Climbing Mount Kenya

My friend Sarah & I climbed Mount Kenya last week - the second tallest mountain in Africa (17,000feet) - supposedly harder to climb (steeper) but more scenic than Mt. Kilimanjaro. I may have to personally compare the two some day!

DAY 1: Begin at 8530feet. Check out the model of the mountain and the route we will take (up Sirimon and down Chogoria).

Quick stop at the Equator on the way

Thankfully these guys carried our big packs and all our food for us!

We hiked 9km the first day - initially it was rainy and muddy but it cleared up by the end of the day. The mud slowed us down, though, so we barely glimpsed our first sight of the mountain at the end of the day and finished hiking in the dark (full moon, though) up to 10827ft. We stayed in a shelter (Old Moses Hut) the first night with a group of young hikers from Denmark.

DAY 2: Hike 14.6km up to 13,780feet

See the Mt Kenya peak behind us as we begin hiking the 2nd day

The mountain gets closer as we continue hiking

Lots of interesting vegetation on the way

Lunch break - getting colder

Rock hyrax - a relative to the elephant - evidently the skulls of the two animals look quite similar though significantly different in size

We slept in a shelter - Shipton's Hut - the 2nd night with a good view of our final ascent path

DAY 3: Begin hiking at 3am in order to reach the summit by sunrise. We hiked for three hours up 3000 more feet altitude (in just 3 km) in the dark over this scree stuff - essentially loose gravel that is very difficult to keep your footing on. We slipped and slid up (and then down) the scree but thankfully made it to the top with no serious injuries.

3am & ready to go (we think!) - Sarah and I with our guide Caeser

Full moon

Sunrise - note the clouds below us

The Pt. Lenana summit - 16,400feet. I doubted whether I would make it to the top all the way up to 10 minutes before finally reaching it - I had to stop and catch my breath every few feet with the altitude and my leg muscles were so tired! Clonus definitely made an appearance (my right leg shaking leftover from my paralysis at age 10 with transverse myelitis). I thank God for teaching me about how He strengthens me in my weakness one step at a time. I also thank Him for healing me from transverse myelitis so that this adventure was possible.

Who knew I'd be walking in so much snow in Africa?!

Sarah & I on the way down the other side (Chogoria route) with the peak behind us

Mountain lake or "tarn" formed by a melted glacier

Steep descent!

We continued hiking after a break for breakfast at 14,108ft. The view of the valley as we continued our descent was incredible!

Nithi Falls

Gorges Valley

We finished hiking day 3 at 4:45pm after hiking 21km, covering 11,000feet altitude (3000 up, 8000 down). What a long but spectacular day!

DAY 4: Altitude 9843feet. Short hike today (we did most of today's hike yesterday) - day of rest!

Our campsite

We saw monkeys, buffalo, water bucks, and lots of rabbits this day as we explored the bamboo rain forest

DAY 5: 10 km hike back down to 8530feet. Another muddy day but fun to walk through the rain forest.

This vehicle - 1978 Land Rover (older than me!) - brought us the final ~20km back to civilization. The vehicle may be old but the driver was excellent at finding the best track as we slipped and slid in the deep mud. I'm thankful for Dramamine!

We finished Sarah's African adventure with a short safari - here are the "cousins" to the rock hyrax

Glad to be back in familiar territory but thankful for such a fun, challenging, beautiful experience

Ethopia Update

Ishi! Ethiopia's amazing! I'm so grateful for this opportunity to travel further in East Africa. I've safely arrived back in Nairobi and will post pictures soon but I wanted to give you a brief update and thank you for your prayers. My favorite parts of the trip:
1) Meeting the Ethiopian people, especially the children, and experiencing their beautiful smiles.
2) Remembering joy in my work as I interacted with patients directly (with a translator), heard their stories, and sought to encourage them.
3) Visiting patients in their homes and seeing how their lives have been changed by the gospel and by the project
4) Sharing perspectives on cross cultural life and ministry with the Treadwells, my friends from Birmingham who are missionaries in Addis with the AIDS project
5) Reconnecting with Red Mountain Church
6) Experiencing a new place in the world with a unique language, culture, scenery, and people

Now I'm off to climb Mt Kenya with my friend Sarah. I'll post pictures after I descend from 17,000 feet!

Selam hunu! (Amharic for "Goodbye in peace")

Ethiopia, etc

From Friday, November 12 through Saturday, November 20, I will be visiting Kenya’s neighboring country Ethiopia. I look forward to joining six other health care professionals from my church in Birmingham,AL (Red Mountain Church) as we set up clinics in the slums of Addis Ababa. I’m excited to reconnect with people from my home church and also with my friends who are missionaries in Addis and have invited us to come. Read about their work caring for and supporting AIDS patients economically, medically, emotionally, and spiritually on their website: www.mtwact.org. I greatly appreciate your prayers for this experience.

