Things Happen Here That Even We Can't Believe

We can sometimes be shocked by the things we learn and see in Kenya.  We are so accustomed to the way things are in the U.S. that we forget they are not the same everywhere. One of our girls, Lucy, was feeling badly one day and Ken and I were talking with her.  Ken had noticed that she often looked like she felt poorly and questioned her about her symptoms.  She reported that she often had headaches and the light hurt her eyes.  Upon further questioning, we found that she doesn't see well at all and that her glasses had been broken.  We booked her an appointment with an optometrist.  The day before the appointment, one of the other girls, Malkia, came to Ken and reported that she didn't see out of one eye at all.  He did what testing that could be done outside of an office and determined that she indeed did not see out of her left eye.  We called the orphanage where she grew up and they were unaware of this situation.  So we took her along to the optometrist so that he could examine the interior of her eye.  He found that she had strabismus (cross-eye) ever so slightly in the left eye in that it turned toward her nose.  He said the eye is normal other than this and had this been detected when she was younger, it could have been corrected but at this point, there is nothing that can be done.  We are not sure why, she never reported this.  It is our thought that she just never thought about it because she had never known anything different.  We are so thankful.  Now we know that we have to do everything possible to protect her right eye, so she will wear sunglasses and protective glasses when we can bring some back over.  We are also using this situation to teach the girls to check their children's vision every so often to make sure that we don't repeat such a situation.  Knowledge in such a case is a powerful tool.  Also, the smile on Lucy's face, when she had her glasses and could actually see was a priceless gift.  

Proverbs 3:5-6 "Trust in the Lord with all you heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.