We've been very encouraged to see the change in Somtac. He arrived as a very sick and under-nourished man about three weeks ago. His sweet wife came with him too.
It usually takes three days for new patients to settle in to the Healing Home. Pretty well everything is hugely different for them compared to their village life - being in a city, the big house; unfamiliar people; white fellas around and the Christian culture.
Somtac took perhaps two weeks to settle in. He was very sick and in addition deaf as a doorstop. We were pretty concerned as he seemed to waste away before our eyes, not eating and not moving from his bed.
It usually takes three days for new patients to settle in to the Healing Home. Pretty well everything is hugely different for them compared to their village life - being in a city, the big house; unfamiliar people; white fellas around and the Christian culture.
Somtac took perhaps two weeks to settle in. He was very sick and in addition deaf as a doorstop. We were pretty concerned as he seemed to waste away before our eyes, not eating and not moving from his bed.
Somtac - I always wonder at the memories people of his generation carry. We get to ask some of our patients about their life under the Pol Pot regime - but Somtac was just too deaf to communicate such things with.
Then Susie sorted some throat medicine and he bounced back, almost overnight. The next day he shuffled out to devotions. The day after he was kicking a soccer ball with Sak's boys. Plus, he turned out to be a real character, kidding old Yay to do a spot of Khmer dancing. Together with his faithful little wife, he headed to his home a couple of days later.
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