Monday, May 25: Final prosthetic fittings...

Monday started early for John and Erin, as they left New Day at 6am for Livingstone along with Ricky, Debbie, Cindy and Sarah. They were able to go to Victoria Falls on Monday and the market in Livingstone.

The road to Livingstone is the nicest road I've seen in Zambia. Livingstone is a big tourist destination.

All the market shops lined up. Each shop person invites you to "look around", "looking is free". They aren't as pushy trying to get you to buy things as the people at the Lusaka market last year. 

View at what a market booth has.

This man's name is Shadreck. He paints all the pictures you see in his booth. He was really nice to talk with.

While at the market in Livingstone, John encountered a man named Stewart who needs a prosthetic eye. John talked with him about Prosthetic Promises and our trip next year. He got the man's name and contact info, so John will be seeing him for a prosthetic eye next year. The man told John that he had an infection in his eye as a young boy, and a witch doctor put a powder in the eye to "heal it" which cause the eye to die and is now shrunken. John talked with the man about Jesus, and he said he knows Jesus now. His story gives an example of the trust in pagan medicine and beliefs that is still prevalent there.

Father and daughter at Victoria Falls! 

Monday for Chris and I consisted of the last prosthetic fittings for the rest of the people from Choma---Ackson, Maureen, Harrison and Kin. Also, Boyd came back for an adjustment to his prosthesis, because he felt it was too long. We shortened the prosthesis slightly to make him more comfortable. Greenford also came back, because he didn't like that the prosthetic foot was slightly longer than his sound foot. After some explanation about the fact that all the supplies are donated that we bring, I had him choose either a dark skin color foot that was the wrong size or a light skin color foot that was the correct size. 

Chris is fitting Maureen with her prosthesis.

Learning to walk with her above-knee prosthesis.

Harrison walking with his below-knee prosthesis. He was one of the patients who had a prosthesis already that was just very worn out, so he's had lots of practice walking with a prosthetic leg already.

We had also called Matthews to come back for some adjustments to his prosthesis. His fit was a little more difficult, and we wanted to make sure we had the best fit possible. We also wanted to make sure he understood all of the instructions. 

Ackson waiting while we made a few adjustments to the prosthesis.

Ackson did very well walking with the prosthesis, and he was so grateful.

After fittings, the patients were able to see some of the New Day kids do "The Redeemer Drama", which is a skit set to music with just motions and no words.

After the skit, Blu explained the different characters portraying Man, Sin and Jesus and how it explains Jesus' sacrifice for us and salvation. Afterwards, several of the patients talked more with Blu about the skit. It was so awesome that the kids were able to do this skit for some of the patients to see.

After the patients left, Chris and I packed all of our supplies in the foot lockers, organized and labeled everything. The supplies and equipment will be stored in The Ark guesthouse until next year's trip. We also packed our personal bags, as we would be leaving Tuesday morning with Niki for Livingstone. 

*Next post: Last day in Zambia and heading home...

Tuesday, May 26: Last day in Zambia and heading home...

Tuesday morning started with Chris and I getting our bags ready to go and all the foot lockers moved from the garage to The Ark for storage. Fence, Bryan and Wes helped us move all the equipment and supplies to The Ark. There will be more supplies arriving at New Day on the shipping container that hadn't made it to New Day yet. John had made the trip to Kansas to take supplies to load on the shipping container, but hold ups along the way kept the container from making it before our trip. The supplies will be stored until our trip next year.

After our goodbyes, Niki, Chris and I headed to Livingstone. We stopped in Choma for Niki to run a few errands and get chicken and chips (french fries) for lunch, which we ate in the truck. On our way to Livingstone, we saw some monkeys and impala which was neat to see. We went to the market for a little shopping when we got into Livingstone and then headed to Ngolide Lodge where we were staying Tuesday night. 

View of the front of the lodge. We stayed there last year when we went into Livingstone to visit the hospital. 

View of the doors to the rooms. Chris and I shared a room, which happened to be the same room Jason and I were in last year. Definitely use mosquito nets over the beds and don't drink the water. 

A covered outdoor sitting area. Chris and I chatted with a very nice guy from South Africa who was in Livingstone on business.

While Niki, Chris and I were making our way to Livingstone, Ricky, Debbie, John, Erin, Cindy and Sarah went on a safari in Botswana. We met up with them at Olga's Italian restaurant for dinner and got to hear all about their safari adventure. 

After our stay at Ngolide Lodge on Tuesday night, Ricky and Niki took us to the Livingstone airport Wednesday for our trip home. We traveled to South Africa, then overnight to London and finally home to DFW airport. 

