B+ for wilner

sweet wilner.. wilner lives in chichigua and we have been blessed to watch this little dude grow, play, and pout. in december, robin and holly took him to get his blood tested and confirmed that he is HIV positive. a couple months later, with another doctor, they learned he needed a blood transfusion.


[ok, i have to pause for a minute and note that robin and holly have taken wilner numerous times to the doctor for tests and medicine, pouring themselves into these time-consuming processes for him. they have faithfully loved him and been consistent people he can trust to take him.. and get him ice cream after having needles in his arm. i say this because i don't want to jump so far in the story without giving a little peek into what those months looked like. now to resume..]

what kind of blood does he have? B+. our whole staff started reporting blood types back to robin. guess what type i am? yep.. B+. the weekend we were going to give the blood for the transfusion, holly happened to have a friend, bonnie, coming who also had B+ blood. welcome to the country, bonnie. come to a clinic in the third world and let us stick a needle in you..

robin, holly, bonnie, lauren (our physicians assistant at school), and i took a day to go to puerto plata for the donating process. first, bonnie and i had our blood tested and then did what we do here all the time: wait.

turns out my dang iron levels were a little below the ok level (bah) BUT praise the LORD- bonnie COULD donate! wilner could have the transfusion!

check out that GIANT needle in bonnie's arm. the donating was ridiculously fast. i mean, look at that thing. no wonder she felt light-headed after losing blood so fast.

bonnie being a champ. that was one giant bag of blood they ever so professionally rested on the chair..

i've heard they don't let females donate blood here because they think women will become iron-deficient (yeah...) so it was incredible they allowed this. ALSO, praise the Lord bonnie was in town for those specific of days!

wilner had the transfusion and is doing well.. still as funny as ever. thank you, Lord!