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Karasi (Full of Life and Wisdom) Nitara (Having Deep Roots) Heller (Brighter)

A Jon Post

For one breathless moment we wait for a cry and a gasp.

Mother and Karasi Nitara

Mother and Karasi Nitara

For one breathless moment we trust that divine lungs are blowing into a helpless and tiny body.

For one breathless moment we wait.

And Karasi Nitara Heller sings… she sings her birthsong, melting into the unintelligible songs of angels, all covered in her mother’s blood and amniotic fluid… she sings.

Then quiet, a whimpering mother clinging to her daughter…

Then quiet, an IV drip hanging from the mother’s vein, an intrusive pest into this intimate greeting…

Then more songs, more joy, a mother’s laborsong mingled with her daughter’s birthsong.

More life, and all the wisdom of the mother poured into her daughter. All the deep roots planted over 9 months of bodily sacrifice bursting forth to the surface of pain mixed with trust all washed in sponges of alcohol based disinfectant and a joyous love.

Singing Together

Singing Together

And mother sits with Karasi Nitara and both sing softly in cries and hymns. Then the angels join in harmony with Karasi Nitara’s laughter and her mother’s weeping.

Then they fall silent to witness this holy moment of life bringing life, of blood poured out for the life of another, of tears wept in anticipation of the now.

Karasi Nitara come forth in Life and Wisdom. Plant your deep roots and shine brighter and brighter until noon day.

(with a 70s tennis player on the right there)

Family of Five

July 1, 2013
Around the house, Medical, Personal, The Kids
8 comments

The Month of June

A Layne Post

From celebrating Jovie’s 1st year of life to solemn talks of death approaching, June has been a full month.

My sweet Jovie was well celebrated with dear friends, and she seemed to enjoy all the festivities.

Cake!

Cake!

 

Presents!

Presents!

Big girl!

Big girl!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She has mastered her walking skills, which has brought much relief to this Mama, as she seems more content chasing her sister and not being left behind as often – just in time for a new baby to arrive! She has brought much joy to our home, especially as her personality emerges with each passing day.

Anaya is anxious to meet her new little sister, giving sweet kisses and encouraging her to “Come out!”

Karasi will be arriving early this week. Please pray with us for safe delivery, quick recovery, and smooth adjustments to our new immediate family of 5. Last week I hurt my back, and while I have been trying to rest it, it is still noticeable.

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Casa Ahavá is now full  with 2 men and 2 women – our other family members! Our dear Eliza seems to be getting worse, which is hard for all of us to watch and especially for her to endure. You can pray with us as we seek the best options for her. Her body continues to worsen despite more medication and treatment, and she desires more and more to be near family – the most ideal scenario in our minds. I am happy to hear her speak of life and death with more peace than I have heard before.

Tomás struggles to get his white blood cell count where it needs to be and as a result has gone two months without treatment. Pray with him and us as we seek to remedy this, so he can continue with his treatment plan and return to his wife and four children.

Zakarias seems to handle his treatments with ease. While still challenging, his body has such strength, and we praise the Lord for this! He spoke with the doctor about his treatment plan this week and will soon receive a scan to decide if he can return home soon, or if he needs to continue here a few more months. His cancer does not look to be treatable, just manageable, so his fighting will continue whether here or at home.

Filomena is near the beginning of her treatment, and it looks to be a long road ahead. This is her second time here with her breast cancer having returned. Pray for her small wounds to dry up and heal and for her emotions as it is difficult for her to be far from her two children at home.

We are always so grateful to you, our supporters. I hope you know that. Thanks for praying alongside of us.

June 23, 2013
Around the house, Casa Ahava, Hospital Ministry, The Kids
4 comments

A Mandão Song About Being Carried

A Jon Post

The sun was just starting to push the grey out of the windscreen and we were stuck in morning traffic on our way to the hospital. I hadn’t slept well the previous night and the coffee in my travel mug steamed up and out of the little pour spout as I sipped its bitter wake-up call. We slowly made our way into the city with the rest of the cars that surrounded us, speeding up and slowing down as little spaces opened, making the car’s motor pulse in long, drawn out beats like a dying mechanical heart.

“We have a song in my language, Jon.” Eliza was telling me, and she started an eerie hymn in the Ndão language. Her voice rose and fell like our car’s speedometer, and her heart sang out a refrain in her tribe’s ancient tongue that sent a chill and a peace into my spirit at the same time. Her song whispered to a stop. She explained in Portuguese so I could understand;

“This song says that you never know who will carry you to the place where you will die. We all expect it to be our father or our friend or our son or daughter but only Mwallee (God) knows. Only Mwallee knows the place and only Mwallee knows who will carry you there.”

So there I sat, in morning traffic. Driving a dear saint to the hospital where her hopes hang by spider silk threads to the idea that she may see her 7 month pregnant daughter again.

