Life-Giving Words

It has been an amazing month where I have really started to come to grips with my role within the hospital environment. While I spent most of January trying to figure out what exactly I’m supposed to do in the Paeds and Multi-Drug Resistant (MDR) Tuberculosis (TB) wards, I felt as if I spent the first two weeks in February juggling the mounting duties within these. The chaos continued in the out patients department (OPD) as my supervisor left for a month-long course. With the therapy department down to 3 OTs (one more focused on community and mental health more than the general clinical work), I was left to gather a great deal of experience as I frantically saw a variety of patients and conditions every day.

What really struck me this month was the amount of disabled children who do not have access to special or full service schools. With simple adaptations to a few schools, trained teachers and extra care-giver support, many more of South Africa’s disabled population could be educated. This month I continued to dutifully assess many intellectually and physically disabled children for school’s placement only to have to tell their parents that their child’s name will be put on a waiting list far too long to fully comprehend. The long-standing void between the KZN Health and Education Department seems to grow daily before my eyes as I witness more and more angry, desperate parents walk through our doors. I have listened to countless heart-breaking stories of how families continued to wait for that promising phone call from the principal of an over-crowded special school bringing promise of education and a brighter future. Many parents had waited over a year for their child’s placement while others have successfully sent their child to the school, only to have to collect them a few months later as they have become so sick after having received inadequate care from the school care-givers. I have spent hours this month listening to the tragic stories of how parents are at their wits end and have nowhere to turn but the people who initially tried to help them – us. As Department of Health therapists, there is little we could do to assist the parents and I feel completely helpless in this unnecessarily complicated situation.

Thankfully, God is a God of justice and listens to the cries of the broken-hearted and abandoned. The parents, Department of Health (DOH) therapists and a handful of Disabled People’s Organisations (DPOs) banded together to take the special school placement issue to Section 27, a public litigation centre that uses and improves the law to protect, promote and advance human rights. Click here to check out their website and our unfolding story. Section 27 took some time listening to the stories of frustrated parents and over-worked staff at a local special school near the hospital. They ensured they had a broad perspective of the problem and I look forward to how they will move within this precious community. It is my desperate hope and prayer that the Department of Education will rise up to the challenges within the area and bring about the necessary change to hundreds of lives.

While this is just one of the many issues within this community, it is one that lies very close to my heart as I have an intellectually disabled brother myself. Having had the privileged of counselling a few parents this month about the weight of looking after an intellectually disabled child, and having spoken at length to my own father about this topic, I am coming to grips with the burden that many of these parents face. This often devastating reality is further complicated when interfaced with poverty, poor transportation and access to public health and education.

These interactions reminded me of the important role I have to play in the life of each person I encounter here at the hospital. My interactions with them are crucial as the treatment, advice and encouragement I provide can have a significant impact on their understanding of their disability/condition, their prognosis, their motivation to persevere despite adversity and their overall quality of life. While this is a sobering thought, I gain much joy out of knowing that ever morning, I get to wake up and pump energy, enthusiasm and hope into other people's lives.

In the Bible study I have been attending on hospital property, we have been focusing on what it means to speak toxic or life-giving words into our own and others' lives. I have realised this month that if I place my trust and faith in the truth, in God's Word, I am built up daily by the promises He provides me. He has provided me with opportunities each day to speak life-giving words into the lives of other people. This month, God has enabled me to connect with an abandoned child, to comfort a gogo with dementia, to empathise with a downcast housemate and to love an arrogant colleague. He uses me, in my weakness to bring about change in His strength. I am truly humbled to be in this position and praise God daily (well not always daily...I wish I was always that positive!) for his provision and upliftment.

