This is a long post so get ready!

I am back in Bon Repos. I had a WONDERFUL time with the girls. It was good to be able to sleep with them in the Orphanage. I felt like I was home with family. We sang together at night and prayed together. I prayed for some of the girls in Creole each night and they loved it. The first night one of the older girls, Vanessa, was having a really bad asthma attack. I was really scared for her. A couple of the girls were in the room laying with her and trying to make her feel better. Two of them were praying out loud for her and another girl was singing a song about Jesus. It is amazing how much faith those girls have. I learn a lot from them every time about relying on God for everything. Vanessa was talking to me one night about how she has been thinking a lot about how everything in this life is vanity. She was crying a little bit so when I asked her what was wrong she said she really wanted to be able to go to school but didn’t have enough money. She quickly told me that everything in life is vanity and that we need to not worry about things we have no control over. She said that she was giving it up to God and that God will put her where she’s supposed to be. If she’s supposed to stay at the orphanage then so be it. I am happy to hear that because I was feeling very sad that I was not able to be in Leogane with the girls. I like being with Sue and working with her kids but a big part of my heart is always in Leogane. I think I need to listen to what Vanessa was saying and realize that even though I may feel like I want to be somewhere else at times, I need to realize that God put me here for a reason and I need to listen to that and thank him no matter what I feel.

I’m back at Sue’s and I’m missing the girls but I know that this is where I’m supposed to be. I just pray that I do and say the right things while I’m here. As we were driving back to Sue’s from Leogane we saw a man laying face down in a ditch. The other people in the car couldn’t figure out if he was dead or alive. The guy driving our truck thankfully knew the guy in the ditch and said that he has seizures often. Some of the people in the car were scared to stop because they didn’t want people thinking they hit him. That would be a huge problem especially for white people in Haiti. Once the Haitian man who was driving said he knew him we pulled up the back of the truck and lifted him in. He was incoherent and barely able to sit up. I climbed in the back with him and held him so he wouldn’t fall over. He wasn’t able to answer my questions when I tried talking to him and I was scared. He had such a strange look on his face and was shaking. We brought him to some friends who took him to the hospital. I don’t know how he’s doing now. I hope and pray that he’s OK

It was an emotional couple of days in more ways than one; Yesterday Sue called me with some news. Apparently the mother of the twins I talked about decided that she couldn’t keep the babies. I have mixed feelings about them being here. On the one hand I LOVE babies and am ecstatic to be able to love them all day every day. But on the other hand, it’s very hard to see a mother have to give her children up. They arrived today as we were finishing up school with the kids. I was so tired all day because I have been awake for a while because I got up at 4:30 this morning to catch my ride back to Sue’s. The second I walked in the gate I had to turn right back around to walk some of the kids to school. When I was finished with that I made a cup of coffee and started working with the homeschooled kids on their work. At noon, us homeschoolers finished school and the babies arrived. Of course I was the first one outside to greet them. The mother came to drop them off along with the dad of the father of the babies and the driver. The driver has his own orphanage in Leogane called the Lamb Center. Sue used to work there so she knows the man well.

The mother of the babies has one leg and seems somewhat mentally challenged. She didn’t talk much at all. I tried to engage her but she was very quiet. I really hope that this was her decision to give the babies up and that she wasn’t pressured by any other people. 

The babies are very skinny. We made them bottles and they drank them faster than I’ve ever seen a baby drink in my whole life! They have pretty bad diaper rash. One of the babies seems to have a crooked upper thigh. Sue says that the leg might have been broken during birth. I gave the babies a bath tonight and the water was very dirty by the end. I am in love. Literally in love with these babies! They have names but the grandfather said that they were just “play names.” I believe Sue will rename them. One of the Haitian workers here said that the name of one of them means to birth a child in Creole… I’m sad that they can’t keep the names that their mother gave them but I’m not so sure about naming a child “labor” or “birth” or however it translates. It was time for the mother, father and driver to leave and one of the babies was in the back room sleeping. I asked the mother if she wanted to say goodbye and she said yes. The people she was with said “oh no, it’s fine. We need to go!” That made me very angry. I asked the Haitian workers why they didn’t let her and they said it was because she’d be too sad and cry. I told them that crying is the appropriate thing to do when you’re sad and leaving your children with complete strangers is a perfect time to be sad. That upset me a lot. However, I could have misunderstood the mother and maybe she didn’t want to say goodbye. Either way I am sad for the babies. I was sitting rocking them to sleep tonight and asked them how they felt. I wonder if they’re sad. I wonder if they know that their mother is never coming back. It then made me think of all the kids without parents. I was so sad to witness children being left by their mother as babies but so many of the kids I know have parents who left them when they were much older. That is so heart wrenching. I have fallen in love with these boys already. They are handsome little guys and I am excited to see them grow and get stronger in the next 9 months.

Sue had to go out to buy things for the babies today and spent quite a bit of money. It was money that she had saved for food for the kids. I told her I would help as much as I could but I know there will be continual costs for things like diapers and formula. She is not sure how much it will be each week or month yet but she knows that her budget was tight before the babies came. If you are interested at all in donating I know she will humbly welcome it. I’m sure she doesn’t want me saying this but we talked about how she has a really hard time asking for things especially financially. I told her I would ask for her. She has given so much to these kids in her life and she does it all in the Lord’s name. I told her today that I think God has a lot to teach me and I think a lot of it will come from her! She’s wise, humble, forgiving beyond belief, and so loving and patient with these kids. Way to go Sue!

As you can see, a lot has happened in the last couple of days so as I have said before, if you’re the praying type, here are some things to keep in mind:

-Pray for the man who had seizures

-Pray for the girls in Leogane that they are healthy and happy

-Pray for these new babies that they will get strong

-Pray that the babies are healthy and that the one babies legs were not broken

-Pray that we can find enough money to support the babies as well as the rest of the kids

-Pray for the mother of the babies

-Pray for more cold weather like the day we had today! ;)

Thanks everyone!