This is Danica. I have not seen her since December 2018.
I genuinely miss her little face and sweet smile. The day I took this picture, she came with her mother to our temporary, makeshift shelter on the mountain to see the doctor during the Continuous Care Initiative (CCI) monthly doctor’s visit. She was polite but nervous. I remember keeping her occupied until she saw C2C medical partner Dr. Mirrielle Bien-Aime who was able to give her a check-up, talk to her mother and provide her with the medicine she needed to get better to ensure her cold didn’t turn into something serious, like bronchitis or pneumonia. A small thing for Danica but a heavy burden lifted from a mother who was worried and feeling helpless. Danica began taking her medicine right away and was up and about several days later feeling much better and playing with her friends.
If Dr. Mirrielle had not been there, Danica’s mom would have had to walk, while carrying her, two hours down the mountain to the main hospital and wait for hours with the hope of maybe seeing a doctor to help her little girl. This scenario is what the 1,200+ families in our Mountainside Partner Community experience every day. They want to change their circumstances by building a health and wellness center in their community to house the Continuous Care Initiative (CCI) so that they can receive basic healthcare and ensure that treatable colds never turn into something worse because they have access to a health and wellness center in their own mountainside community.
As the situation in Haïti remains unstable and volatile, Community2Community remains stable and focused. Yes, some non-profits are closing up shop, giving up and leaving. For the people we serve it’s called “lage” to drop or let go. We have a word in the US for that too: abandon. That we will not do. We do not run away from challenges, we run towards them.
We will not abandon Danica, our Mountainside Partner Community or the Peasant Association in their most challenging time of need. We will not abandon them and we ask you to do the same. If you’re reading this and wondering when is the right time to join us, pray for us, donate to us, lean in with us…Now is the time. Today is the day.
Raising the funds at the Jean-Gérard Eusebe Golf Classic for the health and wellness center will ensure that Danica, her mom and other mountainside families get the basic health care they deserve with dignity. It will ensure that more women live through childbirth and more children live to be adults. Lean in because you can make a difference. We are looking for people with generous hearts to invest their resources so they can make meaningful impact with vulnerable communities in rural Haïti. Lean in.
Will you partner with me to build this health and wellness center?
On behalf of Danica, Thank you.
