Norris Family News

Medical Follow-Up in the Colonias

This week there were two opportunities for different combinations of staff to go on medical followup errands. These are very fun because there is already a relationship between IFM and the family, the story and the need is at least roughly known, and we have the satisfaction of offering physical help as well as heartfelt prayer. We get to sit with people in their homes. I find this very fruitful, even though the surroundings are sometimes grim. I appreciate the chance to see the reality. These are the contexts in which these bodies actually live, and it can shed light on what is or is not possible for them. Everyone is always extremely gracious, althought sometimes there is thinly veiled depression just beneath. Once again, it is impressive to see how clean and neat the residents are when the opportunity for bathing and laundering is severely hindered. Little girls generally have impeccably artful hair. The smell of meals drifting through the makeshift walls is often quite tantalizing. The neighborhoods, however, are liberally strewn with rubbish. The scrawny, unhealthy looking dogs on every street are very uninspiring. When your resources are limited, you have to pick and choose where to sink all your energy!

Sometimes we find that the physical concerns are not at all what we expected. It's hard to say if the information changed hands a few times or if a substandard translator (such as I) was the only one available. We were pleased to find that the "unemployed" father with the purported tumor on his leg actually had a sprained ankle a year ago, and really only has pain after his 11 hour shifts at the restaurant! Other situations were just as reported; a lovely, hardworking and resourceful lady with awful dental disease (also pregnant, with 4-5 of her own children and 4 of her deceased sister's!), two lovely girls aged 9 and 11 with developmental/physical problems who operate at about the level of a 5-6 month old. The good news about these girls is that they appear to be very well cared for, and they just beam when they have visitors. There is an inordinate number of children with developmental issues. It is impossible to sort out how much of it is prenatal issues/during delivery/toxin exposures/nutritional/genetic. It is remarkable.

We cannot completely remove very many physical problems, but we do what we can on the spot, and I understand that in the past God has moved people to tackle some very big needs at times through IFM. We try to be discerning about what to tackle, what we can actually follow through on. There is plenty of material to move the viewer to depression, but when you sit to pray with a severely handicapped little girl who is surrounded by photos of herself dressed in white and lace at intervals over the years, with a cool fan blowing on her and a pretty scarf as a canopy over the single bed in the single room, you have to think, "If this family trusts God and has hope for the future, I shouldn't rush to think otherwise!"

--Erika