As we arrived in their facility in San Jose, Laura was the first one to receive us. She is very active in the program as the coordinator of the San Jose center. She is always seeking the kids' happiness and trying to make the atmosphere at the "Albergue"as cheerful as possible without losing it's efficacy.
Maria de los Angeles, who is the president of the program, is now working twice as much. In addition to the supervision of the "Allbergue" in San Jose, she has been taking care of the constructions of the new facility in Pérez Zeledón. In both regions, the field team of professionals that work with the kids, consists of a psychologist, a nurse and a physician.
Doutor Irola has studied abroad and is very qualified in the area of Palliative Care (see one of his published papers at http://ajh.sagepub.com/content/27/7/456.full.pdf). He is amazingly calm and assuring to the patients and their families. Along his classical medical work, he keeps seeking alternative ways to do therapy with he kids, such as art workshops and activities with dogs, which seem to really benefit the children.
Angelita, the nurse of the Pérez Zeledón facility, is a very happy young woman. She communicates very well with the kids and their families, and is always smiling and seeking the positive side of things, being incredibly generous and cheerful. The week after we left, she donated 30 cm of her own hair to a cancer-fighting campaign. She often drives the truck to the children's houses. Angelita thinks that the process is more complex than simply helping the kids, and she know that help comes from changing some of their habits. In the Indian tribes, for example, she was the one talking to the parents about the need of taking birth control seriously and to the girls about the need of trying to avoid starting having kids at very early ages.
Marlene is the group psychologist, andalternates with Angelita on the driving, which certainly is a very tiring and stressing job. She joined the program after she opened her house's doors to a friend's daughter, who had cancer and passed away shortly after right there in her house. During that period, her husband and her created such a strong bonding with the girl that she afterwards felt the need to help those in similar conditions. She wanted to give the affected kids better conditions of living, as she did to that girl. Marlene is very thankful to the girl for bringing her into the Palliative Care program.
Doutora Alejandra is the physician of the group, and she keeps the group's good spirit joking with Angelita all day long. That joyful facade becomes one of efficiency as soon as she approaches her patients. She tirelessly interviews the parents and grandparents, patiently explaining the specifics of taking care of their special kid. And she always ends the day with the same energy she had started it with. And then she goes home to start her second journey at her house, taking care of her twin daughters!
Sonia, the secretary of the Pérez Zeledón facility makes sure to keep the Albergue in order while the doctors make the domiciliary visits. She was very welcoming to us the whole time, making sure all our needs were met.
The group is much bigger than this, of course, but these are the people we most spent time with the most and made our stay very special. I can only imagine how special they make those kids lives.
Every visit we made with them, no matter if they had never seen the family before, it always seemed as if they had had a long lasting relationship with them. And after that first encounter, they were always able to know each kid individually, even though that is nearly impossible since they help nearly a thousand patients.
On our last night at Perez Zeledon we could again witness the generosity of the Costa Ricans: we were offered a great diner at Angelita's house, prepared with the help of all of them. We are so grateful to them for making our experience there in Costa Rica so complete.
Kisses,
Mariana
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