Growing up I was blessed to go on a couple medical mission trips with my family. My dad worked as an orthopedic surgeon at the hospitals while the rest of the family helped out with random tasks around the hospital. The first trip we took was to Haiti. There were so many things about that trip that really stuck out to me because it was the first time in my life that I was surrounded by extreme poverty. There are some vivid memories I still have from the hospital experience including counting pills and putting them into bottles for patients (why they trusted my brothers and I who were all younger than age 11 to do that I don't know...) and organizing medical charts (again- not a task they should have trusted us little kids with). I remember teaching some young female patients how to make bracelets which was hard to do because they spoke haitian creole and I obviously didn't but it was a great learning experience for me and I think the patients were very happy to have an activity to keep them busy in the hospital. I also remember handing a young girl a gift of her very own pink mirror and seeing a huge smile spread across her face. We had asked our friends, family, and church to donate items that we could take to Haiti with us. The mosts distinguished memory I have from the experience is holding a 4-month old baby that weighed only 5 pounds and was very ill. The baby was found on the road abandoned and severely malnourished and was then brought to the hospital. There weren't enough nurses to hold the baby throughout the day so I was able to spend several hours a day holding her during the two weeks that we were there. At the young age of 11 it broke my heart to leave her because I was unsure of what her future would hold. I wanted to bring her back to the States with me so badly. The wonderful end of that story is that we were able to keep in touch with the hosital in Haiti and they told us a year later that the baby was adopted by a family in Canada ; )
On our St. Lucia medical mission trip I got to do a little bit more work. We went when I was 16 and that was when my interest in physical therapy was starting to begin so I actually got to hangout with some of the physiotherapists and I also got to watch a "surgery". The surgery was the grossest one I've seen up to this date (I've seen around 10 between PT school and watching my dad) because the knee was infected and was the size of a watermelon so my dad cut an incision and the pus squirted out for over five minutes while my brother standing next to me almost passed out at the sight.
These experiences overseas have shaped me in so many ways. I have thought of them very frequently over the past eight years. I unfortunately have been doing a lot of school the last few years so I haven't been able to participate in more of these medical mission trips that my family has taken to Bolivia, Ecuador and Honduras but I've always been brainstorming when I can go again.
I thankfully have been able to be apart of other short term mission trips which have been very positive experiences (high school and college winter/spring break and summer service trips) but everytime it's made me want to use a "skill" other than building houses and running VBS programs. Those things are both great and necessary but I always knew I wanted to use medical skills abroad to help others.
Throughout PT school there were numerous times that I wanted to drop out because I just wanted to go overseas and help people. It was a consistent statement I would make on a long night of studying, "Krissy, I don't want to do school anymore. I'm going to Uganda to work at an orphanage." Thankfully, her along with my other friends and family encouraged me to keep trucking along and now I get to go on a medical mission trip where I get to use my skills and knowledge to help others. I cannot even begin to state my excitement for this experience! Stay tuned because there are several blogs to come on what my role in Kenya will look like.
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
Thursday, January 2, 2014
More love, less fear
I had an awesome 2013. If you know me well then you know that I love to reflect. Usually at the end of a semester I'll sit down and journal about things that I learned and ways that I grew. As I reflect on my past year, and especially the last 7 months of clinicals, there are an incredible amount of lessons learned and ways that I have changed. As I looked back on all the memories over the past year I found one common theme. All of my best memories involved loving people. The cool thing is that there wasn't just one person or one group of people that all these memories were with, it was with numerous people, in many different places throughout the country/world. There was a spring break trip to Mexico with three bestfriends, my family coming to Chicago to celebrate my birthday, going on hikes with new friends in North Carolina, having wonderful heart-to-heart chats with patients in the clinic/hospital... I could go on and on and list off memory after memory from this past year because I have so many wonderful memories with so many amazing people.
When I reflect back on the past I always like to make goals for the future. I don't sit down and write out New Years Resolutions but I do like to think about ways to grow and things to work on. When I think ahead to this future year there isn't much that is known. All I know is that I'm taking my licensure exam and then I'm going to Kenya. Where my new home is and where my future memories will be created I don't know but I do know that I want all my new memories to include loving people. What will be remembered will be how I loved and nothing beyond that really matters. When I look back on 2013 I remember most the people that I spent time with and they way that I loved. I know a year from now as I look back on 2014 it will be the exact same way.
Therefore, my goal for this next year is to love more and love deeper.
As I reflect back on the past year I see another blatantly apparent area that I want to grow in. There was a recurrent pattern of me being really anxious about something and then God continually reminding me that everything was going to be okay. This happened during my last spring semester as I was anxious about school work and then it happened when I arrived at each new clinical location. I was always fearful of both starting a new clinical internship and also of building new friendships at each one. In North Carolina anxiety and fear overtook me because I didn't know why God had "put me out there" but after I gave my fear to the Lord two weeks into the clinical I ended up falling in love with the state and thoroughly enjoying my time there. In Colorado the fear overcame me because I was so anxious about finding a job out there in a "very condensed PT market" but after trusting that the Lord had a perfect job for me I was able to thrive in my clinical and enjoy the relationships I was able to build. There was no need for me to fear or be anxious during any of those times. Of course it's easier to say that looking back when you see that everything ended up okay but I want to be able to look ahead into the future and trust that everything is going to be okay. Because it is. God is in control and there is no room for fear if I trust that.
Therefore, my goal for this next year is to fear less.
As I was journaling about these goals the verse 1 John 4:18 was put on my heart: "There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear". I am thankful that our God perfectly loves us and he shuts the door on fear in our life. There is no need for it.
I also like the Message edition of this verse "God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we’re free of worry on Judgment Day—our standing in the world is identical with Christ’s. There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love."
Therefore, my goal for this next year is to love more and love deeper.
As I reflect back on the past year I see another blatantly apparent area that I want to grow in. There was a recurrent pattern of me being really anxious about something and then God continually reminding me that everything was going to be okay. This happened during my last spring semester as I was anxious about school work and then it happened when I arrived at each new clinical location. I was always fearful of both starting a new clinical internship and also of building new friendships at each one. In North Carolina anxiety and fear overtook me because I didn't know why God had "put me out there" but after I gave my fear to the Lord two weeks into the clinical I ended up falling in love with the state and thoroughly enjoying my time there. In Colorado the fear overcame me because I was so anxious about finding a job out there in a "very condensed PT market" but after trusting that the Lord had a perfect job for me I was able to thrive in my clinical and enjoy the relationships I was able to build. There was no need for me to fear or be anxious during any of those times. Of course it's easier to say that looking back when you see that everything ended up okay but I want to be able to look ahead into the future and trust that everything is going to be okay. Because it is. God is in control and there is no room for fear if I trust that.
Therefore, my goal for this next year is to fear less.
As I was journaling about these goals the verse 1 John 4:18 was put on my heart: "There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear". I am thankful that our God perfectly loves us and he shuts the door on fear in our life. There is no need for it.
I also like the Message edition of this verse "God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we’re free of worry on Judgment Day—our standing in the world is identical with Christ’s. There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love."
I know you don't always think about love and fear being connected but they are. If you have more of one then you'll automatically have less of another. Therefore, my theme for 2014 is to LOVE MORE, FEAR LESS.
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