When I was in China, I spent a ton of time on the 2nd floor of Maria's Big House of Hope. The special thing about this floor is that it is the home of the cleft lip/palate babies of MBHOH. For those who don't know, cleft lip/palate occurs when the lip and palate doesn't fully close before the baby is born. In America, we usually take care of this right away with surgery. We have special types of bottles also to almost fill the hole while the baby eats. The sweet little orphans in China, don't have these resources. These kids are at high risk of aspiration. They also frequently have ear infections due to the way that the anatomy is. A team has arrived to perform about 12 surgeries to repair the clefts. One of the great things about Maria's is that it has an operating suite on the 5th floor, so the kids will be able to go through pre-op, surgery, and post-op without ever having to leave MBHOH!
Go to blog.showhope.org to read more from one of our trip leaders, Mikey!
The cleft kids at Maria's brought me so much joy. I spent the majority of my time was spent in the middle room, the little mermaid room. Some of my favorite memories like Zachariah falling asleep in my arms, holding shy Ella, and fist bumping with Grace occurred in this room. Despite facial deformities, these kids have the BEST smiles. They laugh so often. You can't be sad when you're with them. We even joked sometimes that they are cuter with their clefts.
Here is one of my sweet cleft babies:
These kids lives are going to be changed by the surgeries. Please pray for the kids and the surgeons. Also, pray for the nurses and nannies that will care for them during recovery.
