2 years into the rest of our lives. . . Yesterday was our two year move-i-versary, and this week showed the changes that those 2 short (and long) years have brought. . . Wednesday, I admitted two patients referred to Kijabe by former interns I had helped train – both were complicated kids who had been identified and managed perfectly before transfer (and both would...
We have had an unusual year as people have traversed the ocean to bear witness to and take part in our journey here. As I sit in Kijabe with 5 of my residency colleagues from UAB having just left, I marvel at the web that weaves together both sides of this crazy world – a quilting of our lives that I don’t always know...
this is the most recent update David sent out about the hospital. . . A friend visiting Kijabe for the first time recently asked me, “What do you need?” I know what he meant – do I need a day off, or a new devotional study? I thought for a long while and realized that what I need most is not anything for me, it is for my guest to...
As I write this post, I continue to wrestle with purpose and calling over what my role is in Kijabe, but hopefully through a new lens. In some sense my current role is an extension of what I have done for the last ten years – shooting and marketing and making blog posts and updating the website and answering emails and accounting. The immediate context...
The past two weeks have brought back so many patients from the past 2 years, and have been an amazing reminder of the beauty in this journey we have been on. . . Last week, I walked into clinic to see a precious boy that was having trouble breathing. The mom looked at me with recognition in her eyes immediately. . . “Daktari, this...
I have been struggling a little bit lately with how we are teaching our interns and how they are able to adapt that teaching when they go to some of the more rural hospitals in Kenya. We teach them how to use a bag valve mask and then they go where none exists. . . We teach them how to titrate fluids with care...
If you’re a visitor to Kenya, the first thing you will do is go on Safari to Maasai Mara, but if you’re like us – here for the long run – you’re a little slower getting out and adventuring. Partly because it took a year+ to get our resident passes so we could get in the parks at a local rate, and partly because...
A bit late on this post, but it was a significant part of our year, and why we are doing what we are doing in life! A year ago, when we first told Jennifer (Arianna’s former boss at Kijabe, East Africa regional director for Serge), that we were interested in joining, she told us “great, but you have to start the process NOW so...
my beloved – you don’t often talk about yourself. . .not in a way that would make people understand exactly who you are and what you do. And I probably don’t reflect enough about how different and wonderful my life is because of you. . .but, I suppose wedding anniversaries are good days to do that. . . As I look back over this...
Sitting on the bed in casualty, I was overwhelmed with gratitude for what we are doing here in Kijabe. For the nurses who started my IV and got my EKG and watched my heart rate like hawks as it wandered up and down. For the lab that could process results faster here than almost anywhere in Kenya. For my doctor friends who puzzled through things with me and made sure I didn’t feel alone.
(asked at 18mo mark on March 19, 2016) What do you like about school? Well we have lots of friends and it is fun being at school. It is really fun the we get to hang out at lunch time. What is your favorite thing to do here? The adventures we have like going on hikes and even just building things. What is different...
One of the big reasons I came to Kenya is to teach. . .I love the fact that we are training new Kenyan and East African doctors with passion and dedication and excellence. With teaching and training comes lots of other things – more academic than passionate – like learning research and quality improvement. . . This week was one of those weeks where...
So Wednesday, David, the girls and I returned from a short elephant safari near Kilimanjaro where we sat in the outdoor cabana and played cards during the rainstorm, slept under the stars in the shadow of a breathtaking mountain, and found literally hundreds of elephants on our drive across Amboseli National Park. We returned to Kijabe by way of the most beautiful road I’ve...
I have a few thoughts that have emerged from recent conversations that I would love to share, not as an expert, but as one who is learning. . .these matter a lot to me right now, stepping into a new role of leading our non-profit to support the hospital. The essence is deciding what does success look like? A question for mission projects and...
I’ve spent a lot of the last 3 months in tears. Quiet tears, angry tears, confused tears, tears of sorrow, and some tears of joy. . .for a woman who likes to think she can generally hold things together, it has been disconcerting. On the outside, nothing has changed. The Facebook pictures still show big smiles. The sunsets are still spectacular. The girls are still...
