7th floor prayers

I never realized how fragile mortal life is until I held a dying child in my arms.
I have always understood that life and death are an intertwined unit that cannot exist without the presence of both parts.
We enter this world small, innocent and pure.
Then, through natural processes, our bodies begin to mature and then age until we are no longer capable of carrying on.
This is called death.
Death is part of a grander plan.
Sometimes though, a different course is written into the plan.
A course where the small and innocent spirits are taken back to their Father prematurely.

My first day in the hospital I stumbled across a little boy named “Sam.” During his waking hours Sam is constantly seizing. His entire body shakes with uncontrollable tremors as he groans to himself. He is kept in an old crib in an isolated corner of the Pediatric Neurology wing. No one shares his room. I doubt the nurses share is his presence often either. Taped to his face is a crusty feeding tube filled with the remnants of previous meals. The food is always the same so it’s not the thought of mixing peas and ketchup that concerns me. What about the bacteria? What about the mucus that has ran from his nose and dried to his face? What about the red chaff marks on his cheeks where the tape for his feeding tube is never removed? As I took all of this in and gazed at his tiny frame it was difficult to keep thoughts of malnourishment from entering my mind. It was something previous interns had warned us about. These children, especially the babies, enter the hospital looking “healthy” for their circumstances. But  the more time they spend there the more emaciated and skeletal looking they become. It makes me fear for the ones who never leave. How long can a child last once their bodies enter starvation mode?

All of this was flooding my mind when we first came across Sam. I was with Aislynn (my facilitator) and Kelsey (one of my roommates). Aislynn had worked with Sam before during a previous semester and suggested we hold him and sing. While she gently rocked him in her arms we sung the words to a primary song:

Whenever I hear the song of a bird
Or look at the blue, blue sky,
Whenever I feel the rain on my face
Or the wind as it rushes by,
Whenever I touch a velvet rose
Or walk by our lilac tree,
I’m glad that I live in this beautiful world )
Heavenly Father created for me.

By the end I couldn’t sing. My tongue had become dry in my throat, and my eyes wet with tears as I watched Sam completely stop shaking to lay still in Aislynn’s arms. For the rest of the time we held him he remained relaxed with only a small twitch in his right leg. Incredible doesn’t come close to describing the experience that we, 3 inexperienced interns from Provo, Utah, had been a part of in that Romanian hospital. I knew that our Father in Heaven is mindful of Sam and knows what he is going through. I knew that he understood the pain he endures on a daily basis, and that he has already paid the price necessary for Sam’s body to be perfected and made whole. I knew He knew.

On Thursday I returned to the hospital armed with tiny diapers and baby toys. The first 4 floors we visited revealed no “babies without mothers.” Not only were there no babies without mothers, but a few of the floors seemed to be completely abandoned. How could there be no orphaned children for us to visit when there had been so many just the day before? In America I would have simply assumed they had been moved to different wards. In Romania, a country known for bribery and corruption, it was hard to convince myself that is what had been done...These children are orphans. They have no one to care for them but 7 American girls for 3 hours a day, 5 days a week. They consume valuable resources that could be used for patients with the ability to provide monetary compensation for the doctor’s services. Some of them are on the verge of death. Most of them are “undesirable” because of their handicaps...having these children conveniently fall off the map creating open beds for paying customers isn’t the worst thing that could happen to the hospital. Maybe it really isn’t that corrupt, but after discussing what we have seen there with other interns, we wouldn’t put it past them.