But this post wasn’t supposed to be about Eliza.

It’s about a 23 year old man named Rosario.

See, when Eliza sang about Mwallee and being carried, I was thinking about Rosario.

He arrived at the hospital about 7 weeks ago. He was gravely ill. His abdomen was dangerously swollen and in his eyes fear and pain jostled each other for position.

He smiled when he introduced himself to me.

I stood at the foot of his hospital bed and tried to ask a little about his home and his family. He spoke briefly but I saw the strain it took to respond and noticed pain winning the contest in his eyes. I whispered that he should rest and asked him if I could pray for him. I knelt beside him and whispered a prayer that I’ve whispered far too many times and gripped his hand softly then left.

He got worse.

Though pain dominated the fight in his eyes the fear never really gave up. There were some good days and on those days I was able to hear him laugh.

They were precious few but still very good days.

One day as I arrived he was being wheeled up to the oncology ward in a wheel chair. Oncology is on the second floor of the building it’s in. There is no elevator. Rosario sat slumped in his wheel chair and made no move to stand or struggle up the stairs. His eyes showed no fight, only pain.

I put my head under his arm and tried to help him stand and make his way back to his bed. He shuffled his feet for maybe three steps and then his legs gave way and I pulled him tight against my shoulder to keep from falling with him back down the stairs.

So into my arms he came. My left arm around his shoulders, my right hooked behind his knees, we struggled up the steps. Alice, our dear friend and partner walked out of oncology at that moment and rushed to help support his weight. We made our way down the corridor, through a small door where Alice had to briefly let go so Rosario and I could pass through the opening, and finally to his bed. He made no move to even roll over and make himself comfortable. He simply lay there in his sweat and pain, breathing and squinting his eyes, trying to hold pain at bay.

It was the day I carried Rosario that floated hauntingly through my head as Eliza sang her beautiful psalm on the way to the hospital.

Though Rosario had better days since that one, he did not have many.

His best days came long before this sickness. Some days he walked his father’s farm in the northern Mozambican province called Tete. Some days he played soccer with his friends in the field out behind his school. Some days he carried his little sister around the family property while his mother pounded corn into corn meal and made porridge for his family. Some days he went to mass at church and knelt before a Holy God. Some days he laughed and ran from the old man down the street who shook his walking stick at him and his friends for stealing lettuce from his farm. Some days he lied, some days he spoke truth, some days he hurt others, some days he offered grace and humility, some days he prayed, some days he cursed… and in all those days he was whole and strong and smiling. Those were his good days. Those are the days he remembered, even as he approached his last day.

He died on Saturday night. He died in the place I carried and laid him.

In Rosario’s 23 years of life he knew many men and women. He had the love of his father, mother and two sisters and his Savior. And mine.

Mwallee has honored me by trusting me with this humble office; I got to carry Rosario to the place where he died.

June 4, 2013
Hospital Ministry
3 comments

A Week at Casa Ahavá

A Layne Post

This week I thought I’d give you guys a little glimpse into a week with Casa Ahavá. It is a little difficult to give you an exact picture because each week and each patient varies, but in general here an overview of what is involved:

Each patient is on a 21 day schedule of receiving their Chemotherapy. The day before Chemotherapy, the patient needs blood work done to make sure all is well enough with their body to be hit with such strong doses of medication. That means they need to arrive before or at 7am – leaving our house between 6 and 6:15am to get a simple blood draw. Granted nurses are there and easy to comply with, this is a quick process and the patient can return to the house with Jon as soon as finished. If the results prove the patient is healthy enough to receive the cycle of Chemotherapy, they will return the next morning before or at 7am – leaving our house between 6 and 6:15am. They are then admitted for at least 1 night and depending on how their body responds, they return the next day or a couple days later. (At times the nausea and vomiting that Chemotherapy induces requires a day or two of IV re-hydration.) In general, Jon does these runs so that I am able to sleep in a bit and then get the girls up and going when they are ready.

From time to time a patient will simply need their blood work done for the doctor to see and get a general idea of the patient’s health, so we will then take them, again, first thing in the morning, and then return home with them as soon as they done.

So all of that to say, Jon is usually doing about 2 morning runs to the hospital a week – up at 5:30am, out the door at 6:00am, and then home usually between 9 and 10am. If things have gone slowly for one reason or another, then Jon will visit with the other patients at the hospital during that time and not return in the afternoon. If things move smooth and quick, he comes back, and then he or I return at 1pm in the afternoon to visit. During a normal week, Jon will visit 4 afternoons and I will visit one, spending anywhere from 1.5-3hrs at the hospital chatting with and trying to encourage patients. Post-Chemotherapy a Casa Ahavá patient or patients will just come home with us after Jon or my afternoon visit.

