We are currently caring for 78 women who had fistula repair operations at Strangway Hospital in Bie between August 30 and September 5.
Each woman has a story to tell. Some are stories of love, some are stories of despair, others are stories of rejection. All the stories tell of shame and suffering.
Meet Larissa* (name changed for privacy). Larissa is 26 years old. She has lived with fistula for 11 years, since she was just 15 years old. She has lived 11 years of rejection and mistreatment. After a prolonged labour and the loss of her baby she also had incontinence. The cause was obstetric fistula, but she didn't know that.
Because of her incontinence she was rejected by her mother's family. She was rejected by her father's family. She was rejected by her husband and his family. They said she was "broken" and "worthless", that she was "not even a person anymore".
She went to the pharmacy many times to buy medications so she could overdose and kill herself. She even bought a cord to hang herself with, because she could not imagine continuing to live with the rejection and mistreatment she suffered. "But," she says, "Thanks to God, because He is Good, the same God who brought me to this earth would not let me take my life. Every time I tried to kill myself, someone would find me before I could."
Throughout all these years there is only one person who has stood beside her. It is the same person who helped pay for her transport from the village to Cuito for this operation campaign. It is a young man from her village who has always liked her. Even with her incontinence, he never treated her differently, he never said she smelled bad; if he found her sad and depressed he would try to cheer her up. She says, "he is the only person in my life who has never let me down."
Larissa is one of thousands of women who live for years without hope. We are so grateful she never managed to take her own life, that she has a chance to be healed, and a chance to learn that healed or not, she is WORTHY.
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