Day 49

Friday

I've been having difficulty writing a personal statement. I don't really have much to say. I want to be a doctor. I don't want to be anything else. I'm not wired for anything else. But you can't really put that onto an application...

I don't know how long I've wanted to be a doctor. I don't know why I want to be a doctor. There was no life-altering event that pushed me toward the field of medicine. It's just always been something that interested me, the concepts came naturally to me, the situations interested me and never disgusted me. I don't know what it is that draws me to it, but whatever it is lead me to walk two miles in the mud with a broken shoe on one foot and a broken toe on the other just to give Pa his dressings because we're this close to him getting surgery.

I don't know how to explain that I want to do that every day for the rest of my life not so I can parade around in a white coat or have people talk about what I've done. I want to do that because I know I'm capable of doing it and I'm willing to do it for everyone, not just those with a big name, lots of money or the “big somebody.” If I am given the chance to study and become a doctor I don't want to throw away the massive opportunity I have to share that gift with other people. I am no better, no more special, no more entitled to anything than anyone else is....why would having the title “Dr.” added to my name change that? I want to study, train and improve how I've been wired so that I can be used as a resource for other people, not so that I can make boatloads of money and live lavishly and flaunt prestige. I don't care anything about awards, recognition or praise. I only want to be trained to perform on an award-worthy level so that I am giving my absolute best. I want to be a doctor so that I can be a better resource for those who need it!

I have prayed repeatedly for God to use me as a sock-puppet. I've prayed for Him to fill me up. I want the words I speak to be His words, I want Him to touch others with my hands and use my feet to go places. I want to do that with medicine, too. I want to be a tool, a resource, a sock-puppet. I want my actions to be for honest service to others --just in a more medicine-related way. I want God to use me in the medical field as his sock-puppet. But as a doctor I would be able to be a voice of help and health to my patients, speaking to them about healthy lifestyle changes, diets, and how to take care of themselves on limited funds. I would be able to use my hands in the operating room to make repairs and in the consultation room to examine and comfort. I would be able to travel around my state, around my country and around the world giving my services and care to people who need it.

That's why I want to do medicine. That's why I want to be a doctor.

I just don't know how to say it....correctly.

Anyway,

I think the reason my shoe broke is because my lucky elephant, Woozle, was not in his pocket for the first time ever. Last night I set him on my bedside and this morning in my slumber-haze I forgot to put him back. Bad luck then ensued: shoe broke, stubbed injured toe a minimum of four times on rocks and a few of my things have gone missing.

Today is Friday though! I have two full weekends left in Africa and I'm not sure what I'll do with them yet...probably study and write....and go to Belinda's. (the tailor) I miss home a lot and now that my time here is dwindling I find myself missing home more and more. Nine weeks was plenty long. I'll miss the patients and the staff at SLM. I want to do my best to keep in touch with the volunteers I've met. But I'll be so happy when my plane lands in Frankfurt in 15 days!

Aside from seeing family I haven't seen in over 7 years, I think what I'm most excited about is Maggi salad and cabbage. Weird huh? And of course, a real shower that runs and has hot water. I only have a few short days in Germany before I'm home in Mississippi again! I already know it's going to be torture watching the flight map pass over MS and LA on the way to Houston, knowing I went right over my house and that it will be an hour-long plane ride and 2 hour drive back peddling. But it'll be okay because I'll be back with my family for that part!

It's crazy to think I have 21 more days left of my trip.

I don't think time went by slow or fast.

For once, I think it passed like it should.

Day 51

Sunday

Last night I fell asleep watching Harry Potter 7 (part 1) and woke up around four being choked by my own horcrux around my neck. Actually, it wasn't a locket containing the soul of a dark wizard. It was just a cluster of charms I've been wearing that had gotten tangled up with one another. I just dreamed it was a horcrux choking me. But enough geekery...

Today Elena, Mica and I went to the mountain to climb around for a bit before the rain hit very hard. But, alas, once again we were prevented from doing something because we are 1) white 2) females. The men that sit at the base of the trail and harass climbers refused to let us pass without a guide and then finally after arguing with us and being told to let us go the man insisted we pay 3000FCFA a piece and he'd let us go. Le sigh... See, here's the whole story: had Nathan been with us we could have gone alone. Voss and Kevin climbed, unharrassed and unaccompanied on the mountain for a solid day. (They're white but they're males.) Nathan and Amelie have been to the mountain many times...but Nathan is always there and he's a guy and closer to being black than any of us so, yeah. Once he told us this we told him that was absurd and that we'd walk home instead. He then said something to the effect of “You want to climb on my mountain you have to pay!”

Cue soap box.

I told him, very politely (mom would have been so proud), that we'd all paid our dues already. I'd been here two months and Mica a year. I told him we left the comforts of our “white man country” to PAY absurd amounts of money to come work in his country, for his people, for free. I work in a hospital, Mica teaches the children in a school and Elena takes care of the children in an orphanage and all we wanted to do on our weekend off of work was to come to a mountain God created and appreciate the beauty his country had to offer. How sad it is that the ugliness of greed had to prevent that. I also told him to have a nice day and to be careful on the mountain and if he gets hurt to please come to St. Luke's and we'd take good care of him. After shaking his hand, the three of us trooped down through Greater Soppo and stopped for a drink while the rain hit.

