FHI Cost Center/Program Title & CC/P #:	CDP, Playa Ancha          CC/P # 31600-31
VOC Story for:	Poquera
Submitted by:	Rosa Sarzuri
Date written:	January 24, 2003

 

Participant:	Nelvy Rojas Flores
Age:	12
Household:	Father, Mother, two sisters, one brother
Profession:	Student

 

Dear friends,

I am Jose Rojas Carreño and my wife is Rosemary Flores. We have four children: one son and three daughters. My daughter Nelvy is eleven years old. She has a very serious health problem.

Food for the Hungry provides medical check-ups through the development program. It was at one of these that my daughter’s health problems were detected. We also found out that without an operation my daughter only has three or four years to live.

We have also seen a specialist who did some testing. I am sending to you the letter from the doctor along with some photos of my daughter and my family. We are a very poor family. I am a farmer who plants carrots, onions and potatoes. Sometimes the production is good, sometimes it is bad. We do not own any land. The land we use is shared with other community members. My wife is a housewife. Because of our economic situation, we are very worried at seeing our daughter Nelvy so sick. With this in mind we ask you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to help us please, brothers and sisters of FHI. My daughter feels very bad. She is not able to sleep or run and gets tired very easily. Sometimes she faints.

We are very grateful for your help. May God bless you richly.

Jose Rojas Carreño

Rosemary Flores

Nelvy was not growing. She was an eleven-year-old trapped in an eight-year-old’s body. She used to run when she was younger, out along the muddy banks of the river, her bare feet soaking in the soft earth. Now, even walking tired her. She had to stop along the way to rest, even going from the school to her house not more than a half mile away. Sometimes she would faint. At night she would wake up with blood in her mouth. Her mother said through tears that sometimes Nelvy would cry for hours at night because of the pain in her heart.

Nelvy had been to see a specialist. They ran a number of exams on her which could all be summed up in a very basic diagnosis. Nelvy had a hole in her heart. The hole was gradually widening as her body continued to grow and change.

“I have asked God to heal my daughter from this sickness. She has been sick since she was very small. She always says that when she walks she gets very tired. We touch her little heart and it is beating very strong as if it wants to leave her. This makes us very afraid for her…”

The doctors said that Nelvy had anywhere from two to four years to live if she was not able to have an operation. The cost of the operation, however, was $8000. Rosa Sarzuri, an FHI social worker in Nelvy’s community, went in search of help. She found a doctor willing to do the operation at cost. But it would still require $4000. Nelvy’s parents were desperate. Their little girl was slipping away from them and they were helpless to bring her back. They worked as hard as they could, but $4000 was far more than the total income for a year of work. They did not have years to save up. Nelvy continued to worsen. She stopped going to school and stayed indoors much of the time. She would cry when people asked her how she was doing. The nights grew worse.

Seeing his helplessness in the situation, her father sent a letter, the one seen above, in a final plea for his daughter’s life. The response was phenomenal. His letter and photo with Nelvy was posted on the FHUS website and within a short time $4000 was made available.

Nelvy went in for surgery on June 15th. The operation was successful and Nelvy went home after a few days. She spent a month recovering and then began attending school again. She gradually began helping out with the chores again, caring for her baby sister, and taking the cows out to pasture. She began to grow again and walk faster.

Nelvy wrote a letter to the people who had made it possible for her heart to be fixed.

Thank you very much for your help with my health.

I was sick in my heart. It hurt me a lot. When I walked I got tired. I also had blood in my mouth when I slept.

Now I find myself well. I am growing. My heart doesn’t hurt and I sleep well thanks to your prayers and your financial help.

Nelvy’s neighbors are pleased and surprised. They find it hard to believe that people would send money to heal a child they have never met. Nelvy’s parents tell them that it was brothers and sisters who sent the money because God asked them to. Nelvy’s family is one of the four Christian families in Poquera. Most of the community members pay their dues to the gods of earth and rain. They pour out the last sips of their chicha on the ground as an offering. They offer part of the harvest to appease these gods whose tempers are so changeable. At times they rain down favor and other times their maliciousness comes to destroy crops and lives. At all times they must be treated with care.

Nelvy’s family stood out for their new faith. When Nelvy became sick the community members were certain of the origin of her illness.

“You have angered the Panchamama .”

Nelvy’s parents could not explain the illness. So they prayed and God provided. They have no doubt in their mind that Nelvy’s healthy body is a miracle of God. For them she is a gift re-given. For the community, she is proof that there is a God who answers prayer and who cares for His children.

 

Nelvy went into surgery on June 15th, 2002. She spent two days recovering in intensive care and then went home to rest.

Two months after her surgery, Nelvy wrote a letter to the people who had been praying for her and who had made the surgery possible with donations.

Nelvy is now back helping her parents with her younger sister and in the fields where they had a harvest of carrots. She is back in school and back running through the fields.

 

 

Definitions:

Chicha: Home brewed beer made of fermented corn
Panchamama: Mother Earth