"We work as one. . ."

Anytime volunteers come down, I have at least one bout of apprehension. Don’t get me wrong. I’m stoked to have new people come down and experience a place and culture I love. One of the most incredible things I’ve ever experienced is watching a person change to completely embrace this culture in a mere seven days. However, there’s usually a day or two in which I freak out that someone coming down will just hate everything about this place and the week will be awful for them. Yeah. I’m not sure what I’d do in that situation, and praise Jesus, I’ve yet had a reason to find out (yet another example of why worry and anxiety are a waste!). This past week we had a team of 12 come down for a Stroke Camp--six people from Iowa, Des Moines University (including Meesh), six people from Pennsylvania, Arcadia University, and to round it out six patients from our area (plus Brooke and I). Phenomenal hardly begins to describe the way God moved throughout those seven days, in and out of the clinic.

Huge tears fell from my eyes Monday morning, the first day of camp (day three on the island for the volunteers) when one of our long time patients led us in prayer and choked up with sobs about getting a second chance of life. I too have been given a second chance on this island, with these people, to serve and to do what I love to do as a PT and an individual. I love that my patients here are so thankful for simply life, to wake up in the morning, and aren't afraid to praise God for that! I thought then that I knew how incredible of a week it would be (and how much I would cry throughout). . . but I was wrong. It was so much more! My heart remains full recalling moments throughout the week. . .

Pre-testing on the first day! Kate, Tiffany and Jane ran the Wolf Motor Function Test with Marshie to start.

Kathy is a professor at Des Moines and was a huge help in both heart and expertise all week.  She made huge gains, in particular, with Sylvan.

Lauren, Sam, and Ashley with Sylvan for his 6 Minute Walk Test!

Brian and Kate with Ms. Buttas. Mon, she a work!

Marshie, Mas Easton, and Sylvan

Sam and Tiffany with a smiling Ms. Buttas

Kevon, being so young, loves sports and competitions. Ashley and everyone else put him through the ropes!

We all got pretty creative with Ms. Yvonne as well, although Erica and Brian may have  taken the cake with this one!

Love her! We first saw her last fall and she's made great gains since then. She reminds me constantly why I  love being a PT and living in this country!

Every morning begins with an hour mat routine! Not as easy as it looks!

Brooke was our fearless leader and camp director for the week.  Dr. Kathy had some great ideas to add  too!

Who says PT isn't fun! These guys worked and worked 6-8 hours a day . . . but they got to play some too!

Mi incredible older sisters. So blessed by Brooke and Meesh!

(Can't get this to rotate the right way) Body Weight Treadmill Training! Everyone did it!

End of the day musical chairs. Mas Easton's a sneaky one!

Kevon and sports . . . 

Good ole NMES.

Dance contest winners!

Marshie made huge gains with the balance harness .  . . He never quits trying. Love it!

Every morning we start with devotions and Jamaican choruses. This happened to be the group's favorite . . . so much so that they 'performed' it for our talent show at Anna's and then the next morning here, for the patients! 

As 1 in 4 Jamaicans have high blood pressure, and these guys are at even a higher risk b/c they've already had one stroke, checking BP is a continual practice throughout camp. . . especially b/c no one wants to quit or stop working!

Post-testing! Every single, I mean, EVERY SINGLE person improved on EVERY SINGLE  one of the five tests. . . 

Yvonne schooled her last Timed Up and Go and Wolf Motor scores, Marshie tripled his walking distance, Sylvan moved down two fall risk levels in his balance, Kevon completed 4 more hand tasks. . . this is incredible especially with the range of lower level to higher level functioning that we had at the camp. Medicare, listen up!

What graduation is complete without certificates?? 

All Smiles (and a few tears too!)

June 2011 Stroke Camp

After work, we must play! Boat ride out to Pelican Bar (bar out in the middle of the ocean)

Da Likkle Brutte, still fearlessly leading :)

Love dem!

That night we came home and Anna threw Meesh a not-so surprise  Jamaican wedding reception!  So much fun! Meesh got married May 7, but here her Jamaican community family was able to celebrate too!

Kevon and Webster are both deaf but incredible teachers. Kevon's been teaching me JSL weekly and I'm loving it! Ashley got me started with it during this week. 