Praise God for another successful trip for Prosthetic Promises!! We are so grateful for all the prayers and support from so many people! A huge THANK YOU to New Day Orphanage for hosting us again this year for our trip. We are excited to be planning our next trip for Spring 2016 and continue plans on our future clinic! Stay tuned for preparation update posts along the way.

Want to help?? We collect shoes in good condition, eye glasses or readers and used prosthetic components for our trips. Please contact me if you'd like to make a donation or get involved. As always...we are SO thankful for all of your prayers for our continued mission! 

www.prostheticpromisesinhisname.org

3 days till Zambia! (Africa is big)

We leave for Zambia on Sunday!! Almost all packed...just a little laundry and last check list review. 

As we've been getting closer to our trip, I've had lots of questions about our safety going to Zambia. Africa is a huge continent! [see image below] We will be far from Ebola and extremist terrorist groups (the top 2 concerns voiced from many people I've talked to). 

We do, however, ask for your prayers for general travel safety and a successful mission! We go to not just provide people with a prosthetic limb or eye....that is the physical service we provide in order to tell, and show through our actions, the good news of Christ. 

The Macha radio station has been announcing about our trip and for those needing a prosthetic limb or eye to make contact. New Day has been receiving many calls about patients needing prostheses. This is in addition to the nine patients from the Choma clinic and doing check-ups for people we saw last year. We will have to assess all who come to determine how many people we can make prostheses for in the time we have there and who will benefit most from this service. It will be difficult to turn people away. Please pray for understanding on their side and a sense of peace for us even though turning someone away will be heartbreaking. 

We are so excited to be able to make another trip to Zambia to serve those in need! Please keep us in your prayers the next several weeks. I will be giving a day-by-day recap here on my blog of the trip upon our return with tons of pictures. 

3 weeks to go, 9 patients waiting

 22 days till Zambia!

I had breakfast with Chris this morning in Temple on my way home from Austin. It was so nice to see her and visit! I found out that the resin that was shipped has arrived at New Day...whew! The resin was absolutely necessary to have for fabrication for the prostheses, so that's a big relief to know it arrived safely. Chris and John have also been busy sorting and packing supplies that we need into the plastic tubs for checked luggage on the planes. They also found out that the Choma clinic we visited last year has 9 patients lined up for us to see. 5 below knee amputees and 4 above knee amputees. Plus, we'll want to see everyone, or at least everyone that can come back, that we made prostheses for last year to check up and give new supplies. Since Alnold, Luyando and Luckson are children and are growing, they will likely need new sockets made. So...we've got a busy schedule lined up and likely more people than I just listed to see. I am thankful that our contacts at the clinics/hospitals have gotten the word out to amputees. 

Last year, I was worried about having to turn people away if we couldn't get to everyone in the short time we're there. Thankfully, that did not happen, and we were spared the heartbreak of having to turn someone away that needed a prosthesis. I don't know if it will work out the same this year. I pray that if we do have to turn someone away because we just don't have enough time or materials, that they will be understanding of the situation. 

I was able to give Chris several pairs of shoes from a podiatrist's office in Denton for packing in the plastic totes to take with us. Shoes are definitely a necessity since some people we see do not have shoes, and the prosthetic feet need to have a shoe to protect the foot from damage. 

A big THANK YOU to the girls at North Texas Foot & Ankle Specialists for lots of shoes!

With just 3 weeks till we leave, we will all be very busy getting things in order for our trip including packing and getting our patients here taken care of. **Please pray for our final preparations....packing and remembering to take everything we need. Thank you for prayers and support for our mission! 

39 days

 39 days till Zambia!

39 days till working with these two wonderful people!

        

Wow, we're getting so close to our trip! Update about preparations: The shipping container will not make it to New Day in time, so we're looking at what supplies we left there at New Day from last year (what's still good out of that) and what we can take in plastic containers as extra baggage on flights. Chris found a resin that can be shipped via FedEx to New Day in Zambia (resin is used for laminating the materials for the prosthetic sockets, so is vital that we have that). Blu was able to locate some plaster there in Zambia that we can buy. And, the other materials we need will have to be packed for flights. 

I've spoken with a few reps from prosthetic manufacturers about our shipping container not making it, so they have checked about getting us donations of prosthetic parts. Otto Bock is sending us some feet and knees....yay!  

I'm starting to get nervous about our trip. You would think that since I went last year and did just fine, I'd be not so nervous....but I am. I'm just terrible about worrying.....though, I'm getting better than I used to be. I think "maybe I'm getting too comfortable, complacent with my abilities to do prosthetics/orthotics....therefore I'm not thinking things through enough or not providing the best device for a patient". It's like if I'm not nervous enough or I don't fret enough, then I won't be good enough. How ridiculous! I have definitely realized that I do this cycle of worry and then stop to realize how ridiculous that is and then do the cycle all over again. God will take care of it. God will take care of me and every situation. He will give me all I need for whatever life brings. I just need to keep reminding myself that.