Please pray for:

1) Travel safety and good health for the team

2) Team unity

3) Medical wisdom

4) Encouragement for the missionaries in Ethiopia

5) Good reconnection for me with my church

6) God to be glorified in our words, thoughts, & actions (Ps 145:9-12)

“And find joy also in this – that your sufferings, your losses, & persecutions shall make you a platform from which with more vigor and with greater power you will witness for Christ Jesus. Study your great example and be filled with His Spirit. Remember that you need much teaching, much upholding, much grace, and much humility if your witnessing is to be to your Master’s glory.” Charles Spurgeon

I already know and love one Ethiopian! This is me and Abi Fader (adopted from Ethiopia) on the way back from Mombasa.

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I also wanted to update you on a couple patients. Remember this child? I blogged about her here. After the picture on the left was taken, she became sicker again and remained in the ICU critically ill and febrile for a couple days. We treated her for sepsis and systemic juvenile rheumatoid arthritis and she miraculously improved. The below pictures were taken on the day she went home. Praise God for her healing!

Elijah Terrer (intern), myself, the patient and her mother

This teenage girl is also making a wonderful recovery. She was struck by lightning near her home and suffers from significant burns as a result. She has received multiple skin grafts by the surgery team and this picture was taken on one of the first days she was able to sit in a wheelchair outside (rather than lying in bed). Now she is improving daily as she works with physical therapy to walk again.

Nairobi 10K run

In honor of my one year anniversary of arriving in Kenya, I decided to run a 10K with some friends. The proceeds from the Nairobi Marathon (including the half marathon and 10K) support pediatric eye surgery at 5 centers in the country, one of which is Tenwek. As you can see from the group picture, a lot of Tenwek staff (Kenyan and expat) wanted to support this cause - we filled the bus and an 11 passenger van!

Ready to run, bright and early. Amazingly, the van was still there and in one piece when we returned!

At the starting line

There were approximately 15,000 runners - we ran right through the city center of Nairobi - not a good day to try to drive through Nairobi traffic!

An elephant and a camel??? After all, we are in Africa! (By the way, the camel's real!)

Me crossing the finish line (photo courtesy of Bryan Popp)
At the finish: Bryan and Toanh Popp, John and Jess Cropsey, Meridith and Jason Axt, Jason and Heather Fader, Todd Anderson

We five girls ran together for all 10 kilometers and finished strong!

Group picture at Rift Valley Academy on the way back to Tenwek

View of Mt Longonot and the Great Rift Valley on the way home

What a fun weekend!

Current patients

Meet some of the children I've been working with this week on the pediatric service:

This little Masai boy is improving from tuberculosis

I'm so glad to see this 6 year old boy with a smile on his face. He spent many days in the ICU being treated for an enterocutaneous fistula - a complication from a surgery he had for bowel obstruction from worms. He cried whenever I came near the first few days but two of the little missionary kids brought him some crayons and coloring pages and he began to feel better. Now he's fully recovered and ready to go home.

This boy also spent several days in the ICU suffering from very low blood sugar because of malaria. He also received treatment for pneumonia. He's still weak but is much improved.

I was pretty worried about this 8 year old girl yesterday. She was admitted earlier in the week with measles but worsened significantly Friday and was transferred to the ICU yesterday because of septic shock. After antibiotics and lots of fluids (you can see how puffy her face is from the fluids), her blood pressure is back to normal, her kidneys are working better, and she no longer has a fever or joint pains. We praise the Lord for bringing healing to her as most children with septic shock here do not survive.

This adorable little girl was admitted with a severe asthma exacerbation but now no longer needs oxygen and is ready to go home.

The fact that this child is crying in this picture is actually a miracle. He's 14 months old but only weighs 5 kg (11 lbs). He was admitted with severe pneumonia, but because of his severe malnutrition he was too weak to even open his eyes or lift up his hand. He certainly didn't cry when stuck for an IV or placed on an oxygen mask in the ICU. I really didn't think this child would survive and was surprised to find him alert and recovering when I came back to work after being off a few days. Now he's slowly beginning to gain weight and hopefully will continue to do so.

This 2year old is going home today after being treated for pneumonia - she's still quite wary of doctors as you can see!

A visiting neonatologist brought us an infant ventilator a couple months ago but we hadn't put it to use until this week. This baby was born prematurely due to maternal HELLP syndrome and didn't breathe for several hours after birth due to the medications the mother had received. She stayed on the infant ventilator for about 30 hours and then recovered enough to breathe on her own. She still has significant growing to do but she's alive and her lungs are improving from her prematurity. The mother is also out of the ICU and doing well - 2 lives saved! We treat; Jesus heals!