Da Broom Brothers are incredible bongo players and played throughout the night . . . meaning we danced , danced, danced!

This guy can move . . . in ways that should physiologically not be possible! But Anna showed him a thing or two too!

A small sample of what these two sounded like . . .and this was hours into the party!! Feel the rhythm!

Followed the week up with a sunrise hike . . . love this country and God's beauty in it!

It wasn’t a perfect week, by far. But sometimes imperfection makes things a lot more fun. Like when the water pump for the house breaks or it takes 14 of you over an hour to set up two canvas gazebos. Or the jeep battery dies on your way home. Or you have to push the bus to get it unstuck on the rain laden hill. . . Seven days of flexibility for sure. I'm learning to laugh with it all. :) Seven days of healing, love, JOY, patience, and perseverance. Seven days to try new things, step up and succeed. Seven days full of the reminder that I can still be who I was made to be as a PT (and I love it!). Seven days of watching hearts open, faith come alive, and seeds be planted.

At graduation, Mr. Easton said, “We work as one. We incorporated real good.” Mon, how true that is! God knows just what He is doing, and as it says in 1 Corinthians, He continues to bring about just the right parts to make up a full body, for work, for service, and to create change that glorifies His name. He knew exactly who to send down for this past week. All praise, glory, and honor be to Him! These types of changes will last, certainly in my own heart, but hopefully and prayerfully in the patients’ and volunteers’ lives as well.

Back to the beginning . . .

When you stand out almost everywhere you go, seeing a familiar face is a most wonderful thing!! So the fact that I've been embraced, welcomed back, and loved on more times than I can count, in so many different places over the last three days is a huge blessing.

I'm back! In my Jamaica. In among people I hold near and dear to my heart, and placed in a culture and climate that I absolutely love (maybe not so much this heat, but one makes do!). God is so good, my friends! Between the food (mangoes, jerk chicken, bumpies, papaya, etc), vegetation (flowers galore!), new adventures (i.e. buying fish, hanging lights, Kingston), and people (old and new friends, patients, proposals) . . . well, I could take up a lot of your time giving stories and details! However, there was one person we happened to run into yesterday that reminded me of all the reasons why I fell in love with Jamaica and my work here in the first place.

Her name is Ms. Johnson. I met her almost two years ago to date on my first trip to the island as a student PT. She wasn't a patient, but rather the supporting wife who came in for her husband's, Victor, appointments. He had had a stroke and a whole lot of other things that were inexplainable but left him severely physically disabled. One of the most trying things for him was his lack of ability to communicate. A former pastor, he could comprehend everything around him but was unable to speak. I can't even begin to imagine how hard that must be, in addition to his physical struggles. In his eyes you could see a desire to get better, but frustration and new pain at remaining so limited.

The long and the short of it is that he was one of those patients you just never forget. When I came back from my two-week trip, he was one of the ones I wrote about in my reflection paper for the very reason that in so many ways I felt helpless with my encouragement and skill as a PT. He, and others during those weeks, reminded me time and again that "For as much as we study and learn and practice, PT is only one piece of who we are, what we have to offer to others. It certainly should not be the driving force behind what we do or how we go about our days. Motivation, strength, courage, and healing come from a much bigger source." For Victor, any improvement, any victory he had in our time together, assuredly did not come from me, but from our much bigger Almighty God.

Getting hugged up by Ms. Johnson again the other day, as if I was an old friend not someone she hadn't seen in two years, brought all of this back to me. It was if God knew I needed the reminder to go back to the beginning, where my Jamaican journey began. I needed to remember that no matter what, He's the reason I'm here for this season. He's got my back. He's got everything in His hands, His timing, His plan, and His will.

Not much has gone as I'd planned in the last four days. Nothing really at all. But I know it went exactly as God had planned, which means everything has gone just right. I couldn't ask for anything better.

While my Jamaican journey continues, it's also beginning anew. I can't wait to see all that God will do in the time ahead!

I pray that you're finding His driving force today in all that you do as well! We head to MoBay tomorrow morning to pick up 12 volunteers for Stroke Camp next week! Woohoo!

All for Him!