Two Americans run the Bresma Orphanage in Haiti, which is now in ruins. They are charged with 120 children, and a number of them have adoptions pending. They state in the article above:
In a text to her husband Doug, Jamie McMutrie Heckman, 30, said she and her sister, Alison, 21, were living in the orphanage’s yard with the children without food or water.
“We truly can’t keep babies alive … water contaminated. This is our only hope,” she texted, using a stranger’s Blackberry. “I want to make sure everyone understands we can’t stay in Haiti and the kids will not live if they stay. Riots will start within two days.”
My own children’s faces are all I see.
I was up most of the night thinking.
Praying.
Lucy woke up at one point.
Hysterical.
She was hungry.
It had been a handful of hours since her last feeding.
I lay there for a few minutes…tears…how much harder would her crying be if it had been a handful of DAYS since her last feeding?
We are actually in the middle of doing “Cry It Out”…but last night I couldn’t bear it.
I knew she would quiet in just a few minutes, but my thoughts were in Haiti…
…with babies who cried…
…hungry…
…thirsty…
…injured…
…without even a mommy to wipe their tears and cuddle them.
I know I probably went backwards with the girls by going to them last night.
But I ached to rub their little heads and kiss their soft cheeks.
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The urge to go and hold those orphans and bring some home is strong. And there's just something about being a nursing mom that makes bad news unbearable. Oh yeah, I have been there.
=( i know. when i found out that i that my milk had mostly dried up and my weeks old baby girl was losing weight instead of gaining, I connected to the mommies in poor countries in a way I never had. i now understood what it felt like to hold my baby and be incapable of giving her what she needed. Of course I was able to go to the store and by formula then see a nursing consultant and get my milk back. But they can't. There is no money for formula, no money for food to make milk, no nursing consultant. just a suffering baby. We have never come close to knowing the hopelessness that they know.
Thank you for sharing this. I will hold my kids tighter tonight. i will be more thankful for the bread and milk in my fridge than ever before. =(
So what are they going to do?! Will the U.S. allow all those kids to come here? Who is in charge of that decision? How could they say no? I want to go. I want to hop on a plane tomorrow with a suitcase of formula and another full of bottles….
i lack words. it is so tragic for lack of a better word.