Prayer requests:

• Pray for John and Chris as they are packing supplies again for travel with us on flights...prayers for patience with running through checklists again and purchasing in the midst of their busy schedules. 
• Pray for Erin (John's daughter) as she works to finish up the spring semester at college...prayers that she keeps her determination and focus to do well even when anticipating our fast approaching trip.
• Pray that all the needed supplies will be with us during our trip, patients will be able to come to us for prosthetic fittings and MANY people will be touched through our mission as we strive to show others Christ. 

Thank you for praying for us and our mission! 

Looking at Plan B for supplies

I talked with Chris yesterday...she started the conversation with "Don't panic when I tell you this, but...", and I found out that all of our supplies that are on the shipping container are sitting at port in the U.S.....they haven't left yet....we have 59 days till we leave for Zambia! 

Hurray for 59 days till Zambia! A bit of an issue that our supplies haven't left the U.S. yet. We're thinking they will likely not make it in time, so we're starting on our Plan B. 

Plan B: ship internationally the resin (chemical that we need for laminating the prosthetic sockets) since that cannot go on the plane. We can compare shipping supplies vs doing extra baggage fees for our flights. This is not ideal, obviously, since it incurs more cost, but we need to have supplies there for sure. 

So, we're back to gathering supplies for our trip. I had taken several donations that had come in to Chris when we had our PPIHN board meeting including a few feet, liners and socks. Another interesting thing is that a rep from Otto Bock was at my office earlier this week and offered some donations of knees or feet for our mission work. I gave him a call to let him know our shipping container situation, so he's going to see about getting us some components. Yay! Chris will have to purchase more supplies also. 

Here's the big load of supplies that are on the container. Oh container, we pray you make it to Zambia in time. 

So I did find one small thing amusing, though we're a bit distraught that the container hasn't even left the U.S....last year, our crate had arrived on time with supplies and we had our extra bags on the flight with more supplies. (You can see in the picture above the plastic totes like we had last year as extra baggage on the plane). One of those totes was stolen in transport to the orphanage (read story here...scroll to the bottom of the post). On that tote was our pipe vises, which are equipment that fit into a vise for our prosthetic plaster model to fit in for modifying. So, we had bought two more pipe vises and put in the supplies on the shipping container this year. And now, it looks like we won't have pipe vises again to work with. Perhaps one day, we'll have pipe vises to use in Zambia. 

*Asking for prayers that the shipping container does make it to Zambia in time for our trip. Also, that preparations for our Plan B to make sure we do have the necessary supplies go smoothly. 

Looking ahead...soon and far for PPIHN

70 days till Zambia!!

Friday was my first Prosthetic Promises board meeting in Temple, and I'm so happy to be a part of this group. We discussed where PPIHN is now, our upcoming trip and plans for the future...and had a wonderful time with food and fellowship. 

It is truly amazing to see where God has led Prosthetic Promises in such a short time. Chris and John made their first trip to Zambia in September 2012. After returning, they began the process of forming a non-profit for future trips to Zambia and hopefully other countries as well. In this short time, we have made another trip in 2014 and will be leaving in just 70 days for a third trip! We also have plans drawn for a clinic to be built and the funds in place to start construction. Praise God for His wonderful blessings! 

The drawing of our (hopefully) future clinic. 

At the beginning of our meeting on Friday, Dee (Darbi's mom) shared a story that Darbi (from New Day) had sent her. They encountered one of our prosthetic patients walking on crutches to New Day because her prosthetic foot had broken. She carried the prosthesis as far as she could but had to leave it at some point and continue walking with the crutches towards the orphanage in hopes that when she got there, they would drive back to get the prosthesis to repair. They did get the prosthesis, and Blu replaced the foot. The replacement foot, though, did not hold up. Apparently, storing all of our prosthetic supplies in the attic of the guest house has some issues. We'll have to assess what is still good when we get there in May. (Another good thing about a future clinic with a storage room...better temperature control.) More than the thought of what happened to our supplies, was this huge rush of emotion I had for the lady with the broken prosthesis. John prayed before our meal right after Dee shared that story, and I just had tears well up because this lady...all the people we made prostheses for...got the prosthesis, but I'm not there to fix it when it breaks. A prosthesis is a built, complex device...they're going to break sooner or later. I just want to be there to fix it. My hopes are to be able to teach someone in the future to do repairs throughout the year when we aren't there. In the mean time, I'm counting down the days until I am there.