Merry Christmas

While not exactly your traditional Christmas song, this is one of my favorites. Mostly I think because it reminds me that the reason we celebrate Christmas is because Jesus came to die for our sins. Not exactly the thing we think of first when we imagine that baby in the manager. His sacrifice is the reason I live! 

Christmas plans for me including working the night of the 24th and then heading to Wenatchee, WA on Christmas morning for a couple of days with my grandparents and family. Then I will head down to my family's home in Oregon for a couple of days. I am looking forward to some time relaxing and enjoying family and friends! Next year I will most likely be exchanging my white Christmas for a very green and tropical one with temperatures near the hospital around 80+ degrees and lots of rain this time of year.

The other big piece of news in my life is that on December 17th I passed my comprehensive exam for school, so I have officially graduated! Now I just have to take the certification exam in early January.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

Help Needed

Explore Indonesia and Discover Serving at Bethesda Hospital from Calista Yates on Vimeo.

So the video above is a collection of pictures and videos that helps you explore and discover Indonesia, Bethesda Hospital, and being a missionary. Most of the pictures were taken during a 6 month period in 2006 when one of my main responsibilities was coordinating short-term workers who came to Bethesda Hospital. The song playing is "Here I Am" and was "borrowed" from the group downhere. They have some amazing music that you can find on iTunes or at your local Christian bookstore.

So you have seen the job description and as you you can imagine it feels a bit overwhelming and right now I will be the only American nurse there. And let's face it, I am single woman moving to a rather isolated and rural location. While there will be other missionaries serving there, they are all families and doctors. So I would love to have another single woman, preferably a nurse or nurse practitioner etc to go with me. In the past I have been there both with and without another single woman and I definitely preferred the partnership of another woman and nurse. On the good days we celebrated together and on the rough days we supported each other. We also had fun taking vacations together. This is not a lifetime commitment, even a couple of years would be a big help. Please contact me if this is something that interests you and we can talk.

What

We have talked a bit about who I am and when I will be going, so I thought it was time to tackle the question of what I will be doing. Here is the official job description: 

Job Summary:
Serve at Bethesda Hospital in the areas of midwifery and general nursing.  Part time teaching and mentoring Indonesian nurses and students formally and informally.

Responsibilities:
Care for patients in the obstetrics department.  Assist in births. Teach staff.  Improve quality control measures, establish training sessions.  Care for general ward patients. Assist in disbursal of donated medical supplies.  Teach several hours a week in the nursing school.  Mentor nurses and nursing students. Supervise practical experience of MedGo student nurses.

To me that sounds like more than a full-time job! As always though job descriptions tend to be a bit flexible and I am sure there are things not listed as well. From my past time serving at Bethesda I know there will be also be some administrative responsibilities, helping to provide medical care for the expat population of the area, and working with short-term workers.

The two areas I think I am most excited about are providing care to women as a certified nurse-midwife and working with the nursing and MedGo students. During previous times serving at Bethesda Hospital I came to face-to-face with the tragedy of maternal and neonatal mortality in the developing world. So many mothers and babies that could have been saved with simple prenatal care and skilled care during birth. You can click here to watch a video posted on my other blog for more information about the tragedy of maternal mortality. (While you are there take a few minutes to read my other post - it has pictures of me as a kid!) I have spent the last three years learning as much as I can about how to help prevent these tragedies. Now I have the opportunity to use that education and skills to help the women of Indonesia. I will also have the opportunity to teach and help others learn those same skills. Some of the young nursers will soon be serving throughout Indonesia and hopefully one day in the world beyond through the MedGo Program (more on that soon). 

So that is a whole lot of words but as they as say a picture is worth a 1000 words, so here is my job description in pictures.

Teaching practical skills to nursing students

Providing medical care for other missionaries living in the area including "catching" their babies

Teaching nursing students in the classroom

Mentoring and Discipling

Coordinating short-term workers

Working with patients in the hospital

And of course "catching" a few babies

When?

I hope you all are enjoying a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend! There is much in my life to give thanks for including family and friends to being almost done with grad school and an amazing Lord and Savior!

So we have already talked a bit about who I am and what is happening in my life and now that I am officially appointed the natural question becomes when... When am I leaving for Indonesia?

