My Precious Little One

My first shift. I can't tell you how exciting it was to get my schedule and see on that spreadsheet my name, and work schedule. After two months working in housekeeping, and then two weeks of cleaning and putting the hospital together and orienting the new nurses, I can finally be a "real" nurse again, taking care of my patients.
On my time off I have been going to a local orphanage, called Mvou Mvou Baby Creche. I have fallen in love with the babies there. Many of the babies are malnourished when they reach the orphanage, and the staff are working to get them back to a healthy weight. One particular little boy has caught my heart. Malachi is fourteen months old, with limbs as thin as twigs. His body is not digesting his food the way it should. Though the orphanage staff has been feeding him well, he continues to lose weight. He has been placed on the infant feeding program through the ship, and we have provided the orphanage with a special formula that is predigested, in the hopes that his body will be able to absorb the needed nutrition. He is the length of an average 3 month old infant, and weighs only 3kg. For those of you who are not familiar with metric measurements, this comes to 6.6lbs, the size of a small newborn. His skin clings to his skull and his eyes fill up his face, old and wise like an old man. When I hold him I can feel every bone and angle of his little body. He is so lethargic and hardly moves, and when he cries there are no tears, but his little hands have hold of my heart. I pray that in the time that I spend here in Congo I will see him heal and grow to be a healthy toddler.

My Precious Little Malachi