Wednesday was the day I had been looking forward to our entire trip. It was the day that Jennifer hosted the feeding program and Mother's Milk. Men, women, children, young and old walked up to fifteen miles ONE WAY to make it to this clinic. For most of them it was a matter of life and death. People started pouring in early and there was quite the waiting crowd!
Almost instantly we were all taken with a tiny baby we later named "Rudy" (as a shortened version of his real, Haitian name). Rudy was literally starving to death at the hands of his mother. The reason for her showing up at clinic was unclear other than possibly she felt a slight twinge of remorse for not feeding her baby. 
Her face showed no such thing. Expressionless. Emotionless. Seemingly uncaring. It's so hard not to pass judgement, and much easier to be angry at her. I think shaking her went through all of our minds at least once during the day. Instead, we showed her love, and most importantly how to love as we cared for her baby for the days to come. 
While everyone waited outside, we were inside with Jennifer going through each name, calling in each baby and talking with each family. 
We weighed the babies and made sure that they were on target for weight gain from the last clinic day. 
There may have been a little kissy-poo in the clinic....
or maybe a lot of kissy-poo. Who could resist??
I spent the majority of clinic time working with Amanda and Tammy stuffing the feeding bags. Each person left with a bag of beans, a bag of rice, and a tasty, delectable fish. 
Blek. This is a fish. That people eat. Really. It's a fish. I wrote Jennifer the other day, though, to let her know that I would gladly come back to her feeding clinic even if it meant all I got to do was stuff the stinky fish in a plastic bag.
While everyone was waiting for lunch to be served one of our team members, Joe, shared a short testimony and following that we prayed over anyone that requested it. 
It's amazing how God can use prayer, even with the barrier of language difference, to show His love. I realized He can use even me, the most inept out loud prayer person there probably is! If He can use me He can use anyone! 
Pastor Clebert even had the opportunity to pray for Luckner, the Witch Doctor that half of our team had visited the day before and invited to clinic. Luckner was very inquisitive and asked for continued prayer that he would be given the courage to leave his practice of voodoo. I don't know what's become of him at this point, but I know the seeds have been planted and my prayer is that it fell on fertile soil and Jennifer will have a chance to witness the radical change in a village due to one man's turn to Christianity. Wouldn't that be somethin'!
I pulled out a few of my nursing skills on clinic day and I was happy to remove the cobwebs from my nursing brain. I donned a stethoscope and listening to a couple sets of lungs that, thankfully, sounded pretty good. 
I also got to bring out my early NICU skills and drop an NG tube in little Rudy so that he could eat. He was so weak when he arrived that he was unable to suck the bottle we were trying to give him. 
One too large tube, a lot of KY, (that's the jelly, not the state), and a prayer and that baby had himself a mode of transportation for some milky to the belly! We each took shifts during the night holding him and feeding him. It's amazing what a little formula can do for a starving baby! 
Some of the women at the clinic I found just precious. This little old woman caught my eye and I had to snap a photo of her being so patient......but looking quite bored. Time was passing a little slowly (as we found that most time does in Haiti) so we had Amanda and Becky, both who have angel voices much like my own, sing some songs. The villagers decided to return the favor and sing to us and I had my soul rocked by a blind woman that sang with arms lifted. If only we were so quick to praise Him while so much was not in our favor. My heart hurts now just thinking back on it. Why can't I be so faithful?
Finally the food came. Everyone was given a heaping plate of rice and beans. 
One person I do remember from clinic day was this woman in the yellow shirt. Her smile was so genuine and she seemed to glow. 
I snapped this picture of a little precious thing chowing on her rice. I immediately looked at it and cracked up! If my kids could get this happy about beans and rice we'd have it for dinner every night, too! 
I did my fair share of baby tossing. It was great to get a smile and this baby was handing them out. He had a sweet grandma that was bringing him to clinic. I got the feeling that she was doing a great job taking care of him. 
Our team had spent lots of time preparing seed bags for all the clinic families. Each person left with a bag of seeds specially formulated to grow in Haiti's climate conditions. Our hope is that they will be able to continually feed their family by planting a garden. We also put jewelry in the bags for the women. Everyone seemed to love it! 
Oh, here's me holding that cute baby again. 
This woman was on her way out and I made her pose with Kari. I just can't believe she had that bag balanced on her head! It had cans of formula, rice, beans, AND that stinky, dried up fish in it! How in the world do you make a completely unbalanced bag stay on top of a round head?? Wonders never cease. 
So, just as quickly as they had come, everyone started to file out. Our clinic experience was over but our night was just beginning. One little straggler, baby Rudy, stayed behind and I don't think anyone was too disappointed that we'd have to hold him all night.
If there's one thing that our team was it was a bunch of baby lovin' baby holdin' gals. We'd soon be off on our next adventure: over the river and through the woods (or cactus) to Pastor's church we go! 