To be honest it is a tough question to answer. The easy answer is as soon as possible however there are still many things to do. These include for example:

• Taking and passing my comprehensive exam and board exam to officially become a certified nurse-midwife. These are two separate tests - one for the school and one for national certification. I would love to be done before Christmas but there have been a few issues getting my final paper graded and getting the paperwork processed to get listed to take the exams.
• Lots of books to read and training to do to help me be better prepared for serving long-term in a developing country. Some of these include language acquisition and cultural adjustment training. I am also hoping to take a few more classes and training to round out my education in nurse-midwifery and focusing on practicing with low resources in the developing world. 
• Finally I will be raising financial support to cover my living and ministry expenses while I am serving in Indonesia. My monthly budget is going to be around $3,500. I will be sharing more about this in the coming months. 

How you can be part of the team?

• I am going to need lots of prayer in the coming days. Pray especially for my health that my Lyme Disease does not flare up. Pray that I will successfully pass my exams. Also be praying for the long list of things I need to do in preparation for departure and that I can take it one day and one step at a time. 
• If you are interested in helping out with my financial support please contact me as I would love to set-up a time to sit down one-on-one and talk with you about this partnership. 

So as you can see there is not an easy answer as to when I will be leaving but I trust in God's plan and His timing. 

Officially Appointed

As the picture of the name tag above shows... it is official! I have been appointed to serve as a long-term missionary with WorldVenture in Indonesia!! I have to admit it is a bit strange to know that this dream I have long had is one step closer to coming true. I have been told several times since I got here that my life will never be the same. So exciting and a bit scary!

Now I am in the midst of 10 days of training. So much information and things to learn. On Monday we also spent the day celebrating and this included time with my parents. It has been a lot of fun but also a lot of work. It is going to take me time to process all this. I am looking forward to getting home!

Taking the Next Step

As I write this I am sitting in the main office of WorldVenture in Littleton, Colorado. This is the organization that I served with in Indonesia before and I am looking forward to working with them again. They are a community of more than 500 missionaries working in more than 60 countries around the globe. You can click on their name above for more information.

Over the next few days I will meet with staff members and the board to discuss plans for the future. Hopefully this will culminate in a process called appointment, which is basically an agreement that we want to work together. Then for 10 days I will do training here at the office. This will include the arrival of a mentor (my pastor's wife in Everett) and my parents. I will do all of this as part of group with 10 other units (some single, some married, and some with kids). It has been fun getting to know them today. We are going to be good friends by the time this is over. 


It is going to be an exciting next couple of days!

So Why Go?

So one of the first questions I always get when I tell people I am planning to serve as a missionary nurse-midwife is... why in the world would you travel halfway around the world to serve where the work will be hard and hours long? You are young and single. You could set-up a practice here in the US and settle down and be happy. It is a good question and a good point! So here is the not so short answer...

Maybe you have heard about cardboard testimonies – they are a simple exercise that a group does to recognize what the Lord has done in the group members. On one side you write what your life was like before Christ and on the other side what it is like after Christ. You then share them with the group and celebrate what the Lord has done. Several years ago my pastor challenged our church to write and share several of these cardboard testimonies during a service. I have been a Christian for most of my life so my testimony is fairly simple. So instead I chose to highlight the change between my faith in the early years and the later years. I wrote on my cardboard testimony, “I allowed God to be part of my plan for my life” and other side “Living the adventure of God’s plan for my life." It is only through letting the Lord take the lead (and control!) in my life that I have begun to understand the joys and contentment of walking closely with the Lord. Does this require leaving my comfort zone and letting some of some of my dreams go - yes! It also means however that when this life is over I won't have to look back and wonder what would have happened if I had given everything to serve the Lord. I am excited to see where and what God has planned for the future.

PS - Ah ha and now you know the answer to another frequent question - why the name "Living the Adventure" for this blog :)

So first a little about me...

I was born and raised in a little town in the Columbia River Gorge in Oregon. The perfect place for a childhood with lots of places to play and for imaginations to grow. I am the oldest of four girls and my family is one of my biggest joys. I have wanted to be a nurse for forever or so it seemed as a kid. So after getting my Bachelor's in Nursing and working for a year at Seattle Children's Hospital I ended up halfway around the world ministering at Bethesda Hospital in West Kalimantan (Borneo), Indonesia. For three years I ate a lot of rice, learned a whole new language and way of life and discovered that the world is bigger than even the imagination of my childhood could dream up. I am back in the US now working a "normal" job at Providence Everett Hospital in their Family Maternity Center. Currently I am also getting my Master's Degree in Nursing from Frontier School of Midwifery and Family Nursing and studying to become a nurse-midwife. After graduation in the fall of 2010 I hope to return and serve in Indonesia with WorldVenture at Bethesda Hospital.

Welcome to my blog! Stayed tuned for more on this adventure known as life :)