Mounds of Stone: July 2012

Monday, July 23, 2012

Road to Kenya Part I

Many of our friends, family, and colleagues have desired to know more about the Mitchell family's plans for this year as well as our plans for Kenya and beyond. Erin has been doing a great job at detailing the fun we've been having, so I'll update you on the work to be done. Keep reading and stay tuned for plenty of information about surgery, Kenya, World Medical Missions, and the Pan African Academy of Christian Surgeons (PAACS). In a four part series, I'll begin to describe where God has called our family to serve, what we'll be doing in Africa, and how YOU can help!!

Where we are now.

Spectrum Health Butterworth Hospital in Grand Rapids

The sign from atop the hospital

Where we are going.

A picture of Tenwek Hospital in Bomet, Kenya

The sign out front of the hospital

Part I: July 16, 2012-July 16, 2013

Erin and I loved Grand Rapids so much that we decided to stay here one more year before heading off to Kenya. Living here and working for one year will give me time to take my surgery board exams (written exam on August 9th, and oral exam sometime in November or January), pay down my medical school loans (a lot of $$), and spend time with various specialists learning surgeries I will have to do in Kenya but did not learn during my general surgery residency. For example, here in the USA I function as a general surgeon...operating on the abdomen, neck and occasionally the chest. ENT, urology, neurosurgery, pediatric surgery, hand surgery, and OB/GYN all are separate training programs that dedicate 4-7 years of time learning surgeries in these areas. However, at Tenwek Hospital in Kenya I will be the ENT surgeon, urologist, pediatric surgeon etc. as well as general surgeon. A little daunting, but exciting at the same time. Erin and I hosted Jason and Heather Fader (a surgeon and family that just finished two years at Tenwek Hospital) for dinner a few weeks ago and he gave me a long list of surgeries I will have to be familiar with. Therefore, for the next year I will work as a general surgeon with Spectrum Health here in Grand Rapids, and my free time will be spent with various specialists learning as much as I can about each specialty. For example, I have a parotidectomy (taking out a tumor in a salivary gland), nephrectomy (taking out a kidney), and lung lobectomy coming up soon. Spectrum has been very supportive of my desires to serve in Africa and has facilitated my working with all these specialties. What a blessing!!

Erin and I will also be using this time to prepare for our service in Kenya. We have a long reading list to get through, passports and visas to obtain, and many logistics to work on. As far as finances are concerned, the mission organization we are going through (World Medical Mission) will provide a stipend to help defer the cost of our travel and living expenses, but we will also need to raise some support (Ahh, the joy of being a missionary!!) God has already blessed us with people's verbal commitments for support (even though we haven't even asked yet), but we have a long way to go.

Part II will include information on Tenwek Hospital and give you all a little flavor of Kenya. I'll then give some background on the post residency program sponsored by World Medical Mission (a branch of Samaritan's purse) and finish off with information about PAACS, which is a revolutionary surgery training program that will change the face of surgical care in Africa over the next 20 years. Stay tuned!!

Monday, July 16, 2012

They've Taken Over....

So I have four little boys, right? So I assumed that we would spend our time playing trucks, building forts, building with Legos and racing cars. They like these things, but what they LOVE, what they spend most of their time doing....wait for it....Beanie Babies. Yes, stuffed animals. I kid you not. These kids go crazy for those stuffed little creatures. We happened upon a garage sale last weekend where they were selling every Beanie animal imaginable and they were so excited, they stood there for 15 min. trying imagine how they could pick just ONE! So imagine their delight when the lady running the sale said they could Buy one Get one free! Oh glorious day! So here is our collection, what we could round up (sometimes they are good at hiding). We also find those pesky creatures (they all have a name, that even I know) in some crazy places.

Nuts ready to roll

Chocolate sneaking a treat

Spike trying out the potty

Knuckles sipping some H2O on a hot day

Slippery in his special spot

Zip taking a snooze

Stretch going for a ride

Strut working hard

Zip and Stinky playing cars

Zip has stolen the remote AGAIN!

I wonder if I had girls, what they would play with??!

Monday, July 2, 2012

Dr. Husband

My extremely talented, hard-working husband FINALLY graduated from 26th grade on June 16th! He finished his surgery residency (5 years) after 4 years of med school and 4 years of undergrad. It has been a long road, and even though most days were VERY long, overall the journey seems to have flown by. I have to say I am so proud of him. He worked so hard, studying many nights of the week on top of working 80 hours/week, always did AWESOME on his yearly tests, and was able to minister to many, many patients.
On top of all this doctor-duty, he is also an awesome husband and father to our 4 crazies. He comes home most nights, eats dinner and then plays with the boys for 2 hours before they go to bed. They adore him. He is their favorite playmate by far. One question you can always hear around here is, "Daddy, can you play with us?". He is also an awesome (though not perfect :) husband, letting me have girls nights once or twice a month, helping me with bedtime, diapers, and cleaning the shower (his "chore").
He has given up most of his hobbies, making his family his hobby. We love it when he is home and hope now that he has a "real job" we'll see even more of him. We were able to celebrate at graduation which was a really nice dinner with all the surgery residents, some attendings and our families. Each of the 6 graduating chiefs got "roasted" by a 4th year resident and Eric's was super funny. Then we had a big 'ole graduation party here at our house with about 60 adults and 5 million children (well, that's what it felt like). It was great fun (you know how we love parties!!) and hopefully Eric felt honored as he should. Here are some pictures of our celebrating!
Congratulations Dr. Mitchell, we are SOOOO proud of you!