nick and suzanne

Monday, September 25, 2017

time away: photos from Australia and America

Beautiful sunrise on an early morning flight

Hello friends! Today I want to share a few photos of our time away from Mercy Ships between Benin and Cameroon.

We love life on board the ship, but it is also intense and fast-paced. It's good and healthy for us to have breaks from being on the ship, and gives us a chance to reconnect with loved ones and be refreshed to continue on in the next country.

We left Benin on 18th of April- sooner than we normally would leave an outreach. This was to allow us enough time to take a break before I joined the advance team in Cameroon, preparing for the ship's arrival, and for Nick to go to Switzerland to study french for a month.

Visiting family in Cairns, Australia

First we went to Australia - we visited family, and Nick was even able to return to work in Brisbane for a couple weeks. We love going to church in Brisbane, and catching up with friends there. I am now a resident of Australia, and have a spouse visa. So, on this visit we were able to take care of some things like sorting out my health insurance and getting me a medicare card. We're thankful for the way God has provided for us in this way, and that we have a country where we can both live and work! Now, I am a registered nurse and a resident in Australia.

We loved spending time with our family in Australia, and seeing little Blair just before she turned 1 year old

April in Australia is lovely- it is Australia's "autumn" and I especially loved waking up to birds singing and open windows

Camping with friends outside of Brisbane

Photos from the day we drove just north of Brisbane to the Sunshine Coast to visit the Mercy Ships Australia office

In late May, we headed to the states spent some vacation time with family in Indiana. This was our longest visit since we got married, and we spent precious summer days with my family and youngest brothers. It did my heart so much good, and helped us feel refreshed and ready for another outreach with Mercy Ships.

I couldn't get enough of these lilacs! We came just in time to see them

Enjoying my parent's pond

Family get together!

Lots of afternoons spent swimming with Jonathan and Levi

We watched Jonathan play his little league games

We spent a long weekend in St. Paul visiting Mark and Selina

We loved seeing Mark and Selina settling in to their new lives after grad school - so proud of what each of them have accomplished. Also, they picked a beautiful place to live!

Ollie - this was our first chance to meet my family's new (and very much loved) dog.

Levi played on a soccer team this summer, he's fast!

Sweet sister!

We even fit in a Mercy Ships reunion weekend - such precious memories and friends!

Not sure what's going on here, but the picture makes me smile. It was SO good to reconnect with these two.

Last few photos - we've been lots of places, but the clouds are pretty amazing in the midwest!

If you were one of the MANY people who welcomed us into their home, took us out for a meal, or stopped us in church or at work to say a kind word...THANK YOU! We deeply appreciate your kindness!

Monday, September 18, 2017

5 months since Benin

It's 5 months to the day since Nick and I left Benin- those months slipped by quickly!

Nick and Melchior prepare for an afternoon of seeing patients at the Ponseti Clinic

Today I want to take a moment to look back at our time in Benin, and tell you about our friends and colleagues there. In both Madagascar and Benin, we have been blessed to work alongside amazing people who have become part of our "clubfoot family" around the world. We are immensely proud of who they are, and their dedication to their patients.

This little patient was getting her last cast taken off, just in time for her first birthday the next day. Her mama was thrilled!

In this post in January, we shared about some of the exciting progress made by the Benin clinic. After January, Nick and the team went on to treat another group of patients together, totaling 20 kids. Throughout this time, CURE International remained involved supporting the work of the clinic, and in March they brought Melchior on as the country's clubfoot program manager, a full time position.

Ulysse and Rosemonde carefully assess the angles of a patient's foot, tracking their progress.

Twins- one born with clubfeet one born without.

Nick and Melchior discuss braces.

Teamwork includes the patient's parents.

This little guy, ready to take his first solo steps on straight feet!

During the final months of our visit, Nick helped facilitate the clinic's transition out of the season of working with Mercy Ships. The team's clinical skills are excellent, and we know that anyone who brings their child to this team will find safe, good quality care.

