A Schizophrenic Week

This is the longest I’ve gone without writing because I just haven’t had the heart for it until today. I’ve gone from feeling elated to blue to back again and, maybe that’s just me but, I’ve got whiplash. The first half of the week was spent working on a Procedure Manual that had nothing to do with HIV and even less to do with why we are here. All three of us were losing our minds. I thought, “Why did I come all this way to do secretarial work I could have sent via email?” It was enervating and demoralizing.
Then, a group of nurses came in from outlying clinics and the powers that be had to do something with them. Tada! I was called upon to give another presentation on ARV’s and adherence. This was great! Community Health Nurses. My bailiwick. What a great 2 hours. We really got into the nitty gritty of interventional strategies for adherence, exploring barriers and overcoming them, when to start therapy, and on and on. They even asked about how to change med administration schedules while maintaining therapeutic blood levels. I was in heaven.
The next day – back to the Procedure Manual. Blecchh.
And now today. Today. My most satisfying day yet. I actually got to go out and do home visits with the student nurses. Three weeks here and I finally got to do what I do. We drove for about 2 hours to Mpaka and Siteki. We went down roads that you could barely call paths. Very heavy brush. Normally, I work in an urban area of Swaziland such as it is. Today, the flora was truly sub-tropical and dense. The homes we visited consisted of cinder block boxes approximately 15’ X 14’ on average. Some smaller. All of the visits were conducted outside, in front of their homes. The families were very welcoming to me. Actually, everyone in Swaziland is welcoming. These may be the nicest people on the planet. I was able to do mentoring that included discussions of HIV, TB, diarrhea and Nutrition (Sorry for the specifics but it is what it is).
An interesting close to the day – On the way home we stopped at a gas station/chicken coop. Here, the clinical instructor got out, bought 2 live chickens, their feet were then bound (which kind of broke my heart), they were placed in individual bags with their heads peering out, and we rode home with them squawking all the way.

For a laugh, I’ve included a photo of me from last weekend dancing with some traditional Swazi dancers. I tried to hide but they pulled me out of the crowd. TWICE. Sheesh! I decided it would be less mortifying to just go with it.