Faces of Tomorrow

Jesse, patient 210

He wasn’t scared and he certainly wasn’t crying. He was smiling ear to ear with a huge wide complete cleft lip. He did his best to speak to anyone who would listen despite the fact that he also had a cleft palate and spoke Cebuano.  He passed through the nursing team, the surgical team and then to me for a photo and a folder to keep his documents in.  Next step for Jesse was speech pathology and then– wait.  Jesse and his mom would have to wait until the end of the day to learn if he would receive surgery. After patients were seen, they were to wait outside in the sweltering heat sheltered by a small tent with hundreds of others. Since we saw him early in the day, Jesse would have to wait for about seven hours to learn his fate.

The day continued much the same except now I had a very friendly Jesse peaking at me through the glass window of my work-station. He sure was a flirt. If I had a break, I would take the time to step in the hall to chase him a bit or give him a fist bump. By the end of the day I was thinking this was my guy. Little did I know, that when he was not charming me, he was busy flirting with the Peace Corps volunteers, charming the nurses and making sure the surgeons did not forget his face as he kept pressing it against the glass wall of their work area. Not a bad plan, since inevitably two of those surgeons would change his life forever.

Jesse was scheduled for surgery late in the day Thursday. Babies get the early appointments because it is harder for them to go with out food before surgery. Since Jesse was eight, he could understand why he could not eat before surgery. He checked in Wednesday night and spent all day Thursday charming the nurses and Peace Corps workers on the 4th floor with his art work, his big smile and his sticker masks. Those of us working on the second floor couldn’t resist going up to check on him. That’s when I learned he had pretty much charmed our entire team and his affection was not for me alone.

It was 2:30 pm and Dr. Rubinstein called for his next patient.  I jumped at a chance to go upstairs and retrieve Jesse. When I arrived his face was covered in stickers. I let him know it was his turn and offered up a piggyback ride. He jumped on and downstairs we went, his legs wiggling the entire way. I handed him over to our amazing nurses and doctors. As Dr. Lovely our anesthesiologist spoke with Jesse’s mother through an interpreter, Jesse sat on the table swaying his legs, taking deep breaths and doing the Trinity Prayer.  He was pumped and he was ready.  Dr. Lovely gave Jesse some Versed to relax him and soon he began to struggle to keep his eyes open- but the smile never left his face. As Dr. Lovely carried him off to the OR, a drowsy Jesse told the Filipino nurse “I am so excited” then mentioned something about the girls at school liking him even more. It was pretty clear we at FOT were not the first to be charmed by this little guy. 
In the end it would be Dr. Rubinstein and Dr. Shih who would have the honor of changing Jesse’s life.

While Jesse is a special kid with the gift of charisma, the reality is that without this surgery he would never have had the opportunity to reach his full potential.  Getting a job would not be an option and going to school would become harder and harder as he became older.  We have heard about kids leaving school because of the endless teasing - especially as they got older and those are the lucky ones because many never go to school.  Worse, many kids with clefts, especially wide complete clefts such as Jesse’s, are left at birth. Some are even killed. We have heard of fathers beating the mothers for giving birth to a deformed baby. Some families are so ashamed they never leave the house with the deformed child and the mothers also become prisoners.  In some cultures it is thought that a cleft is a sign of being possessed or cursed by demons.

As Jesse lay asleep on the table with our team of nurses, surgeons and anesthesiologist fast at work, I wondered what if FOT were not here? What would his fate have been? Tearing up a bit, I thought FOT is here and this child will wake up in two hours with opportunity and hope for a future. It was a lot to take in and the emotion was overwhelming.
Thank you to everyone who made Jesse’s bright future possible and for allowing me to be a very small part of it.