The Paradox

Some of the best times come with lights out (for those of you who don't know lights out means that the power is out).

Lying as still as you can as to not feel the heat...but still feeling the sweat drip off your body and sink into the 1 inch ash foam mattress beneath you.

But it is these times when the whole family gathers in the living room. Spreading out a sheet on the cool tile they all lie down to sleep...but it is only 7PM

Since it is still early in the night there is laughing that echoes through the house into the back room where Catherine (age 16) and I are...Catherine is on the ground with a straw mat and I am in my bed pressing my body against the window hoping for air.

We can hear Precious (age 9), Priscilla (age 13), Vero (my Ghanaian mom), Prince (my Ghanaian dad) praying and singing praise songs. Although they can't seem to make it through a prayer or song due to the fact that Precious is either imitating an over enthusiastic Ghanaian pastor or attempting to sing the bass line of a song.

Catherine and I are bursting into fits of laughter from our room listening to all the commotion.

But there is something so comforting about this. It reminds me of the days my brothers and I used to yell room to room late at night...mostly when my parents were out of town and we would have Jess Fischer staying with us. Or when we would all cram into my parents bed and no one would get any sleep because of all the giggling and shoving that would take place.

Family, love, and laughter heal pain. I am so thankful for that.

I have been having a lot of encouraging conversations in the past few days. A lot of conversations around allowing the pain I feel to be turned into love. That each time I feel pain, I need to be able to outwardly express it as love.

"I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love." Mother Teresa

This morning I am thankful.

I will be home in 4 days for a week break...my body is aching for that week break. :)


A picture of my sisters last May and their cousin. (Back left is cousin Lorattia, back middle is Priscilla, back right is Catherine, front and center (like her personality) Precious):

Hot Saliva before you vomit

Friday and Saturday brought a bad mood.

Sunday and Monday brought a lack of interest- No desire to be in the house, at the football pitch, at work, or at the orphanage.

But still, I could feel no sadness. I was numb, I had never felt that before, I felt nothing.

Even talking to a friend on the phone yesterday my words were hollow. I spoke about Yaw’s death as if it were a television show-maybe with even less passion than that.

Even today the lack of interest persisted but I forced myself to go to the football pitch.

But it was tonight that the numbness started to fade.

After leaving the football pitch I ran into Laurie (the woman who is adopting from Osu Children’s Home). It was inevitable-she brought up Yaw. After learning that I hadn’t even found out until a week after his death AND from a volunteer who blurted it out like it were the score of a football match she started apologizing. She was torn that she had forgotten to call me and that’s when she started telling me the story:

She said that he had fallen out of his wheelchair a few days earlier; that he had cut his mouth open when he hit the pavement-

They took him to the doctor for his cut but he was in too much pain to eat-he was starving-

Two days after his fall she could see his soul leaving him-he was hollow- “he just looked so tired and needed to let go”

Thursday night he died in his sleep-

As they took his body away, Laurie gathered the boys for a prayer-they clapped for Yaw and released him to God.

This is when the numbness started to go. She stood up from her chair and embraced me. I felt my body convulse as she squeezed me as if she were the only thing keeping me together. She told me to let it out but I couldn’t. I clenched my teeth, swallowed the lump in my throat, and squeezed my eyes shut so that the tears wouldn’t come.

It is like right before you vomit when the hot saliva comes. Once you taste that hot saliva you know that it is only a matter of time before you vomit. How many times can you swallow that hot saliva before you throw up?

But I need to keep swallowing until I get home on Tuesday.

I can feel it rising within me; not just the pain from Yaw’s death but the feelings I have been swallowing about the kids at the home and my crumbling relationships with them. Flashes of when Victor died come to my mind and I am reminded of the paralyzing sadness that controlled me for months. I feel the anger, and sadness, and pain, and jealousy of other volunteers that have replaced me begin to rise up in my throat like bile.

Yesterday I didn’t think I would ever feel it; that I had just become used to death; but tonight as I prepare to go to sleep I will continue to swallow this hot saliva praying that I can make it a week before I vomit.

Easy Silence

I might as well just say it:

Last Friday Yaw from Osu Children's Home died. I just found out last night. No one knows what he died of, probably neglect.

I am numb, probably because my body knows that if it lets me feel I won't be able to handle the pain that comes with letting it in. It will consume me.

So I will put one foot in front of the other and keep walking.

Yaw two years ago when I first met him:







Yaw last year:



Yaw this year:






"Have heart my dear
We're bound to be afraid
Even if it's just for a few days
Making up for all this mess"

With me today, tomorrow I'll be stronger

Today is one of those days that I just can't stop smiling...

I am not sure why exactly, maybe because it is baseball season back home, maybe its cause I am listening to good music while plugging away at work, maybe its cause I am coming home for a week in 2 weeks, or maybe there is no particular reason behind it...

I am so lucky that my love for Ghana has not faded over time...in fact; it has done nothing but grow.

I have watched people struggle and fight for that love that they once had as they watch it slip through their fingers, I only hope that my fire that continues to grow can re-ignite the fires inside some of those people who are losing hope.

Ghana makes me a better person. I become more laid back and extraordinarily positive, and for any of you who know me...this is a pretty miraculous thing.

It doesn't take away my intensity and passion but it takes the edge off of that intensity...the part of my intensity that is my greatest weakness is reduced...it is just the positive side of my drive that shines through.

It is strange to me that I am a positive person here...at home I can get sucked into such a negative place and complain about everything but here I seem to rise above it all and give encouragement to those who are normally positive but can't seem to find their strength.

This is my favorite tree and bench in all of Ghana, it is perfect: