The clinic stood about one kilometer outside of Yocón, on the main road to La Unión, a slightly larger village nearby. Few families owned cars, so transportation depended on supply trucks and the single bus that left for Tegucigalpa one day and returned the next. There was no electricity, no telephones, and no televisions.
We did have ice-cold Coca-Cola — a commodity found in every corner of the world — kept cold by kerosene-burning refrigerators.
As our clientele grew, I hired Christina, a local nurse, to help me. We worked well together. If a mistake was made, she took the blame — and I was, at that time, the kind of man who let her do it. She knew most of the people who came in for treatment and would share their story if they were poor, or warn me of danger if she suspected they were gang members. We tried to stay neutral, since feuding families often ended up in the waiting room together.
Machete cuts were common, and we had to close them up several times a week. Sometimes they were accidental injuries, like a child using his father’s machete to strip sugar cane. One wrong move, and he was missing a finger or two. Other times, it could be a thief with one or both hands cut off for stealing a cow, or a man with his scrotum ripped open by the horns of an angry bull, or a father with a deep machete cut across his back — a wound his daughter had inflicted to protect her mother from his abuse.
Boils ranked high among the challenges, some caused by infection, others by Bot fly larvae—both required time to treat. When draining pus, it sometimes bursts out under pressure, hitting us with the hot, foul-smelling substance, even in the face. Maggot removal was more complex because the maggots had to be extracted alive, which involved applying lubricant to the breathing hole and waiting for the maggot to protrude enough to be plucked with tweezers. Each day brought new experiences, and almost every day had a story worth telling.
On some days, Christina acted as my trainer, pulling on my leash when my ingrained arrogance surfaced. One of those times was when a father from one of the hill tribes brought his ten-year-old son in with a high fever. The boy looked malnourished, and the father said he had been sick for several days. I had him lie the boy down on the exam table while Christina took his temperature. When she said it was 105 degrees, I knew we were in trouble. I gently touched his lower stomach. He winced and cried out in pain.
“Appendicitis,” I murmured, glancing at Christina for support. “He needs to go to the hospital right now.”
As we discussed the possibilities, the bus going to the paved road was dropping off more patients.
“Christina, stop the bus and put the man and his son on it.”I gave her $25.00 to pass on to the father and told them to hurry. I was relieved when the father climbed on board, and the bus sped off down the road.
The following morning, I brought the incident up with Christina, and she informed me that the man had gotten off the bus just out of sight of the clinic and brought his son home, where he died during the night. I knew that was a possibility; still, I held the father accountable for not trying to save him with the money I had given.
Two weeks passed, and a man brought in his sick little daughter. Christina took her temperature as I started my examination.
“That is the father of the boy who died,” she whispered, cautiously.
“Oh! So, you think you can get more money out of me by bringing another sick child?” I stopped my exam and looked straight at the father, who stood humbly staring down at the floor. “Who do you think you are, coming back here? I’m not giving you any more of my money!”
“Ssh,” Christina interrupted, as I was preparing my second round of abusive outbursts. “Let him talk.”
The tearful father explained he was grateful for the money, but he had never held that much in his life. He had six other children at home who would benefit more if he used it to buy food. He chose to sacrifice his son so the rest of his family could eat.
He left the clinic that day with enough vitamins for all of his children and more money for food.
Many of our patients were regular visitors. Some came to get out of the house and socialize for a few hours. Others just needed some attention and were reassured they were okay after their vitals were checked. One grandmother from the other side of the river would bring her two lovely grandchildren in when she wanted her blood pressure taken. Both children were exceptional: a nine-year-old girl and her cousin, an adorable four-year-old boy. The two of them always kept the waiting room entertained with their wit and charm.
When it rains, the river rises, and at times it takes two or three days for the water to reach a safe level to cross. Such was the case for the grandmother when her granddaughter developed a high fever. By the time she got her to us, she had become unresponsive and was very close to dying.
I put cold towels on her head and chest to bring the temperature down, but I didn’t hold out much hope. The grandmother pleaded with me to save her, and all I could think to do was start intravenous fluids. As I put the needle in her arm, some of the other family members joined us, and we waited for death to take her. It was late afternoon, and there was no change, so the family decided to take her home to die. I was told the following day that she had survived the night and was talking, but was unable to walk. I was surprised by the news and hoped the inability to walk was not the result of permanent brain damage.
It was nearly a month before I saw the grandmother and her granddaughter again. The grandmother looked haggard as she walked through the door, and when her granddaughter followed her in, I understood why. The child seemed to have suffered brain damage from the fever. She walked with a limp, and her left arm hung by her side. She moved around the exam room, touching everything, and ignored her grandmother’s requests to sit down. Something within her had changed. Her personality was the exact opposite of what it had been before.
The following week, the news hit me hard. We learned that the granddaughter had taken her uncle’s gun and killed her four-year-old cousin. The boy’s father said he would kill the girl as soon as the funeral was over, forcing the grandmother to go into hiding with her granddaughter. I never saw them again.
I don’t regret my attempts to bring her back from the dead, but I cannot help feeling partly responsible for the ripples it created.
Some in the village believed that near-death experiences could open the body to malevolent spirits. I doubted that, but on another day, three intoxicated men brought in one of their friends, who was unresponsive to any stimulus. As they laid him down on the table, Christina shot me a look that told me these men were not of good character.
I began examining the man while Christina translated their story. A stop at a local outdoor Sotol bar had led to a drinking contest to see who could consume the most of the highly intoxicating brew. Sotol is a spirit distilled from the desert-spoon plant, and in unregulated batches it can contain dangerous levels of methanol alongside the alcohol — enough to cause seizures, blindness, or death. Their friend had been the first to start and was already on his third shot before the others had finished their first. He went into convulsions and passed out. When he failed to respond, they brought him to the clinic.
“Javier,” I said, as I looked into his dilated eyes. “Do you know where you are?”
There was no response, so I continued taking his vitals.
“No,” he whispered.
I wasn’t sure if his delayed response was to my question, so I asked him if he could see me.
“Yes, but you are far away,” came his slow, delayed response, suggesting that his spirit might be outside his body, perhaps in that space where malevolent spirits reside.
He stopped responding after that. I told his friends there was nothing more I could do — they could take him to the hospital or take him home. They chose to take him home, where he died a few hours later.