How do you say goodbye? I have been pondering this as we prepare to leave Guinea. B and C Ward have been emptied, and we have spent this week cleaning, packing, and securing everything from those wards for the sail. Today A Ward will discharge its last patients and we will begin to clean it. The packing and cleaning has solidified in my mind the realization that we really are leaving. Our service here in Guinea is almost complete. I have been so blessed and have witnessed so many patients experience amazing transformations. So many of my patients will be forever in my memories. The young boy whose hand was released from burn contractures and proudly showed me that he could now hold a pen and write his name. The young deaf woman with the goiter, who could not speak, but who was so excited to see me when she returned to the ship for her follow-up appointment with her neck fully healed, with hardly a scar to show where her goiter had been. The beautiful little babies who came in for cleft lip repairs with their beautiful smiles, both before and after surgery. The lovely young woman with severe burn contractures to her neck and chest and arms who danced for joy the day her dressings came off. And, of course, there are my lovely teachers and children at the deaf school and the day workers that I have worked with in the hospital. They are forever in my heart, forever in my prayers. . So how do I say goodbye?
With a few tears, an abundance of love, the hope and prayer that each and everyone of them goes on to a better life, and that through our witness of the love of Jesus, they will come to know Him.
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| Saying Goodbye to My Patients at the Hope Center |
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| Saying Goodbye to Fara |
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| Posing with the A Ward Nurses and Day Crew at the Day Worker Farewell |
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| Posing for a Last Photo Before Our Day Workers Leave the Ship for the Last Time |
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| Saying Goodbye to Antoino and Koffi |
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