Surgery in Africa!

CAUTION: THE FIRST COUPLE PARAGRAPHS AND PICTURES ARE NOT FOR QUEASY STOMACHS.  IT MAY BE A LITTLE GRAPHIC.
Have you ever had a pimple on your face, that you squeeze and it turns out to be one of those pimples that bursts and puss and a tiny bit of blood flies from your face onto the mirror?  That is how the cyst  behind my ear was while Kristen was draining it today.  It was practically a surgery.  A very painful one at that.

Prepping the surgery. I am scared!

I can check that off my list of things to do in Africa now:  Surgery on my head.  Woot... ;)
For at least a year, I have had some little bumps behind my ear.  I never knew what they were or what to do with them except just live with it.  After arriving in Africa, they started swell and created one large bubble.  It built up a lot of pressure and at the beginning it was really full and wasn't squishy, but for the past couple weeks it has been squishy (because of the less pressure) and it has hurt more.  Even having an earring in my ear would make it sore.

Bump before surgery

So, after talking with my mom and finding out that it was a cyst, I decided to have Kristen (one of the volunteers here who is on her way to becoming a doctor) drain it.
Kristen, while draining the bump, pulled out about 5 or 6 cysts. And LOTS of puss.  Yuck.  She would get a pimple burst of puss, it would bleed for a little bit, and then she would squeeze again and get another pimple burst of puss.

See the hole? That's where all the puss and blood was coming out. Sorry the picture isn't the best)

She said in those bursts she would pull out 1-2 cysts each time.  We dirtied about 5 cotton swabs from blood and puss.

Bloody cotton swab and gloves

She told me after that she hasn't been feeling well this whole week and draining my ear definitely didn't help!  Right after she finished draining my ear, she had to lay down so she wouldn't faint or throw up.

Bandaged up!

Since the surgery, I have been so tired.  It seriously wore me out!
ALRIGHT, DONE WITH THE SURGERY STORY.

I have rested all day and I have been working on Joel's and Sam's presentations for their mothers.  It is going well!  We should be able to present the information of their child's disability hopefully at the beginning of this next week (Monday or Tuesday!) :)
We were able to visit Sam and Joel's mothers and ask them questions that I had found I needed answered before we could finish our presentation.

We don't want to sound like we are doctors and are diagnosing their child.  We are just giving them information on what their child's disability might be and how they can find out for sure what it is. We will tell them what the disability is, and what they can do to help their child.  Hopefully it will encourage them to continue to help their child even while HELP is out of the country.

I really hope that will be the case.  I pray for that to happen.  I hope these children's lives can be changed and improved.

Quote of the Day!
"Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced." - James Baldwin