Recovery

Time is flying.

We are all exhausted but life goes on.

We have been both in the international media spotlight and behind the scenes.

And we have barely slept.

We continue to experience aftershocks including a 6.1 aftershock a week ago. We are always on edge, finding it hard to sleep inside, close the door, shower or be stuck on the toilet. Our bodies have hypersensitive reactions to sound (low rumbles of airplanes make us cringe thinking it is an aftershock) and to movement (often you are just standing or sitting still and you feel like the earth is moving). This is normal I am told. It will fade...after the aftershocks are done.

Week 1 involved us deploying medical teams all over Port-au-Prince. In hospitals, in field clinics, in triage, pre-op and post op care. At first there was not enough people to care for the over 300 000 people injured. Operative wounds stood uncared for for days, infection taking many lives. Bodies would appear on the street at days end.

Then the world descended in Haiti in week 2. Medical teams from all over the world came in working in local hospitals and setting up field hospitals. The USS comfort boat arrived. There were so many medical personnel that there were almost too many in some locations. This is when we pulled out of most hospitals and ran more field clinics.

Since then, we have had a fantastic surgical team from Texas set up a great OR in our clinic (in the lab). It is now one of the best in town for equipment and cleanliness. We completed over 30 surgeries in just a few days saving many lives. We have been busy transferring surgical patients in and post surgical patients to the comfort boat and other great field hospitals. We continue to work in other local hospitals and field clinics.

Today however, many field hospitals are pulling out of PAP. Surgeries are getting to the end thank God. Death from infection is slowing but still ever present. Post op care is a problem. Continuity of care for the country will be lacking. Surgeons to take out rods in 6 weeks needs to be addressed. At Mission of Hope, we are looking at all of these issues and addressing them so we are serving our people best.

It is exhausting.

In the end I do not know what the numbers will be. We are currently at 150 000 dead. 340 000 wounded. Over 100 000 amputees. We overheard a CNN reporter talking that he had spent years in south Lebanon and other war torn countries but this was worse than them all. It is mind-boggling.

We have moved to recovery. Our mission has started a game plan for recovery but it is a huge task. We are excited to have developed great relationships with many organizations and individuals who want to help Mission of Hope move forward. If it is God's plan, we are ready for the challenge and we have been blessed by the help coming in. We have a long way to go however.

The need for our hospital is now greater than ever. The rebuilding that will have to go on in Port-Au-Prince is astronomical and the medical needs are huge. The UN estimates that 75% of PAP needs to be rebuilt. We have 3x the amount of people coming to clinic here everyday both due to needs and due to the mass exodus from PAP to surrounding areas. God will provide.

God's blessings?

1. We hit water!!! Mission of Hope has tried to hit water for a well for 10 years now and we finally got it. Perhaps a shift in the earth's crust or perhaps for some other reason, the well drillers hit water this past week. Laurens is working on connecting it.

2. Our church is packed!! So many people see God in a different light now and many are coming to Christ asking for Jesus to come into their life. Our church is standing room only. As our Pastor said, both Christians and non Christians died. Both Christians and non Christians lived.

Those of us alive today have been given a chance. For the non Christians He has given them a chance to come to Jesus before their death in this world. For the Christians, there is a reason they were spared. He challenged us to find out what God wants us to do for Him and do it with all our might. He was not done with our work in this life yet.

3. More people are aware of Haiti and Mission of Hope's work in Haiti.

4. We have banded together as a team like never before

In closing, I still have not cried. Oh sure I have shed an occasional teary eye, but I have not yet cried full on. I find that I am so busy, I can't not stop to cry. I know that it will come. When I have the time to reflect. Reflect on the trauma I have seen, on the lives that are broken, on the stories of my friends, on the hundreds of thousands that are sleeping under a sheet propped with a stick, on my hospital walls that are broken, on my broken dishes......but then I know I will smile knowing that there is still hope and that this is the hour for God's people to shine.

PRAYER REQUEST:

On an aside, please pray that the Canadian government will push through our girls adoptions. The justice palace is destroyed and many judges with it. If the Canadian government does not push the Haitian government enough to grant adoptions to international cases, it could take years to legally adopt them (which means they can't leave Haiti). Our case was very new and we are in a special situation due to our Haitian residency status. Please pray that the Canadian government will understand our special circumstance and fast track our adoption. This is something that is too painful to think about right now, but we just give it to God and know that it is in His hands.

Thanks for being there for us and partnering with us to spread the love of Christ in this country's dark hour.