Birthday and Back Aches

If you know me, you know I love birthdays. Especially mine. :) With this past week being my birthday week I was geared up for all sorts of birthday fun. But Sunday night I get a call that there is a medical mission group here for the week, could I PLEASE come help translate since no one speaks Spanish??

I have been praying for the opportunity to help with a medical team the whole time I've been here and jumped at the chance! I was expecting to learn new words and have a good experience, but as usual I can never prepare myself for the awesomeness that God has in store.

I went into it a little nervous that my Spanish wouldn't be good enough or that I wouldn't be able to understand the patients (and a couple of them were pretty difficult to decipher!). I was put with Shane Palmer, a chiropractor. I think he started out as nervous as I was... But we both did pretty well, even though we were unprepared for the whirlwind week that it turned out to be! They even had to hold some patients back from him, he was so busy!

It was amazing to witness the relief people felt when they realized that someone could help them. Years of harsh living and work conditions, with no chance to hit up the spa once in awhile like we do, or even just have a day of rest, (and in many cases terrible diets) take a serious toll on these peoples bodies. But I can't describe how it felt when we realized there wasn't much we could do.

We saw a 9 year old boy who had an infection in his hip several years ago and had surgery. Now the part of his hip that needs to grow is no longer there, resulting in one leg shorter than the other and not much anyone can do about it. He needs at least one more surgery in a few years and a possible hip replacement in his 20's. I was the one who had to translate that to tell his mother, who is probably struggling to survive week to week, and watched as she broke down. We all cried with her.

We saw a 27-year-old woman who had nearly unbearable pain from rheumatoid arthritis. She could barely hold her 2 month old baby.

There was a woman with pneumonia so bad she could barely breathe and should have been in a hospital long before she came to visit the clinic.

We saw a few people with herniated disks in their back but didn't know what it was and had gone untreated for years, doing irreparable damage to their bodies.

Janie and Renee, the 2 nurses pictured above, did an amazing job with triage and taking symptoms despite the language barrier, and prayed for so many of the patients. It was such a blessing that they were able to help so many people. In 3 1/2 days the doctors saw about 680 patients and gave out I-don't-even-know-how-much free medication, toothbrushes, combs, bible verses, necklaces and bracelets, and candy to the kids. They had church services every night. Another team from the same group helped build a new church building so the congregation wouldn't have to meet outside anymore and got it about 80% finished, and another team went to a daycare and did VBS there every day with the kids. This group from the Florence, Alabama area was amazing. They worked all day without complaining, and were a pleasure to get to know. They even sang me happy birthday and I shared my cake. :)

At the end of the week I was dead tired but completely inspired as well. It was an emotionally, physically, and spiritually exhausting experience but one that left me just a little less self-absorbed and a little closer to the people of Paraguay. And although I still love my birthday, for the first time it took a back seat to the rest of the things going on around me and I was strangely ok with that. :) Dios te bendiga!

Oops.

So. It's been almost a month since I've updated this thing. Woops! So here are some updates/thoughts/prayer requests I've had in the past few weeks:

I've been sick 2 or 3 times since last updated. Apparently my kick-butt immune system continues to be a serious pansy in Paraguay. Hit up the ER 2 weeks ago with a fever, an awesome cough, and stellar headaches. Don't worry, I'm obviously fine. But I could definitely use some prayer for health! It's been very difficult me to be the sick one. I'm so used to being healthy and not needing to rely on people for things. It's been difficult for me to ask people for help when I'm sick, but it's been a real learning experience literally having to rely on others. Still stubborn though. :)

Speaking of health, I know I've talked about the health care here before and the hospital situations but every week it seems I'm learning more about it and becoming more horrified with the way things are done here. There is a girl in 7th grade at the school who has asthma problems that apparently are starting to affect her heart. But her family can't afford the medicine, and they can't afford the hospital care. She's out sick pretty often, and has made several visits to the hospital. Last week Sue and I went to visit her and pray for her, and she was sitting in a front room with only an IV for fluids since she'd been vomiting. They wouldnt do anything else for her unless her family could pay up front. We held a "Hamburgeseada" for her and sold hamburgers to help pay for her medicine. Please keep her health and family in your prayers. And definitely pray for the health care down here. There are just so many horror stories...

It's been rainy and cold the past week or week and a half. And by rainy I mean crazy, torrential, rivers-in-place-of-streets type of rain. Something we have desperately needed but good grief... It finally got sunny today and it was gorgeous. And since we're in the beginning of winter down here, it's getting cold too! My apt doesn't have heat except in the bedroom (thank you Jesus for that!) so I keep bundled up most of the time. Since we had sunshine today its much more bearable, but I have a feeling its only going downhill from here! Should be interesting... Prayers for warmth! I'm mainly dreading showers in the freezing cold. eek.

