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.
