a future!!

Until No Child Dies,

Kelby