Francisca's Story

We visited Joytown today and I have so many photographs of the children and facilities to share with all of you. We arrived and immediately met Francisa pictured to the left. She is a mentor and advocate working at Joytown for students with spina bifida. We sat down together and she told me her story of how she arrived at Joytown which I am going to share with you now. It's a story of significant challenges physically, but more importantly, socially, but one with a happy ending. I promise!

Francisca was born with spina bifida. In Kenyan society, a child with a physical disability is seen as a curse on the family so Francisca's arrival was not welcome by anyone in her family except her mother. Her mother found out that her mother (Francisca's grandmother) was planning on killing her in order to rid the family of the curse. There as a plan in place to do so at a time when her mother was distracted and this involved carrying the infant Francisca down to the river. When her mother caught wind of this, she fled the family and the tribe in order to protect her daughter. She knew her daughter's life would be difficult but as a mother, she wanted to do everything she could to protect her.

Though she was a very bright and personable young girl, the spina bifida that afflicted her made learning to walk extremely difficult and controlling her bladder difficult if not impossible. As a young girl she remembers going to school and wanting to make friends so badly but no one would play with her. She was the girl who walked funny and was seen as unclean. She told us how she used to bring candies with her to school to offer them to her classmates so they would play with her but they would take her candies and then leave her alone. She described her life as a child as extremely lonely and very sad. Her parents used to fight all the time about her as her father was not supportive or understanding about her disability while her mother continued to fight for her daughter. She felt terrible about being the source of her parents' fighting and shame on the schoolyard as she tried desperately to make friends.

When she was 19 years old she heard about Bethany Kids and made her way to Kijabe where she was seen by the doctors and operated on to help her with her walking and incontinence. She describes it as her re-birth! She stayed at Kijabe for the next 10 years working with children with spina bifida as a counselor and mentor to try to support them as they struggled as she did as a child. Nine months ago, when Bethany officially became involved with Joytown, Francisca moved to Joytown to continue to counsel and mentor the children at Joytown with a special heart toward those with spina bifida. Francisca is married now to a wonderful man and they live together just outside of the school where she commutes to Joytown and he commutes into Nairobi.

Francisca's story is a remarkable one of faith and perseverance. Presented with so many challenges, she continued to approach life positively and has now committed herself to giving back to support others. Her story also highlights the importance of the work at Bethany as physical but also social supports for the children. The medical intervention can go a long way toward allowing the children to become fully functioning members of Kenyan society when they would almost certainly not without it. Not only are there physical challenges with such a disabilty, but devestating social challenges as well. There is nothing a child wants more than to make friends and be accepted for the person they are. Francisca struggled through a difficult childhood but now wants to support others in any way she can. Her story is a wonderful connection between the work the doctors are doing at Bethany Kids and the work happening at Joytown for the most needy.

I will be back at Joytown on Monday with books for the library which I will talk about more in my next post...