Meet our new friend Cesar...

Meet our new friend Cesar.  He is one of the most joyful, curious, and resilient children we have ever met.  And Cesar needs your prayers….

Kris first met Cesar this past Wednesday.  We were told by our project coordinator that he had met Cesar and his family on Tuesday and that we needed to visit his family and weigh and measure both him and his siblings because it was suspected that he was suffering from severe malnutrition.  When Kris, Ricardo, Beth (an intern with us this month, working toward her Masters in Public Health at ETSU), headed to their house Wednesday morning, they found Cesar just like this- tied up outside of his house with a chain around his neck, no other adult or child present at the house.  After some questioning by Ricardo, we found out that this was normal for Cesar.  His mother was gone with his other brother and sister and since she didn’t want him to run away while she was gone, she chained him up.  He could easily get out of the collar, so they asked him why he didn’t let himself out.  He said that they would hit him if he did.  At this time, we realized that this sweet child was not only suffering from severe malnutrition but also neglect and maltreatment.

I (DeeDee) returned with Beth, Ricardo, and Katy later that evening to find that the rest of the family had returned.  In the one small house lived Cesar’s grandfather, his single mother Carmen with her three children, and Carmen’s sister Teresa, also a single mother with her own two children and one other on the way.  This time, Cesar was hidden back in the kitchen, and against the wishes of his mother and aunt, we requested that he come out to see us.  Although all of Carmen’s kids were poorly dressed, none were in tattered rags like Cesar, and after weighing and measuring all of the kids, we found out that Cesar was the only child in the family in the condition of severe malnourishment.   We found out from Ricardo that he was purposely neglected by the family because they believed he was “special,” related to a belief that when Carmen was pregnant with him, she saw a mentally disturbed homeless man on the streets and this apparently cursed Cesar in the womb.  As far as we could see, Cesar showed no real signs of physical or mental handicaps other than the normal signs of a child who is severely mistreated and malnourished.  He showed a desire to be loved, as he very willingly jumped up into Katy’s lap to be held.  He smiled and laughed and talked to us about things going on around the room.  And he gobbled up a peanut butter bar that is specifically made for malnourished children.  That evening, we left with his family three more peanut butter bars for him for the following day, as well as some mixes for a drink called incaparina that had lots of nutritional value for children, and we told his mother we would return the next afternoon.

After a trip into Coban to pick up a rental truck and buy groceries, we (Kris and I, Beth, and Ricardo) made our way back over to Cesar’s house on Friday afternoon.  We brought some clothes for the kids (from Katy’s kids), more peanut butter bars for Cesar, more incaparina for the family, and de-worming medicine for all of the kids, as well.  The family was having a church meeting at their house, but they graciously invited us in anyway.  Although Cesar came out with black lips and a little less responsive than the day before, reports seemed very positive at first.  Carmen told us that Cesar had eaten all of the peanut bars we had left.  So, we began to feed him another one.  He started as ravenously as the night before, but then slowed down.  After requesting some water for him, they brought some incaparina.  He began to drink this but then quickly vomited it back up along with the peanut butter.  A little later he vomited again.  We then asked if this had happened earlier in the day as well.  Yes, he had first thrown up and had diarrhea that morning, with the same thing following after each peanut butter bar that day.  This was not good- a sign that his body was rejecting the nourishment that was being offered to it, and a telltale warning that he was severely dehydrated.  We began discussion among ourselves about taking him to the hospital.  Ricardo seemed wary of the idea of first, but after we pushed the reality that Cesar’s life could depend on it, he helped us to ask Carmen if she would be willing to come with us to take Cesar to the hospital.  Thanks to God, she agreed to it, as long as she could bring along her youngest who was still breastfeeding.  Before we left, we asked for the church members to pray for Cesar and his health that night, and they insisted in praying over him in that moment.  So, with hands laid upon him and with a heightened sense of community accountability for this family, we all with one voice lifted up Cesar to our Lord.  We then packed into the truck, ran back to our house to quickly pack our overnight bags, and headed on our way to Coban once again. 

Cesar threw up once more on the ride, and slept the rest of the way.  We stopped first at the Health Center in Carcha and got a reference from the doctor there to take with us to the hospital in Coban.  Cesar was so amazed by the lights and sounds of the city- probably his first trip ever to an urban area- and still smiling and inquisitive as ever.  Once at the Coban Regional Hospital, we were immediately admitted to the emergency room around 9pm.  They asked a question or two, weighed Cesar, listened to his breathing (which caused Cesar to giggle) and pointed to space on the other half of a stretcher where a little girl was asleep.  But then we waited… and waited… and waited.  Cesar fell asleep.  Around 11:30, they finally started his paperwork and asked both us and his mother a series of questions.  We found out that his mom could not stay with him because she had the younger child with her.  So, knowing that we all needed some rest, and trusting the nurses when they said that he would be attended to and moved to a regular room shortly, we left around midnight and headed to our hotel.  After about five hours of sleep, we got up the next morning and returned to the hospital.  We found Cesar in the pediatric ward, cleaned up some, hooked up to an IV, with his arms tied to the posts around his bed.   He was fairly unresponsive, but we at least took comfort in the fact that he was in a safe place, he was warm, and he was being cared for.  The nurses told us that we needed to find a responsible caretaker to stay with him.

After this, we headed back into the Valley with a new plan.  We were going to encourage Carmen to leave her youngest with her sister and return to stay with Cesar in the hospital, hoping that she would take this opportunity to make Cesar a priority (perhaps for the first time in her life) and that she would learn from the nurses and mothers around her how to love and care for her son once again.  Again, by God’s graces, she and her sister both agreed to it.   After a very quick rest back at home, we made our third trip to Coban within 36 hours.  Back at the hospital, Cesar was asleep once again, but we were told by the nurses that he had eaten a very good lunch.  They also informed us that they planned to start a full evaluation with both the doctor and a nutritionist starting that evening and continuing into Saturday.  Carmen still barely looked at her son and hadn’t touched him since we first left her house they day before, but we knew that we had to leave and trust him under her care, with the guidance of the nurses and doctors.  We whispered our goodbyes and love to him. 

Today, after a much-needed night’s rest, Cesar is still on our minds and tugging at our hearts.  We are still questioning how a parent can neglect her child to such a degree, and we are still seeking wisdom as to how to best deal with the social situation.  Upon recommendation by Christian, Ricardo is putting in a report to the Guatemalan equivalent to DCS, and after Cesar is released from the hospital, we hope to find a spot for him in a nearby Recuperation Center for Malnourished Children, which apparently includes a teaching and training component for parents. 

I do not find it to be a coincidence at all that on Thursday when everything seemed to start heading south, this was the devotional thought in my Jesus Calling book:

“Let me help you through this day.  The challenges you face are far too great for you to handle alone.  You are keenly aware of your helplessness in the scheme of events you face.  This awareness opens up to a choice: to doggedly go it alone or to walk with Me in humble steps of dependence. … So, consider it all joy whenever you are enveloped in various trials.  These are gifts from Me, reminding you to rely on Me alone.”

And so we do rely on and trust in HIM completely as HE cares for Cesar and guides us to support him and his family in the coming days and weeks.  Please join us in prayer for complete recovery for Cesar- that he would be restored to good health, that he would be loved and cared for, and that he would be allowed to play and develop fully as all of God’s children deserve.