This precious baby girl was born to a mother with BOH, as we say here (bad obstetric history). She had lost 3 previous infants and had no living child. I loved listening to her sing to her daughter as she fed her this morning. The baby is doing well and will be going home soon.This is my favorite view from the hospital - especially beautiful this morning on call.
"The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." Lamentations 3:22-23

Mashujaa Day

We had fun celebrating a Kenyan holiday yesterday - especially since I got a day off work in the middle of the week! Read more on the McCropder's blog.

Canadian Thanksgiving

One of the fun things about being here is not only getting to know Kenyans, but getting to know people from all over the world and learning about their cultures and customs. We have physicians working here from Ethiopia, Nigeria, and Cameroon. Visiting doctors and medical students have been from Great Britain, Germany, Poland, and many of the 50 states. One of the long term missionaries here is Japanese. I have also enjoyed meeting other missionaries from several different African countries in the last year. And my new roommate, a respiratory therapist here for 6 months, is Canadian. So this week, I learned about Canadian Thanksgiving as Annette planned a celebration and kindly included me in the festivities. We were joined by Nathan, a Canadian physician assistant student, and the Fader family as Heather was born in Canada. It was a good time to remember what we're thankful for and to fellowship over a delicious meal together. We'll teach Annette about American Thanksgiving next month!

Mombasa PRP retreat

Prior to leaving for the beach, all the Kenyan post residents enjoyed a pizza party in Nairobi - the first time we've all gathered together from 3 different mission hospitals in Kenya. We certainly all share a special bond through common experiences as young physicians in a new land and culture seeking to share the gospel through medicine but facing similar frustrations and obstacles along the way. Pictured here are the Friess family (OB/Dental at Kijabe), me (IM/PD), the Fader family (surgery at Tenwek), the Cropsey family (ophthalmology at Tenwek), Christina Francis (OB at Kapsowar), the McLaughlin family (family practice/OB at Tenwek), the Shirley family (infectious diseases at Kijabe), and the Jones family (family practice at Kapsowar). Total: 14 adults and 13.5 kids! What fun!

Four families and two singles were able to get time away to join together for retreat on Kenya's coast. What an amazing time of renewal, refreshment, and re-focusing for us all! The week certainly exceeded all my expectations and provided great fun, fellowship, and spiritual growth.

The morning and evening retreat sessions focused on leaving behind, living in waiting, and ordering to hope by studying the life of Abraham. Abraham certainly has a lot in common with us: "Now the Lord said to Abram, 'Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.'" (Genesis 12:1) We each have left our country and familiar culture and families and friends; we each are waiting and hoping for our eternal home (Heb 11:10-16); and we each are praying for God's direction regarding where He is leading us after these two years. It was such a blessing to share struggles and triumphs with others who understand and to pray and worship together.

The children also enjoyed fun time together with babysitters during the retreat sessions. We even sang "Father Abraham" - one of my favorite songs from children's church as a kid - in honor of what the adults were learning.

Fun together included games, swimming in the pool, jumping waves in the ocean, eating ice cream, running on the beach, and looking at the coral reef sealife through a glass bottom boat. Abi and I are drinking fresh coconut water in this picture (she liked it more than I did)!

Swimming lessons - Anna & Hudson - both kids made significant improvements through the week and I enjoyed remembering my swimming instructor days from summers in college.

Mombasa PRP retreat group: Jones family, Fader family, Cropsey family, Christina Francis, McLaughlin family, me, James Paternoster (speaker/pastor), Edna

Abi & Maggie

Jessica & I snorkeling - so much fun! Amazingly beautiful coral reefs and colorful fish.

Pizza and ice cream - yum!

Sunrise over the Indian Ocean

Wrist update

Great news! My repeat x ray today showed no fracture! So this MacGyver type splint and thumb immobilizer is no longer a necessary attachment! Though my left hand stepped up to the plate, I'm grateful to have the use of my right hand again - even typing this is so much easier. I did learn through this ordeal that I'm that obnoxious health care provider as a patient who reads too much. I'm a bit embarrassed to admit I spent a couple hours reading about wrist injuries in the hand surgery and fractures orthopedic textbooks in the medical library. While I learned a lot about scaphoid lunate dissociation, SLAC wrist, and the surgical management of scaphoid fractures, it was probably not the most productive use of my time. :) And I'm sure my orthopedic doctor is grateful this is behind us, too! The best news is he's cleared me to swim at the beach this week!