Waging War

Now I am a big believer in the old saying, "don't let the truth get in the way of a good story", but folks, I ain't lying here. I went to buy my friend a birthday card, an/;d for every birthday card, there were 100 "with deepest sympathies". Now as I have said before, I am a self-proclaimed birthday grinch, but I just did not feel the "with deepest sympathies" was totally appropriate, even though that is exactly how I feel with each uptick of that damn number.

I cannot even begin to tell you how much time Malawians spend going to funerals, visiting someone in the hospital or visiting someone suffering from malaria. It is pretty shocking. I have not gone through one week without hearing about a funeral or someone I know down with malaria.

I spend at least one day a week taking one of our kids to the clinic to get tested for malaria (we are at 100% at this point) or visiting someone suffering from malaria. I have been here long enough to see some kids on their second bout of it since I arrived. I mistaking started to think of it as if it were something like the flu as everyone I know has had it since I have been here. I had a huge reality check when we visited one of our boys in the thick of it. It was awful! I was convinced he was dying and of course mike was saying he's "just ok". I was wondering if we were looking at the same thing. He could barely breath or recognize who I was. To add to the disturbing scene, there was no adult there to take care of him in this small, dark and dusty room without any ventilation. I left very concerned, disturbed and more religious about taking my malaria prophylaxsis. I am now deathly scared of malaria, and I would say rightfully so. You should see how neurotic I have gotten when I see a mosquito. All I see is death flying around and I cannot relax until I get him first.

Pictured is how you need to sleep if you want to stay alive. If only I had video of me waking up at 3am with one in my net. It gets crazy. I would definitely again, be an Americans Funniest Videos winner no doubt.