Day 6: He Is In So Much Pain.

I saw what dying looks like this morning. The frail skeleton unable to prove he is alive except for the unsteady breath that goes into his lungs and back out again. It may be scary for some, for others tearful, and for the rest of us overpowering.

 

            Doctor Ben and Florence agreed to take Adrie and myself out on their home visit. We all hopped in the Faith Alive van and flew across town to another community. Most people would call it impoverished but here everything looks the same no matter what part of the city you are in. We walked through the alleyway and into a small home where a young woman was tending to a toddler. She pointed to a small room connected to the living room and the doctors pulled out their supplies while Adrie and I entertained the little boy. I couldn’t see what was going on in the medical side of this visit so I spoke to the family members a little bit in my handful of Hausa phrases and hand motions before Florence called us over. It was too much to take in at once. A man was lying on the bed with his shirt pulled up and his pants taken off so his underwear was the only real clothing being worn. He was so thin I could see the outline of every bone in his body. If I had walked over and touched him it looked like he would crumble under the weight of a finger. Florence told us that he was HIV-positive on top of suffering from TB. He had just come home from a long stay in the hospital where the nurses had neglected him enough to allow bed sores to develop on his lower back. Two large patches of dead skin and bloody sores must be unbearable when you don’t have the strength to turn yourself. As the doctors cut off the raw skin then bandaged his wounds I wanted so badly to sit and hold his hand. I admire the fact that I am in no way qualified to be a doctor yet they still want to include me in their act of love by allowing me to be a presence to support this family. We were there about an hour and when they were done the man didn’t have enough strength to say anything, but I knew he was grateful not only for the free medical treatment but for the presence of people. We walked back to the van and headed to two other homes in different parts of Jos. Both patients had family members who met us outside the doors and denied service at their home because they feared their neighbors would realize they were housing someone who was HIV-positive. We went back to the Clinic exhausted.

 

            The rest of the day as I worked sorting patient index cards and files I thought about what had happened in the morning. I was proud that something I would have normally found gross or disturbing instead allowed me to see love at one of its finest moments. But the thing has continually rolled around in my mind are the different reactions we saw from the three families. Who would ever deny their husband or sister or daughter medical treatment for fear of reputation? Kristin shared at dinner that her first home visit was to a family where the mother decided she took her thirteen-year-old daughter off the ARV drugs to die because she was too expensive to take care of. We don’t normally think these things in my community. The pain of suffering physically is horrible, especially those with HIV who are dying slowly. But how much more painful is it to know that you are a burden on your family because of something that has infected your body without your consent. How painful to realize that around the world people are scared of your condition and in many places are afraid to touch you. How painful to know that you will never live the life you had expected. I know it is painful for me to sit and watch, trying to figure out what I can do to help.

 

             I wonder how much more painful it is for God.