I’m going to plunge right in here and show you all something that I think is truly, deeply, phenomenally wonderful. I’m about to post some pictures that I hope will make everyone who has been reading my blog all along grin from ear to ear and maybe (if you’re like me) tear up a little bit.
It all started last January or so when Lena was brought to see what she could do for an elderly Tibetan lady crippled by severe Rheumatoid Arthritis. Sonam Yutron’s illness was bad enough and had progressed far enough, that she was bedridden and hadn’t been able to leave her dark, dank little room in years.
She hadn’t seen sunlight for four years. Imagine how depressing that would be! So I asked, appealing to friends, to people on mailing lists I belong to and on this blog, for donations to help buy Sonam a wheelchair. We thought that, if she could get out of her bed, even just a little, get out among people again, that it would improve the quality of her life. And they - YOU - responded. People sent $5 and $20 and $50, whatever they could afford. Mostly, that first couple of days, I watched 5 and 10 and 20 dollars turn into the couple hundred that we needed for the wheelchair. Then we hit our goal and I said, okay, you can stop now. But my friends, who knew what we are trying to do here, said, no, keep the money, keep going - this is just the start of something. There are so many many more…
That was the start of the Tso Pema Medical and Emergency Fund. In the past two years we’ve helped literally hundreds of people in our area with health or survival emergencies. I’ve got lots more stories to tell. The biggest thing is that, together, we’ve made a difference in people’s lives. Sonam Yutron got her wheelchair and got out into the daylight.
There are other people walking around alive today because of this phenomenon. There are kids who can hear and read and run because they got medicine or treatment or a pair of glasses that they desperately needed. $5 buys a lot of antibiotics around here.
Today though, was special. Today we have a new picture to show you:
This is Sonam Yutron, 2 years later. Yeah. Walking. Only a few feet and only with assistance, but she’s been able to get out of bed and walk a few steps, to the bathroom, to a chair, to the amazing world outside her front door. Once she got the wheelchair, she got something else. Hope. Optimism. And medical treatment. Lena has been working with her all this time, finding a medication and physical therapy protocol that works for her. Enough that, this summer, she was able to take those few, precious steps for the first time in nearly six years.
There was still an obstacle to be overcome for, at the same time as she began to move more, the cataracts that plague a lot of elderly Tibetans grew bad enough to blind her. Shortly after she was able to walk, she stopped being able to see where she was going. What to do?
That picture above, the one of her coming out her front door, shows her heading for the car to take her to Vinayak Eye Hospital in Ner Chowk, a town about an hour away from Rewalsar. She can walk that far again because, two weeks ago, Lena took her to Dr. Vinayak and he did the first (very successful) cataract operation on Sonam and she now has full vision in her left eye.
Today he performed a second, identical surgery on her right eye.
By this time tomorrow, she’ll be able to see out of both eyes again. That’s a wonderful thing. There was a great moment this past week when Nyondo stopped in to visit Sonam and her husband Lobsang. Lobsang put the kettle on for tea and then someone came to the door so he stepped out. While he was out, Sonam glanced over at the stove from where she sat in her bed. The flame under the kettle was too high so she asked Nyondo to turn it down. Not until Nyondo had done so did it occur to both of them: She could SEE the kettle - on the other side of the room!
You guys rock!
Oh and Dr. Vinayak rocks too. He’s one of the really good guys and on the same page with us - he did both surgeries at cost. He has been doing terrific work because he loves it and because he can and much of it is charity work now as he’s getting closer to retirement. We’ve got some plans together and I’ll write more as they unfold.