The 5th floor proved to be more fruitful in its baby supply, and then we got to Sam on the 6th. I was so excited to work with him! If you know me, you know I’m not a singer, but all I wanted to do was sing. Sing to Sam. The effect it had on him before was at the front of my mind, and I wanted him to be able to relax again, even if for a small moment. He was sick so I knew it was good we had come. He sounded congested and we thought it was the mucus causing his breathing to be haggard. Kelsey picked him up and held his body on her lap as I held and massaged his legs. As we held him and sang he became calm momentarily, then began to arch his back and emit choking noises. His eyes were bulging, his face was turning red, and we could tell this wasn’t normal even for him. I could feel his panic fill the room, and then our own as he continued to worsen. Kelsey informed us he had stopped breathing. We didn’t know what to do. The mucus was blocking his air passage so even CPR would have been futile. We propped him and and tried to get him to cough. He finally did. His breathing resumed but something was still very wrong. His breathing was very inconsistent and his other symptoms continued to escalate. Aimee went to get a nurse while the rest of us tried to stay calm and keep him alive. The words for “choking” “emergency” “dying” “can’t breath” and “get in here NOW” aren’t in our Romanian vernacular, so she did the best thing she could have done. She yelled the word for child and held her hands to her throat in the universal sign  for choking. During all this I was praying as fast as I could think. It wasn’t much of a prayer because all I kept saying was “Don’t let this boy die right now.” “Please help us!” and “Please God. Please!”, but it was directed heavenward. A nurse came in and judging by her reaction we knew whatever was happening wasn’t a regular occurrence. As she took him from our arms she yelled for another nurse to get the doctor and for us to leave. We did.

We climbed the stairs to the 7th floor and stood there in a stunned silence. It was difficult to comprehend what had happened. It had all happened so fast. That was my Sam in there. MY Sam! The one that I had sung to and it had made him all better. What was going on? I wanted to go back in there and make sure they gave him the care he needed. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I knew they’d be mad, and even though getting yelled at in a language you don’t understand is a lot easier to deal with than one where you can feel every cutting word, I was glued to the spot. Kelsey offered to say a prayer for us. She prayed that Sam’s mind would be at peace even though his body wasn’t. I absolutely loved that line. That’s exactly what we came to Romania to do, I just hadn’t thought to word it that way. I didn’t come to Romania to heal the physical ailments of orphans and abandoned babies. I came here to nurture them. To make them feel loved. When we sang to Sam we didn’t magically cure his seizures, we brought the spirit into the room. The spirit means everything to me in helping these children. Even if we don’t speak the same language, we both can understand the language of love. From the second I stood next to the first crib in the orphanage, to the moment we held a flailing Sam in our arms, I was filled with an inexplainable amount of love. I know that this love has come as an answer to my prayers to be able to love the children I serve as Heavenly Father loves them. To be able to become more than I am so I can fully comprehend their needs. I know that this love does not come from myself. I know that when I am surrounded by these kids, my mind and heart are opened and I am filled with the pure love of Christ that allows me to see them as our Savior sees them. I know that despite how cute the children are, it is not my own love that I am sharing. I have never felt any emotion so strongly and it is because of this that I know that I am a tool in the Lord’s hands.

We finished our rounds and decided to check on Sam on our way out. Kelsey peeked in his room and when she turned around she had covered her mouth and was silent. “Go check if that’s his room.” We both knew it was, but we just had to be sure. I looked. He wasn’t there. The sheets were off and his crib was empty. My heart sunk. I felt like there were rocks in my stomach and I wanted to puke. Walking back to the apartment was a miserable experience. I was angry. Angry that hospitals here suck. Angry that perfect babies are abandoned. Angry that mothers could even consider leaving their child straight out of the womb. Angry that doctors could let the mothers just walk out of the hospital knowing they were leaving their baby behind. Angry angry angry!! Luckily I got over it pretty quick. It’s not my place to judge them so I won’t.

That night I was haunted by nightmares of babies dead in their cribs. I woke up the next morning fearing that’s what I would find when I went to the hospital. It was a hard 24 hours. I felt so inadequate. I didn’t know how I could possibly make a difference in these children's lives. I have no training that I can speak of and I’m expected to just fly half way around the world and wing it. Overwhelming ya? I still don’t know how I will help these children when I am here for such a short period of time, but I know they’re gonna help me :)

And just in case you are wondering, Sam is doing alright. We got word yesterday that he is in the ICU.