Another Indonesia story! The adventure I always think about this time of year. Abby’s 2nd serious illness happened when she was 14 months old. Her forehead got warmer as the day went on, and by the time Jason got home she was burning up and couldn’t walk in a straight line to greet him, although she tried. Jason took her to the doctor while I stayed home with 3 year old Samantha and made dinner.

Jason brought Abby home with a diagnosis of malaria – terrifying! Normally Palangkaraya was too hot for the type of mosquitos that transmit malaria, but we had been having some ‘cooler’ weather. This brought mosquitoes down from the mountains and created an epidemic. The doctor gave Jason meds but said Abby would have to be admitted to the hospital if she vomited them up, which most children her age did. We gave her the first dose, and she vomited just a few minutes later.

I packed Abby and I a bag, and we all went to the brand new pediatric hospital. I was scared, knowing malaria can be fatal, but it was evening and too late to get a flight to Jakarta and better health care. After Abby was admitted, in a room with a cat exploring a dirty bandage in a corner, we started to settle in while Jason and Samantha went home. I started to feed Abby when she suddenly began having a seizure. Her room didn’t have a call button, just a cell phone number taped to Abby’s IV that called the cell phone at the nurses’ station downstairs.

As I reached for my phone while trying to hold Abby, the doctor came in with a nurse to check on us. They immediately left the room again. Now I didn’t know what to do – I thought it was clear we needed help! But the doctor came back quickly with a manual oxygen mask. The nurse started pumping oxygen while they talked, not realizing how many medical terms I had picked up. The doctor told the nurse to get Abby’s malaria medicine going right away because she had the worst strain of malaria, and it would be a race between the meds and Abby’s fever.

Because of our town’s electricity issues, Abby’s IV was gravity fed. The bag had all three doses, that needed to be spread over 36 hours. The nurse drew two lines on the bag and told me to call her when the medicine level got down to the first line.

Abby was stable for the moment, so I was finally able to feed her and get settled. I got absolutely no sleep that night, alternating between watching the medicine level in the IV bag, making sure Abby’s tiny little chest was still going up and down, and feeling her forehead. She slept peacefully through the night and got her 2nd dose of malaria meds.

We sat watching her the next day like she was a bomb about to go off, but her fever never hit dangerous levels again. That night she got her 3rd dose, and the next day we were able to take her home, on Good Friday. This day took on even more special meaning for me, getting to take Abby home from a hospital again. God’s grace spared her again, but he didn’t spare His Son.

John 3:17 NIV
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.