1 morning a week around 9am we offer a little Bible Study over muffins and tea and then do a general house-keeping meeting to make sure all is going smoothly in this little community.

1-2 nights a week we invite the patients to eat dinner with our family. If the patients have had a rough week, due to pain or recovering from Chemotherapy, this number may increase, though they’ve been wonderful about taking care of one another. They make their own food for the most part and do their own grocery shopping at small local markets on our street. Our little Heller family tends to receive 1-2 meals a week at the courtesy of our sweet Eliza.

In the morning you will usually see the patients moving around, making breakfast and tea, doing some laundry by hand even though we’ve offered the machine, sweeping their kitchen, sweeping our yard even though Jon has showed them the rake 100x, picking up dog poop, or trimming some trees. Sometimes this is the time they’ll go for a little walk or do a their grocery shop.

Lunch time they tend to eat in their kitchen, and sometimes on especially nice days you may find them eating on the table outside.

Everyone naps or at least lays down for 1-2hrs in the afternoon.

Typically, the girls and I (or Jon if it is his afternoon home) spend our post-nap afternoon outside on the lawn with whoever is out there. For the most part, Mozambicans think the house is for sleeping and spend a majority of their time outside. Eliza likes to crotchet the day away, either sitting in her black plastic chair outside the kitchen, giving her pot of food an occasional stir, or laying in the grass shooing our large dog. The men like to sit outside and listen to their radio or watch TV inside their room.

After 7pm, and sometimes earlier, we usually don’t see anyone again until the morning.

Weekends are low key. Sometimes we’ll have a visit from a sister or brother-in-law. A game of croquet may be enjoyed in the lawn. The patients enjoy attending church with us on Sundays.

 

So maybe that gives you a little glimpse? I hope so. Overall the patients have overwhelmed us with blessings and community and have required very little outpouring on our part. Thanks for your continual prayers. We still currently have 3 patients – Papa Zakarias, Tia Eliza, and Tio Tomás. We are in discussions and prayer over our 4th right now – please join us! We would like to add one more woman to our community before little Karasi joins us – our 5th Heller!

May 27, 2013
Around the house, Casa Ahava, Hospital Ministry
4 comments

He’ll Have Two Legs Soon

A Jon Post

There are some things I don’t really know how to write down.

As much as the American side of me wants to hold on to the idea that a crisis is just a lead up to a triumph… sometimes a crisis is simply a precursor to collapse. Sometimes victory does not come. Sometimes death’s mocking smile is all the reward that comes at the end of a battle. These times are neither easy to write down nor pleasant to do so. But they are important to remember. It’s important that someone is spoken for. So we write them down.

Papa Xavier arrived in the hospital in December last year. His soft smile and calm eyes were the first things I noticed. He was strong… perhaps too strong for a man with only one leg. Despite his strength, he is tender and meek. He is quick to laugh and slow to find offense or to even frown. When I offered New Testament Bibles to the men he was quick to begin reading and quick to humbly share what he was reading. We read over Matthew chapter 5 together back in March. He soaked it up.
He has five children. The youngest is 3 years old. Three boys, two girls. He loves them all dearly. He grew up in a distant village in the Mozambican province of Inhambane. He is proud of his heritage and his tribe. He loves speaking his language.
He loves my daughters. Especially Jovie. I brought Jovie to his room many times and, though initially hesitant, she soon leaned away from me and into his arms whenever we were in a room together. His tender arms wrapped around her, and he always allowed her to pull on lips, nose, or ears when she was in his arms.
He loved to play soccer with the young men of his village until his leg got too weak to keep playing. Even after he stopped playing soccer he still kept up with the Mozambican soccer league and often talked about his days of activity and sports. It was hard to go from being strong and athletic to having a leg amputated just below the knee because of a tumor growing there. When he arrived his body reflected the joy he had found running and playing. After 6 months of cancer ravaging through his system it was hard to see but, because I still remember how he arrived, I could still see the echoes of his strength.
On Friday last week Jovie and I walked into his room one more time. An ambulance was taking him home the following morning. He was going home to die. He has been fast losing this fight, and he has not seen his 3-year-old since November last year.
Jovie squealed and sat on his bed and reached for Xavier’s face. With shaking hands and barely the strength to raise his head he beamed at my daughter and reached for her waving hands. She melted into him. She threw herself onto his broken body and his weak laugh filled the room like a hymn. “Ah, Jovie” his soft voice said. We sat together for some time and Jovie soon got restless. Our prayer mingled together with tears, and Jovie and I walked away.
Over these last 3 years these kinds of goodbyes have always been hard. They should be and I hope they are never easy. I am so honored to have stood next to Xavier for these last 6 months and I look forward to standing with him for eternity. He’ll have two legs again soon.

May 20, 2013
Hospital Ministry, The Kids
4 comments
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