Hopeful or hopeless?

Over the past 5 weeks Noortje and I have cared for a very sick 9-year old girl. She spent several weeks in coma due to a combination of cerebral malaria, HIV, tuberculosis, meningitis. Additionally, she was severely malnourished; weighing less than the average 1-year old child.

After moving out of the high-care ward, the girl was placed in a forgotten corner: plagued by flies, covered in bodily fluids and excretions. Her grandmother, though always present, was unable to properly care for her..

As she lay, nearly motionless, flesh over bones, the situation seemed hopeless largely due to the carelessness of her surroundings.

We made a point of stimulating her grandmother to care for the child every day. When the girl finally regained consciousness and the ability to swallow food we tried to stimulate her to play and move. One day, I placed a small children’s toy in front of her on the bed. To my surprise she moved her arm, knocking the toy off the bed and weakly laughed. It felt like a victory beyond words. To see her move would already have been an unimaginable milestone but to see her play a joke on us was more than we could have wished for.

We were flooded by hopefulness; this girl had been given a second chance at life.

After more finally regaining the ability to walk though still severely malnourished, we allowed her to go home with her grandmother. A few days later, we visited her remote house to find her lying in a corner of the house on the floor in the dark in the middle of the day. No medicines opened, bed net still in the wrapping, the fortified foods still untouched.

My heart sank, it seemed hopeless.

We encouraged the grandmother to give each medicine every day, and even made a checklist for her. We told her the girl had to move and practice walking, asked her to hang the bednet, to feed the girl. A few days later we returned and found the medicines given, the girl walked towards us, the bags of food had been opened. Grandmother attempted to hang the bednet but it had fallen down.

Maybe there is hope.