Real Hope for Haiti has been a part of our lives for over ten years.  Our first contact was through being foster parents of a baby who came to the US on a medical visa for life-saving surgery.  When it was time for her to return to her parents, I travelled to Cazale and fell in love with everything about Real Hope.  I became friends with Lori and Licia and Casey and their families.  They are like the cousins I never met growing up.

I have so many memories from my several trips; assisting my RN husband as he stitched wounds, stroking the leg of a tiny baby who was so sick he didn’t want to be held, walking through the open air market and the town, caring overnight for an under 5 lb newborn who’s mother died and father desperately wanted her to live, visiting the temporary cholera treatment center and the ‘new’ CTC on the land that is now being transformed into the permanent home of RHFH.  I had to pleasure of meeting a man who was to become my ‘brother’; reuniting with my foster daughter after 4 years; meeting the young man we were sponsoring in school and creating a relationship where I am his “Mom” and the grandmother to his new baby.  I was able to watch my daughter, adopted at 18 months, connect with her birth culture on her first trip and meet her first father on her second. 

We loved and laughed and prayed and cried with Lori, Licia, Charley, Enoch, Casey, Briana, the Haitian staff, and ’Misye Zach’.  The holistic approach of Real Hope, caring for the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual needs of the community is one of my favorite things about them.  Medical care is given, yes of course.  Abandoned children are placed in foster families and those families are given financial help.  Food is distributed to elderly, ill, and especially needy families.  Babies are provided with life-saving formula.  Trees and vetiver is planted.  Seeds are given.  Clean water is provided.  Spiritual support is offered.  Lives are changed.

Real Hope for Haiti is very aptly named.  This mission offers exactly what it says.  REAL Hope.  For the present and for the future.  I am so blessed to be a tiny part of this mission!