Another Home Visit

Greetings blog followers!

This past week at work I've been trying to finish up my grant proposal, but we went two days without power this week so that made it difficult. Next week I should have it completed and submitted for certain.

But I also got the opportunity to tag along on another Home-Based Care visit this week. This time we walked to some houses clear up in the hills of Mwanza. Mwanza is a very rocky and hilly city, and the families that live up in the hills are usually the poorest of the lot. There are no roads to these houses, no electricity, no running water, and no privacy from your neighbors. Furthermore, when I say "houses" I am actually referring to mud shacks. These buildings are small, with patchy roofing and lacking all the luxurious amenities that we're used to back home like stoves, refrigerators, etc. Imagine your entire family living and sleeping in the same one room house all the time! Also, to get water they must walk all the way down and then back up the hills with buckets of water from Lake Victoria. Needless to say, their lives are already tough.

However, the families we visited have even more daily hardships to endure as they are all HIV clients of ours at Shaloom and must adhere to specific ARV drug regimens. One family in particular stood out to me...It was a mother, two sons, and a daughter living together. All of them have HIV. One son is very young, but the other son and the daughter are older. The daughter though, is paralyzed on the whole right side of her body. She suffered a stroke and was left unable to move her right side. Apparently she's making good progress, because she can now feed herself and stand up on her own--things that she was previously unable to do without help. She can't speak anymore, but she can understand everything people tell her and is able to acknowledge them with noises and gestures. I was struck by her cheery demeanor and determination. As we entered the house, we waited for her to enter the room. She insisted on getting into the room on her own power, so we waited as she slid on the ground, pushing her body along with her left arm. Finally, she made it into the room and lifted herself onto a chair. She was so happy to do it on her own and also pleased to see that we'd come to visit her.

This woman will never be able to leave her house unless someone carries her down the hill, because no vehicles can make the journey, she can no longer speak or walk, and all she has is her family. But she still finds joy in the little things of life, and that was refreshing to see. What you begin to realize here is that most of the problems we have back home pale in comparison to the challenges many Tanzanians face every day. Too often we worry about the silly trials of life, and we fail to be truly thankful for all we have. I will surely think of families like these whenever I am stressed or upset in the future.