Back On The Field

In December I was able to settle into my new home in Mexico, start Spanish classes, and meet many of the workers at Hospital Misión Tarahumara. I was even able to observe my first birth there and go on an ambulance transfer of a laboring mama to the city hospital!! One of the other missionaries and I helped a little Tarahumara girl create a nativity craft as she waited days for her surgery with her broken leg in traction, and we read her the Christmas story. Plus I was able to help the hospital acquire some new OB meds and devices that could be lifesaving in future births!

Then I had a quick detour home for the holidays since no one was staying at the hospital compound. As some of you know, that trip was elongated two weeks due to Covid in my family. With it likely being omicron, we wanted to be extra careful that I wouldn’t be bringing such a contagious and deadly disease back to many vulnerable and largely unvaccinated people! So I got some unexpected time in quarantine and with family, which is always a blessing. Plus I knocked out the rest of my continuing education for this cycle of my midwifery licensure!

Over the next couple months I will be learning how the hospital routinely cares for pregnant women, building trust and rapport with hospital staff, and starting to implement changes to (Lord-willing!) improve care and outcomes for these Tarahumara women, all while taking Spanish classes and hopefully having plenty of social opportunities to practice my Spanish! Learning a language through masks in the hospital is nearly impossible! (even if I already have a good base) So I appreciate all your prayers! Please also pray that as I start working and introducing new ways to care for women, that the staff is eager and willing to adapt.

There are lots of exciting things happening at the hospital in the near future. Currently we have an anesthesiologist visiting for two weeks to enable the team to do surgeries more than their scheduled one weekend per month. That is a blessing for the staff and patients alike. We also are having an inspection done to hopefully install solar panels for the hospital. The water systems are being repaired and upgraded. And to top it all off, the hospital has been making plans to build an addition onto the laboratory! Please pray that all the logistics go smoothly and that through these services we are able to serve the Tarahumara people better and facilitate an environment where they can encounter the living God. That is why we are here.

I hope you are all enjoying the new year and considering what 2022 means for you. At the end of 2021 I heard a pastor speak about how we often think about the heroic figures of the Old Testament and want to know what it was like to be them, but they could ask us a similar question, “What is it like to have the Holy Spirit inside of you?!!” So now I ask you, what are YOU going to do with that knowledge and power in 2022?

Sending love and sunshine from Mexico!

Caitlin

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