Noor

I’m crossposting this blog from one I recently posted for Shevet. My personal blog has been a little dry on Iraqis lately and I put a lot of the minutia which into this which I hope gives a true sense of the relationships and emotions. This is a little boy named Noor, “light” in Arabic, who had open-heart surgery through Shevet Achim about two weeks ago. Follow his entire story from start to finish here: http://www.shevet.org/nooriraq/

Noor was looking very good today when we visited him at Wolfson Medical Center. He was very excited to see the Shevet family and wanted to play right away. Noor is still pretty weak and needs to take it easy, so I thought a nice wheelchair ride around the hospital was in order. We stopped to enjoy the photos on the walls in the halls, and we waved “bye bye” to Noor’s mother as I wheeled him outside around the hospital grounds. We enjoyed the scenery and talked to each other the whole way, though we could scarcely understand a word the other spoke. Noor giggled the whole time and especially enjoyed the wheelchair being leaned back when we went up and down the curbs, and meowing at a cat we spotted resting under a car. We stopped by the play room on the way back and did some coloring and played on the piano.

When we arrived back at his hospital room a nurse told me some surprising news: Noor was to be released back to Jerusalem today! A doctor soon came in to do some checks and confirmed he would be allowed home today; Noor’s mother was very happy to hear this news. After the good news we enjoyed a hospital lunch together on Noor’s bed, and as usual Noor made sure I ate everything he ate. While we were waiting on a couple other things Noor decided he wanted to try out pushing the wheel chair, so I hopped in and Noor had a blast wheeling me around the room and crashing into things (and occasionally people). After about 15 minutes of this we made him stop so he wouldn’t exhaust himself, which he wasn’t happy about, but we were soon on our way home. Noor waved and said “bye bye hospital” in Kurdish as we pulled away.


On the day of Noor’s surgery, while it was taking place, I was able to get someone to snap a photo of the unique situation the Iraqi mothers and I found ourselves in. The photo below depicts all the mothers with hospitalized children in one place. The child of the mother on the far right had at this point unconscious post-surgery for more than a week, and struggling to survive. The child of the mother next to her was in the intensive care unit as well recovering from open-heart surgery. The mother in the middle is the mother of Bilal, the child in the stroller, who was enjoying his first opportunity to be outside since his surgery. The woman on the top left is Noor’s mother. Perhaps it isn’t very obvious without knowing these mothers personally, but the solidarity and even happiness these mothers exhibited during the time this photo was taken, in the midst of these terrifying times as a parent, is quite incredible. It would surely not be possible were but for their confidence in the ability of these doctors, their trust and friendship with us as we stand by them, and the supportive relationships they have built with one another.