This thought led me to write a poem I have entitled “Life-Giving Words”

Life giving words flow over my soul

And permeate my inner being

They lift me up and remind me

That God is the One I should be seeing

And from these words I am encouraged

To go out and plant positivity

To speak life, hope and comfort

To all those surrounding me

I run from toxic words

In a world so full of lies

I turn my back on destruction and hatred

God’s love above these shall rise

My mighty God will break through

The toxicity in this place

He will bring an almighty redemption

Upon my human race

I am a part of this plan:

I have a role to play

I need to speak life-giving words

Each and every day

While speaking words of life and truth build strength and hope within people, they often take more time, effort and patience on my part. I find myself coming home at the end of every day feeling drained and emotionless. Continual service to others is a very exhausting task! However, just as I was starting to lose motivation, I spontaneously spent a weekend with my boyfriend in Middleberg and heard a very appropriate sermon focused on how my life should be one centred around serving others. I’d recommend a listen if you have some time:  click here to download the sermon. (Check out the St John's Presby website for more sermons). We all have a duty to serve those around us. While this may be exhausting at times, the rewards are far greater than the weariness. I am so fulfilled when I see others progressing, changing and growing, be it emotionally, physically or spiritually.

An exert from my prayer diary this month “Oh Lord you have called me to a life of service. You have shown me your love over and over again and require me to do the same for others. But some days are easier than others. However, you have called me to serve in the midst of my own adversity. You have asked me to be there for others no matter what is going on in my own heart. Lord help me to sacrifice myself for those around me, just as you did for me. Help me to serve those who are not grateful for my actions, those who don’t seem to notice my effort and those who don’t return the love. Lord, give me strength to serve those who make me feel weak, angry and incompetent. It is not about me – this is about you and the abounding of your love.”

It is my hope and prayer that we do not serve those around us from a position of power or authority, but one of servant-hearted humility. One where all thoughts of entitlement are destroyed and we are left serving because God has called us to. May we intentionally seek to serve all those around us.

February Highlights:

1.       Kick-starting new groups in MDR TB ward. I took the opportunity to encourage chronically ill people to dance, sing and laugh again. We worked to start a dance group with the women in the ward. I have learnt Zulu dances, local songs and am quickly learning that if I put energy into something, more often than not, it will be returned by the patients. We also started a hand, nails and hygiene group focused on improving how the MDR patients see themselves. It has been so encouraging to see how the patients have responded to these groups.

2.       Seeing patients for follow up appointments at the hospital. There is something incredibly powerful in recognising someone outside of the patient-therapist roles. Twice this month I have bumped into previous patients who were now visiting other people in hospital. It was so motivating to catch up with them and see their growth and improvement. They loved being recognised by me and seemed touched that I remembered their individual stories and displayed concern for their current progress.

3.       Clinics! These are the days when I really feel my expertise is really put to the test. I encounter such a variety of conditions as I sit on the floor in a cramped nursing room over an hour away. I am starting to get to know my patients, their care-givers and their stories. The therapeutic bond is slowly developing as I work alongside them as fellow community members.

February ‘Lowlights’:

1.       My “reality dreams” or so I have named them. These very vivid, overpowering dreams often plague my nights as I dream about seeing patients for a variety of reasons. They leave me feeling very drained the next morning as I attempt to “assist patients” at ridiculous hours in the morning. These prolonged restless nights are starting to take their toll on me as this subconscious anxiety continues to be expressed in my dreams.

2.       Loosing a patient. No matter how frequently I saw someone, the knowledge that they are no longer living and breathing on this earth is a difficult reality. I have struggled to let go patients who have passed away over the course of this month.

3.       My workplace endurance still leaves much to be desired! I come home every day feeling absolutely shattered and often find myself in desperate need of a nap!

I will end this entry with a blessing that has brought me comfort and hope this month:

“May our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God our Father, who loved us and by His grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.” (“ Thes.2:16-17)

February's Captured Moments:

Chicken's chilling in the tree outside of the therapy department...reminding me of my rural lifestyle, just in case I forgot!

The usual borrowed therapy room out at a clinic. This room was a nurses work station at a four-roomed clinic not too far from the hospital.

Running stimulation group for mothers of malnourished children where we teach them about how to assist in the development of their children.

Climbing the hospital water tower for a much-needed picnic with old friends.

Mattys, the com serve physio, stopping for some water on the way back from a clinic.

Dancing to zulu tunes in the MDR ward every Tuesday afternoon.

Hydrotherapy for some of the paeds ward patients.