Waida is the mother of three children: Kuku (age 8), Nania (age 5) and Kumi (age 2)*.
Living in a warzone as a woman bears its own unique challenges and risks, but for Waida, her suffering has been compounded because she also has epilepsy.
Last year, she was cooking over a fire for her family and had a seizure that propelled her body into the open flames. Her convulsions lasted too long in the fire pit, and she suffered severe burns on her face and hands.
There are very limited options for medical care in Sudan, but Waida was eventually brought to a German run hospital in the Nuba Mountains. Over the past year, she has had multiple reparative surgeries. However, due to her scarred physical appearance and disabilities, her family and community have rejected her. Unfortunately, this is a common practice for those with any form of life-long medical condition or disability in the nation. Many of the children in our anti-trafficking network who have special medical needs have also experienced this rejection from family and it regularly brings them to our doors for help.
Waida’s oldest son shared:
My name is Kuku, I am 8 years old. Both my parents are alive but due to the nature of the sickness of my mother (epileptic), our father abandoned all of us. My mother fell into an open fire and as a result, she got burned and her face deformed. Our father then, not wanting to be associated with us, abandoned us and moved to Northern Sudan. Reports have it that he got married to another woman and settled there. Since my mother got burned, Lwere hospital headed by German Emergency Doctors (GED), where she is being treated, had been our home for the last two years.
Waida and her family need your help.
The GED hospital has been the make-shift home for this mother and her three children but when she recovers, she will have no support system. Since their facility is not equipped as a safe house, the doctors at GED have asked if LUV would help intervene.
At each of our centers, we have limited enrollment to our housing program. We don’t have enough space for all the children who require assistance, and unfortunately, we often must turn precious ones away — a heartbreaking reality of working where both extreme poverty and conflict yield extreme needs.
However, when we reviewed what we could do at Our Father’s Cleft (our partners in the Nuba Mountains), we learned that there were exactly two beds left and we knew we had to participate in the care of this family.
Waida and her youngest son, Kumi, will continue to stay at the hospital as Waida receives ongoing care for her medical needs over the next months. However, Kuku and Nania started attending Our Father’s Cleft school in September while they live at our safe house.
God’s hand has clearly been on this situation – as we had exactly two bed available. One for a girl and one for a boy.
Overjoyed Kuku expressed,
I am happy to be enrolled in class for the first time in my life. I am so grateful to OFC for creating a place for me to be in school. I sleep in the dormitory with clean beddings unlike where I was sleeping before. I am happy to find a place I call home and hoping to be a doctor later after my school life.
Echoing her older brother’s sentiment, five-year-old Nania shared,
I am in pre-school where I was enrolled this year. Things changed for the better when OFC took us to the orphanage. We can now get everything we need and sleep in a decent place. My desire is to be a doctor in future.
To ensure that we can care for all the needs of Kuku and Nania – we will need your support.
To provide a child in our program with nutritious meals, safe housing, preventative medical care, Christ-centered education, and nurturing trauma-informed support costs $2,500 per child a year, or approximately $210/month.
We also want to build a small home for this family close to our school so that they can be fully reunited when Waida finishes her medical treatment in 2024 and continue to be a part of our trafficking prevention school and nutrition programs.
With nowhere to go for help and limited opportunities for employment due to her disabilities, we’re exploring how we can equip and empower this young mother so she can have a fruitful future and extend Christ’s loving grace through practical care. To build a home, we estimate costs to be around $5,000.
Will you uplift Waida and her children?
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“I was hungry, and you gave me food, I was thirsty, and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” – Matthew 25:35
*Children’s nicknames used to protect identity online.