Anyway, today is Sunday and I go back to work tomorrow. I'm excited to see how everyone has progressed over the past two days. It seems like healing is spreading like wildfire through the hospital. People are getting well and going home left and right and it's awesome to see! I am almost positive Charles will be heading home this week. I'm hoping Pa will be scheduled for surgery soon...he apparently qualifies now (or soon) because his infection is mostly gone (amazing!) if he can just make a deposit on his bill first...The other Pa will be going home very soon, too. He is scared to leave until the entire wound is gone. He came with diabetic gangrene and had his leg amputated, so it's no wonder he's scared of a small wound --that's how he said the other started. The patient whose arm was taken into the meal grinder looks awesome. If I hadn't seen him when he first came I'd have just thought he had a small machete accident. His hand looks like, well, a hand! He should be scheduling his second surgery soon after Dr. Palle returns but probably after I leave.

This afternoon I sat down with the German-English dictionary someone left here and have been looking up words and practicing my sentence construction. Ugh...Dr. Odom would hate me right now. The girls here all speak the slang and don't know too much about the “high German” grammar rules he taught us. Oh well, I'm hoping I'll at least be able to get by with my family for four days.

I have twelve full days left here. It feels like so many but so few at the same time. I'm ready to go home. I'm ready to see everyone again and get back to “normal” even though I know things will be at least a little different. But it will be so weird not being here. I've lived away from home for long periods of time (like when I moved to school) but this is different. From the first few days my room, the city and the volunteers I was with all felt like I'd been there forever, felt like “normal.” It's weird to leave...not sad, just weird.

It has been cold and rainy the past two days. Shops don't open much so getting things done isn't always easy. It's also hard to get stuff from your tailor when she's hiding from bill collectors. Hey Cameroon! I just hope I can a hold of her before I leave. I've got a lot I need her to do...and it will probably help her with her bills.

Day 52

Monday

Last night I slept horribly. The anti-malarials already give me insane dreams but mixed with half a Tylenol PM, the dreams turn to vivid hallucinations. There will be no more of that.

Regardless of having poor sleep, I had a great day at St. Luke's. Dr. Palle is back so the waiting area was flooded with people and we were busy all morning –just the way I like it. I did dressings this morning and charted then went to help Dave in the lab. He was pretty swamped since all of the new patients here for consults needed blood work done. I helped in the lab until rounds when I actually got to present several of the patient's updates to the doctor. It was really fun. It was almost like I was presenting an experiment I had done for class: explain the procedure and rationale behind it and then discuss the results. It was really cool to be able to talk to the doctor and have his approval. He even agreed to extend Pa's antibiotics and consider him for surgery soon. I was asked to wrap our elderly amputee's newly healed stump so that it would be molded into the correct shape for a prosthetic, because I'd had experience with that before. Dr. Hatten would have been proud of that wrap-job, too.

Charles went home today! The doctor was ever-so pleased with how well he healed and sent him for an x-ray so that we'd have an updated one. Then his mother went to settle his bill. Once that was done, he would be free to go home. He was practically bouncing in his bed when we did rounds and gave me a big high-five when we were leaving the room. He said he couldn't wait to get on those crutches and head out!

There was another young boy, older than Charles but still in his teens, that was admitted Friday with an injury almost identical to Charles'. When the doctor looked at his leg and diagnosed it he looked pretty worried. I mean, his femur was sticking out of the side of his knee... It was pretty cool to be able to look at him and tell him not to worry because there was a little boy in the very next room who had the same injury about a month ago and was now packing up his things to go home. The boy just said “Really? I can heal that quick too?”

I did find Belinda. She was hiding from the bill collectors. But luckily she's re-opening tomorrow so she can start working on the gifts I ordered. I hope she works fast, though....I don't have much time to keep tracking her down. Plus, I have a doll I want to give Catty (her two year old daughter) before I leave. They're such a funny duo. Catty is everything sassy packed into a two year old's body and Belinda is exactly who she got it from.

I went to the cyber to post what I'd previously written and check my email, but my dear laptop is on it's last legs and refused to boot up while I was there. I tried 7 times and the loud beeping it does to tell you that it isn't recognizing the hard drive was starting to disturb everyone else there so I packed up and came home. Temperamental little thing started up fine (on the third try of course) once I got home. I need a new laptop, guys.

I also need a mouse trap. One thing I KNOW I didn't hallucinate about last night was the big fat mouse on my desk making so much racket it woke me up. Better a mouse than a roach though...at least they're kind of cute.

The tap is running again for the third time in about five days.

This is bizarre!

Day 54
Wednesday

Today turned out to be a hot one. Even as I sit here typing this shirtless and downing a Top Ananas (and fresh bananas) secured from the bakery down the street's fridge, sweat continues to roll down the back of my neck. The frigid sponge bath in my future doesn't sound too daunting anymore.

I'm feeling much better. I woke to rain this morning, my fever broke at breakfast and I walked to work. I did dressings, rounds, charted and did admissions for a new patient then when things hit a lull I came home a bit early and power napped before lunch. I should be 100% by tomorrow. Fingers crossed, thumbs pressed.

Aside from a gruesome story of spewing yams on Tuesday and having constipation described to me by a patient in Pidgin, I'm all out of stories for now.

Cheers!