3 months pregnant and a broken foot

Just the other day Jako was commenting on how our blog updates didn’t seem to be as exciting as they were several years ago before the orphanage was established – back when we were in little rubber duck boats, praying the waves on Lake Kariba didn’t capsize us and feed us to the hippos and crocodiles that were everywhere.  Back when we were traveling from South Africa to Zambia every month or two, in borrowed vehicles, then our own 1964 Land Rover that Jako built (praying that it would make it because it was never really designed for the open road), putting up tents in the pouring rain and praying over difficult border crossings 6 or more years ago……. Well, I don’t know if God has a sense of humor or what but only a few days after Jako said that something “interesting” happened. 
We had just finished picking up the team from a Church in Florida (which included Amber’s brother Josh and new sister in law Katie) when at a mid-road trip stop, Amber went to go and stop Jakob from picking oranges (bright balls) from a friend’s tree.  After picking him up to direct him somewhere new, she accidently stepped into a trench that was covered by grass and subsequently twisted her foot and ankle.  Since we still had another 2 hour bush drive left before we got home Amber didn’t mention much and just hoped it would feel better in a bit.
Unfortunately when we got back to camp, it was evident that the injury was a bit more serious than originally thought.  Not only did she have a nice swollen ball on the side of her foot but she could put no pressure on it.  Not wanting to take any pain medicine due to being 3 months pregnant (surprise – now the word is out!) she tried to tough it out but woke up in tears because of the pain.  Fearing that the strain that she was under would be worse for the baby then a bit of medicine she did eventually took 1 tylenol and with a a bit of good ace wrapping from Jako she was able to make it through the night.  Praise God that that was all the pain meds that she needed to take the entire “adventure”.  The next morning, due to the pain we figured the foot was broken and decided to call our local African insurance company to see what they would suggest doing.
They were great to us and after looking at all the logistics (a four hour ride to the nearest good x-ray place, Amber being pregnant and not able to take pain meds etc.) they decided that the best course of action would be to fly Amber out via helicopter!  We were definitely surprised but weren’t going to complain.  Jako quickly got to work making sure the local soccer field was cleared, that they had a flag visible from the vehicle as a marker, and making sure they had the correct GPS coordinates in order to find us.  You can only imagine what the villagers were thinking as they saw the helicopter land, load Amber up and then take off.  There was definitely a crowd around the soccer field as many had never seen anything like this before.  While the helicopter ride wasn’t Amber’s favorite part of the whole trip (thank God for doggy bags) she did get to see a nice ariel view of their home, the orphanage and mission, and it did cut her travel time down from four hours to half an hour. The insurance company was great (thanks SES) and got her to x-rays and a doctor in the time that it took Josh (Amber’s brother) to do his first solo drive out of the bush and meet her in Livingstone.  Jako stayed back to help with the team and Alyssa picked up the slack of overseeing the cooking and other responsibilities that Amber normally handled. 
In the end the x-rays revealed that her foot was broken but we praise God that it was a clean break, with nothing out of place, only requiring a good cast and crutches for about a month and that the pain was greatly lessened once the cast was on. We were quite relieved to hear the news as we feared that if anything was out of place (as often is with foot injuries) she would have to be flown to South  Africa for surgery, and didn’t know what that would mean with her being pregnant.  Amber and Josh returned to the camp the next day and apart from almost daily visits from villagers wanting to see if she was okay, life went back to normal – well as normal as life can be when living on crutches.  The Lord knew the timing of everything though because the team was great at helping to care for Jakob, and taking over most of the “big cooking being on the feet a lot of the time” responsibilities and making sure that Amber had enough time to rest and recuperate.  Now Amber is looking forward to two dates.  July 3 when the cast finally gets to come out and mid December when the new baby is expected to arrive.  Praise God for his wonderful provision and watch care over all of us.