LWB’s Medical Program first met Alejandra in early 2011 when her orphanage in Guizhou Province asked us to help provide for her medical care. Alejandra was born with a severe facial cleft and needed cleft surgery, as well as another surgery for a painful and complicated hernia. At four years old she had her hernia surgery first.
Alejandra before her cleft lip surgery…
There it was. A little green pea was making its way out of Ellen’s nose. I knew it was possible. I had heard the stories of raisins, kernels of corn, chocolate and even noodles sneaking their way into a toddler’s nose. It’s all part of having a cleft palate.
Even after having a cleft palate repaired, often little holes or fistulas still remain. Read more.
Every time I visit the Anhui Healing Home, I wish more than anything that I could just unpack my bags and work as a nanny there. This home has a very special feel because all of the caregivers are related or good friends. When you walk in the door, you hear music and laughing – and you know within minutes that all the babies are in very good hands, from their heads to their sweet little toes.
Read more.
Babies with cleft lip often have a very difficult time in an orphanage setting since they often face special challenges in drinking from a bottle. Orphanages frequently contact us when they have a baby born with cleft who becomes failure to thrive. We have seen remarkable transformations occur in our homes, and so many lives have been saved. Read more.
We were first asked to help Jiang when he was eleven months old. A relative of Jiang’s worked as a nanny in an orphanage where we help many children, and the nanny directed Jiang’s family to apply for help through Love Without Boundaries. Partnering with Smile Train in Kunming, we were able to provide cleft lip surgery for Jiang in February of 2012 with the help of our Unity Fund. His family traveled 200 miles from their home in a rural town in Guizhou to seek help for their son. Read more.
LWB first met Emily a year ago, and who could forget her! This spunky little girl with a big personality was dealing with multiple special needs, including three missing limbs, cleft lip, and a heart defect. Emily had her cleft lip surgery during our 2012 Cleft Medical Exchange last April and then stayed at Heartbridge Healing Home before and after her heart surgery. In December Emily, now named Jennai, was adopted by her American family. Read more.
Frankie came to LWB’s True Children’s Healing Home in September, after a long journey from his home province of Shaanxi. At six months old he weighed less than ten pounds and was in need of a great deal of careful nurturing, but his sparkling eyes told us that we would soon be seeing a strong and active Frankie.
The TCHH caregivers immediately set about filling Frankie’s tummy with nutritious formula and filling his little soul with love and attention. Frankie began to thrive. Within a few weeks he had started crawling, and by November he was brave enough to approach the bigger babies and take their toys away!
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A little over a year ago little Abby was admitted to LWB’s Henan Healing Home. Because of her bilateral cleft lip and palate, she had great difficulty feeding, and the HHH nannies set her up with a feeding tube. Having reached a healthy weight, Abby was able to be part of LWB’s cleft exchange trip held in April last year. After a difficult surgery, her results looked amazing. Happy to be rid of her feeding tube hat, Abby smiled more, became less shy, and gained more weight as feeding was so much easier. Read more.
As many of you know, we learned this week that our Henan Healing Home has to close. We told our supporters about this news in an announcement on our Facebook page. Today, we wanted to share a few of the final photos taken of some of the babies with their loving nannies. Read more.
Last August the staff at LWB’s Anhui Healing Home (AHH) was contacted about taking in an infant girl with cleft lip and palate. Arya, as she came to be known, was just a few weeks old; so this was a wonderful opportunity to provide nurturing care and surgery at the earliest possible date. This is so important as the feeding difficulties associated with cleft lip and palate can lead to a rapid decline in a baby’s health after birth. Arya arrived at AHH at one month old weighing 2.6 kg (5.7 pounds).
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