Out of body..

Written May 8th


Yup, my emotional wall has definitely been broken. I did pretty good.. almost 3 weeks with no tears. Here’s hoping I’m not an absolute mess for the next 7 weeks. I had a moment yesterday that was something like an out of body experience. Or like a dream that you only remember a while after it happened because something triggers the memory. I was sitting in the home of a 15 year old girl who struggles with a mental illness and lives with her elderly grandmother in a very rural village far from town. Her parents had abandoned her because they didn’t want a child with a disability (quite typical in Uganda). This girl started to pray in front of us, in her local language. She was asking God to give her and her grandmother money for medication to treat her condition. A wave of emotions hit me like a ton of bricks in two ways. First, I started to reflect on my work back home. And I wondered about the amount of medications that are administered on a regular basis and how much we take medicine for granted in Canada; often taking unnecessary amounts for something as minor as a headache. I started to feel disgusted with this and I had so many questions about my practice. The second piece of this was a sudden feeling or realization that I was exactly where I was supposed to be in that moment in time and Uganda is where I belong right now. This is what I mean when I say it was like a dream that I had so long ago but couldn’t remember until it was happening; like déjà vu. I have not questioned whether or not I was meant to be here since I arrived, but suddenly it became even more clear in this moment sitting in this home. Before coming here I had so many doubts and had questioned whether or not I was a good fit for Uganda because I had never in my life considered myself for such a task. But as I watched myself (from outside of my body of course) sitting there listening to this girl’s story I realized I am doing it, I am capable and cut out for this work, and this is exactly where the universe needs me to be right now. I don’t know if I could even explain the reason why, but I can say I have never felt so sure about anything as I did in that particular moment, and still do now. What an amazing feeling. I wish I could feel so sure about every aspect of my life. I feel so blessed today.