| KABUL, Afghanistan, Oct. 20, 2006 — My story is like most people who come to Afghanistan; in some small way, I wanted to make a difference by aiding in the recovery of the Afghan National lives, with an emphasis on women’s health issues and the improvement of the infant mortality rate, which is one of the highest in the world - 147 deaths for every 1,000 live births. As a woman and a mother of twin 3-year old boys, John Thomas and Rodgers Timothy Williams, who are being cared for by my husband, Rodgers Williams who I affectionately call ‘Mr. Rodgers’ from the famous 1970’s children’s television show, I couldn’t begin to imagine what it would be like to lose a child. Any woman, who has ever cared for a precious life, can empathize with the plight of the Afghan woman. The children here are threatened with obstacles that take them all too soon, something I could not fathom before arriving here. As I’ve watched my own two boys grow, in leaps and bounds, over the last 36 months of their lives, I received so much joy from them, and it breaks my heart to know that many of the expectant mothers here in Afghanistan will not get the chance to experience the joy of motherhood, which is why I was so moved to come to Afghanistan and assist with the Kabul, Rabia - E - Balkhi Women’s Hospital project in anyway that I could. Knowing that the work we do here immediately impacts the nationals lives, awakens me every morning feeling blessed. To see the medical staff, with Afghan women back at work, is overwhelming. The prior systematic discrimination against these women by the Taliban halted the education and progression of Afghan women. And for those women who came back to this country to work, they were persecuted and killed.
My witnessing, first hand, how the Afghan people have worked so hard to maintain what little functionality they have in this hospital facility is truly remarkable.
I now have a new found respect for old-fashioned ingenuity. For instance, in the daytime something as simple as keeping the lights off and not powering up the radiology department until absolutely needed protects the 30-year-old electrical boards they have from burning out. |