For the next 4 months at least, I am the interim medical education director in Kijabe. . .when I first agreed to do it, I thought I would have 12 medical officer interns and help them finish well, then welcome 12 more when they left. Instead, the Kenyan Ministry of Health “posted” the new class a month early – and I found myself with...
The stereotype I had of Africa (and I think that many people share) is largely based on the Lion King. I truly was disappointed on our first trip that Kenya was not filled 24-7 with epic music and dancing. . .yes I secretly hoped the animals would sing too, but I did know that was a little farfetched. Real life is cities and people and...
Life holds this dilemma, this paradox, of laying down our lives for others, but doing it in such a way that it can be repeated day after day. . .and that difficult balance has been my journey of the last few months. Laying down my life. Taking it back up again. Collapsing. Sometimes with joy, with satisfaction, with peace – often just with exhaustion....
Next weekend, the new children’s wing opens, and I am giddy. It is full of light, full of promise, a place to teach, to inspire, to walk forward and take care of children better than I ever could have imagined. . . and it’s opening is years in the making. It goes back to a long term doctor here who loved children with hydrocephalus...
We’ve been from mountains to sea as the girls had a month off of school and Arianna had two weeks to recover from the long year. These are some pictures from our joyrneys (a joyrney is a joyous journey) and of Christmas in Kijabe. Above is the volcano outside our window with a Christmas present (2x converter) from my brother that makes it much...
Christmas week is always an emotionally charged week to be in the hospital for me. The peace that weaves through things, the poignancy that ordinary events have, the comfort deepened, the grief magnified. Last week was no different. Sometimes Christmas week is quiet. Not this year. We ran from place to place with overflowing census and critically sick kids. . .some we could help, some we could...
Often, in the day to day life, we get caught up in the sadness of the battles we feel have been left unwon. . . but my last month on the ward was one of small and big celebrations. . . of joy in the midst of impossibility. Of laughter, teaching, and children going home better for their time with us. . . S* was...
A big part of our lives in the past decade has been shooting weddings. It was definitely unclear what would happen to photography, particularly wedding photography, after we moved to Kenya. I had made peace with giving it up, but then ended up with 4 weddings back in the states this year. Pictures and video for weddings are a very big deal in Kenya...
Madeline turned 10 last weekend and wanted a fall party. With no seasons in Kijabe, it took a little bit of planning ahead. Arianna brought back fake leaves from the states on our last trip, which turned out awesome for decorations. And our friend Stephanie made the most insane and yummy cake ever seen in Kijabe. The exciting game was pumpkin bowling, rolling pumpkins...
We live in one of the greatest periods of history, a time of unprecedented connectivity, knowledge, and innovation. From Kenya, we can connect instantly to friends and family anywhere on the planet. Though we are half a world away, we could be back in Atlanta in 24 hours. We care for the neediest African children with equipment from Asia and a team of doctors...
Our friend Shruti came all the way from San Francisco to spend a week with us (spending most of the time at the hospital). So, her first weekend, we went out to Crescent Island for an amazing day. New Camelbacks for the girls (garage sale purchase) were definitely great for trekking around the pennisula and searching for giraffe and reedbuck and zebras. Madeline is the...
After the craziness that was Friday, we shifted gears completely to get ready for the creative silliness that is Carnival at RVA. Madeline insisted on being Violet Incredible and Annabelle wanted to be “Little House on the Prairie”. They met their big sisters at RVA for some old fashioned carnival games and the yearly jump off the 10 foot wall onto mattresses as their...
And then there was the night the hospital caught on fire. . . I work with amazing people. I know that, but with all the crises we face on a daily basis, nothing tested it quite as spectacularly as last night. At 3 pm the power went out in nursery (and the rest of the hospital). I was running mock resuscitations with my interns...
After my call weekend, everyone returned from their weekends away, and I welcomed their wisdom and company. The prevailing sentiment that struck me most in Kijabe was that so much more was possible than we could dare to think. The women that made up the pediatrics team – Ima, Mardi, Sarah, and Jennifer – refused to accept anything less than the best care that...
Because things are never clear in memory, I am going to post this from an email I sent to my best friends after that first call weekend. If you have been following us from the beginning, this is familiar ground – the part of our short term trip that began the rest of our lives, and the part of the story I tell most...