This morning we had the land dedication for the Poliodeportivo the school is starting to build! It's a huge project that's been planned for years but they've been building in stages and then the price went up, but it's finally going to go up! It will have a gym area open to the community and more classrooms to expand to 9th-12th grade, something we desperately need. Still trying to raise funds for it, if you want to give, email the Director, Sue Givens, at sue@paraguayschools.org. Also, only 2 out of the 56 kindergardeners have sponsors to attend the school. This is obviously a big problem! We are working on getting sponsors now, so if you want to sponsor a child or know someone who might, email Sue at the email above! There is a website (it's poorly done, they're in the middle of updating it I promise!) at http://www.paraguayschools.org/. Feel free to leave me a message here and let me know and I can give your some more information!

Bendiciones!

*Here are a couple of pictures from the dedication this morning*

Here is the morning half of the school, there are about 260 in the morning and another 260 in the afternoon. You can see part of the school building behind everyone.

Diggin' the dirt!

Yes, they let me use the shovel! And then promptly asked me if it was my first time... humph. :)

El Campamento

This past weekend was a 4 day weekend for teachers and students in Paraguay. They had off Thursday for Teacher Day and Friday for National Workers Day. A little silly that they get off both days, but no one was complaining... except maybe Sue, the school's director. :) Thursday I went with Sue to visit a sentimiento (shanty town) about an hour outside of Lambare. If you remember, in the shipment from the states the school received new(er) computers and have been giving their old 90's version IBM desktops away to some schools Sue has connections with. VERY few schools have access to computers here, especially schools in sentimientos. It was an eyeopening experience. I had never actually visited homes in one before, and definitely not a school. You can see in the pictures what a dismal state these are in. The school only recently got water and electricity and has only 4 small classrooms for pre-kindergarden thru 8th grade (I think!). Since they got water access they are also finally putting in a bathroom. The teachers work hard but are poorly trained or equipped to teach with this kind of environment, although Im not sure how you would train anyone to teach like that. They have few materials and no money to buy any.

The rest of the weekend was spent at a weekend retreat for the "jovenes", or young adults (ages 17-39) at the campground an hour and a half outside of town that is owned by the Methodist Church here. I had a great time! Met lots of people from other churches, was thrown fully clothed in the pool twice, participated in crazy games, competed in the "mr./ms." portion and sang and danced my lil heart out in front of 50 people (no, this white girl did NOT win!), hardly slept at all, and we had lots of awesome worship and great speakers. Well, the parts that I could understand, that is. :) Yes, my spanish is much improved but when they start throwing Guarani in or talking 80 miles/hour I get a bit confused. It was great! Here are some photos for you!

Me and Willi, my dance partner!

La Fogata! Bonfire! It was kinda cold that night...

Perla and I, soaking wet

Surrender?

So I had a nice, easy going blog about my recent adventures in Paraguay but then I decided to check out some people's blogs that I hadn't read in awhile. One of the ones I read was The Bradburn family (www.thebradburns.blogspot.com). If you do go there, prepare to cry, be amazed, touched, etc. Theirs is an amazing story of strength and hope. The most recent blog spoke of surrendering. This family is battling every day to beat the cancer that has hit their son. His mom writes of struggling with really, truly surrendering HER will that her son lives for GODS will, whatever that may be. She has chosen God's will.
Just writing that sentence makes me want to cry.
If she can make that choice, how can I sit here and fight God on so many things? Things that do not include giving over the life of my child? As I sit here with no REAL worries, yet worried about so many things. The little things in life that I make into catastrophes in my mind. The things that I need lay down for HIM to handle. Because He can do a much better job than me. But still.......... I struggle to surrender. I struggle to surrender my independence. My work in Paraguay. My future. My relationships. Each day is a new struggle.
But each day, I will choose to surrender.
Our lives are not for ourselves. They're not to make sure that we live every day getting our way, getting what we want. And it's not easy. I'm pretty sure I make my life much harder than it needs to be. Definitely ready to change that.

"And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in the knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ" Phillipians 1:9-10

"What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?" Luke 9:25

I'm giving you my heart, and all that is within
I lay it all down for the sake of you my King
I'm giving you my dreams, I'm laying down my rights
I'm giving up my pride for the promise of new life

And I surrender all to you, all to you
And I surrender all to you, all to you

I'm singing You this song, I'm waiting at the cross
And all the world holds dear, I count it all as loss
For the sake of knowing You for the glory of Your name
To know the lasting joy, even sharing in Your pain