Closure--Melinda Dessieux

I can hardly sleep the night before the flight. It could be from excitement (or the fact that I am having a hard time keeping anything down), but after 23 years have passed, I am finally going to the place my family calls home. After watching Haiti on television, actually being there is very interesting. On TV, all you sense is misery, and all you can see is extreme poverty--yet when I arrive, I find so much more. There is a certain spirit among the people of Haiti that makes life…. so much more enjoyable and makes me truly appreciate life for what it is – an adventure.

I am home the moment I step off the airplane.

I never thought I would enjoy rubbing little children down with permethrin cream, take pleasure in instructing a mom on how to use an inhaler with her son, or use juice (pedialyte) to persuade a 6 year old into taking a worm pill……but I do. I know that some of the patients that were seen at the off-site medical clinics would not have had any medical care or access to medical care for a while. Even the medical care provided at the clinics is limited by the amount of resources available, yet that is never an obstacle. Everyone on the trip has a ‘get it done’ mind set: From creating a makeshift pharmacy to using a car as the power source for a nebulizer.

The day before we leave, we are able to go to the orphanage that is down the street from the mission, and I have so much fun there. The children are so polite, and I fall in love with a 7 month old named Gigi. Her mother passed away during birth.  Her grandmother, unable to take care of her, gave her to the mission because she knew that Gigi would be well cared for. Despite the situation she was born into, Gigi is the happiest baby I have ever met. She is loved and adored by everyone she makes eye contact with, especially me.

I did not expect to be touched during this trip, in my mind I thought I knew everything there was to being Haitian…Man, was I wrong. Many of us wake up every day and take for granted the blessings God has set before us. Prior to this trip I was unsure about what I wanted out of life--I definitely would be fibbing if I said I was deliberately searching for the answers to my life--I can honestly say, though, that this trip has inspired me to redirect my focus to the simple things in life. Simple things like teaching a child patty cake or dancing on a roof top surrounded by mountains and a lake….or waking up to a guy praising the Lord on a bullhorn (okay maybe that wasn’t  simple). This country is absolutely beautiful and amazing. Since I have been back to the States I feel like a foreigner.

I love my experience and I hope everyone experiences something like this at least twice in their lifetime.

The time and money that I donated with Ke Nou was nominal in comparison to what I had the opportunity to experience and the lifelong friends I acquired. If there is one thing I regret, it is that I did not have the ability to do and give more while I was there. Ke Nou, thank you for a truly enlightening experience.

Melinda Dessieux