Once he was offered the position of country program manager, one of the first questions CURE asked Melchior was whether or not he had a passport. He went and got one, and sure enough they've already sent Melchior to Kenya and Rwanda for further leadership training. In June 2017, here he is in Kigali, Rwanda on the left, and "meeting" a giraffe in Kenya on the right:

Melchior reports that the team is doing well, they've brought on some new therapists to help with providing treatment. Ulysse is currently in France doing a masters program in physical therapy, and we are very happy for him as he pursues further study (but he still loves clubfoot treatment!). The clinic in Cotonou has welcomed a further 27 clubfoot patients since the ship left port!

Melchior continues to raise awareness about clubfoot in Benin. Here's a twitter post from CURE clubfoot:

With support from CURE, the clinic will help open a second location further north in Benin. There is a need for more clinics outside of the Cotonou area, so that good quality treatment is available in the more rural areas of the country. The team is well equipped to share excellent clinical knowledge with other professionals in Benin.

A few more photos from our last weeks in Benin:

Last Ponseti team dinner - Nick and Marina (ever-amazing Ponseti Program Assistant) pass out gifts, lots of laughter, and a few last rubik's cube competitions (Nick taught both Ulysse and Melchior how to solve it, and they practiced during the whole outreach). Melchior beat Nick's time. :-) In the bottom left photo is Josiane, the visionary clinic director who wanted her team to learn Ponseti, saw value in the training and gave the team the freedom they needed to pursue it. She was a wonderful support during our visit in Benin.

We miss this sweet family! Melchior and Rosemonde are both physical therapists, and we love seeing the great things they have already done for clubfoot kids in their country!

We are honored to call all these wonderful people our friends, and we look forward to the next time we can visit Benin!

Sunday, August 27, 2017

Arrival Day! The Africa Mercy in port in Cameroon

Hello everyone! Breaking the silence on our quiet blog - good news, we are here on the ship in Cameroon! Nick and I have enjoyed settling back into our cabin home and life on board since the ship arrived just over a week ago. Standing on the dock and greeting the ship as it arrived was an incredible experience.

I am planning to post a couple more updates on what we’ve been up to lately- but here’s a quick overview:

It has really been a privilege to be part of the Mercy Ships Advance Team for Cameroon. This means that we were part of the team which goes ahead of the ship's arrival to make sure everything is as prepared as possible for our 10 month visit.

On advance, I was the Medical Capacity Building Liaison. This means I helped prepare for anything Mercy Ships does which involves teaching and training, including on-board mentoring for surgeons, anesthetists, nurses, preparing for various courses we will run, working on the WHO checklist project (click the link if you want to know more about it), and also helping prepare for the Ponseti Program.

Nick’s role was to prepare children with very severe clubfeet to enter our orthopedic program. We are starting orthopedic surgery early in the visit to Cameroon, so in order to give these kids the best outcomes possible, Nick has been pre-casting them to allow time for their feet to stretch out before they go to see Dr. Frank, our orthopedic surgeon. Nick has also been working on starting his teaching program (which will offer treatment to younger children). He has been meeting key contacts, and will even begin teaching an intensive course starting tomorrow. Nick never wastes time getting started once he’s arrived in a country. The photo on the left is after Nick's first day of casting in Cameroon- happily back to being covered in plaster.

During advance we saw mountains move and saw the impossible become possible again and again. Not an easy journey but a good one- and couldn't have asked for a better team!

Finally the arrival day really came! It's a Mercy Ships tradition for the advance team to have special outfits made for the arrival day- we chose our fabric here in Douala. We stood on the dock along with a group of our newly-hired local Day Crew- local people who will work with us during the next 10 months. They came along to sing and join in celebrating the ships arrival.

What an amazing feeling after the first person yelled "I see it! I see it!" and we could see the white Africa Mercy off in the distance, coming around the corner!

The ship was looking so lovely, with all the flags out and the crew standing out on deck waving back!

As the ship got closer, we could begin to make out faces of friends. Then began a long frenzy of waving and yelling and cheering, with the Day Crew singing there on the dock with us.