One Month Home

Hello everyone we have been back in the states for about a month now. To say that it was easy to get back to our busy lives in the U.S. would be far from the truth. Although we were beyond excited to see our friends and family greet us at the airport, it was impossible to not feel a sense that we were leaving something behind.  (Although we did love the Dunkin Donuts iced coffees on our way home that many of us immediately got!)  

Our whole trip to the Dominican Republic feels very much like a dream.  There isn’t a day that goes by that we don’t find ourselves thinking about our amazing journey-whether it be looking through old pictures, listening to our authentic bachata or reggaeton CDs, or running into one of the girls from the group on campus.  There is a definite void in our day-to-day life as we begin to relive all of our amazing experiences with the people of the Dominican Republic, in particular, the people of Las Matas de Farfan.  We also miss the easy going lifestyle in the Dominican which can also be referred to as  “Dominican time,” not to mention the beautiful 80 degree sunny days!   It was so refreshing to be able to simply go with the flow of things, something that us nursing majors are NOT comfortable with.  We are so used to having a strict schedule and routine that we were all expected to go outside of our comfort zone to truly immerse ourselves in the Dominican culture.  

Since the trip we have had one meeting where we all discussed our feelings since returning to the U.S.  One of the major issues that we struggled with was how to even begin to explain our trip to friends and family who ask about it.  When asked, “How was your trip?”  it is nearly impossible to even begin to put to words the incredibly intense emotional moments that we as a group experienced together.  We all agreed that no one will be able to really understand our trip, even if we go through every picture that we have taken.  We as a group also discussed how we feel as though we all have a special bond that will never be taken from us and never forgotten.  Just in the short two weeks that we were together, we learned so much about each other, we got a little TOO personal at some points!  We are all so different and we each offer something to the group that proved to be essential.  We had no choice but to immediately get to know each other in a deeper way than just being classmates.  Through our trip we struggled with some pretty difficult emotions and experiences that made us all come together and raise each other up.  

There are so many things we now miss about the Dominican Republic. I think most of all we miss our host families. It was so amazing to have the opportunity to stay with a Dominican family. We learned so much about them and from them. Even though many of us were not fluent in Spanish we learned to communicate with them in other ways. Our families were so welcoming and we will never forget them. We also miss spending our time together. At school we only see each other in the halls or in class. Two weeks does not seem like a long amount of time, but it feels like it was an entire lifetime. We had early mornings and late nights, but I know we would all do it again if we had the opportunity.  

This trip would also not have been possible without our incredible and selfless professors that came with us.  After this trip we have gained a newfound respect for these amazing women.  We look up to them more than they will ever know, and hope to one day be only half the nurses that they are. Alicia, Dianne, and Donna are amazing and strong women who shared their love of people and nursing with us. Without their guidance we would not have been able to navigate the emotional and cultural aspects of this experience. They taught us so much more than nursing skill and technique. They shaped us not only into better nurses, but into better human beings.  It is impossible to summarize this experience or even begin to verbalize the effect it has had on us. All we can say is that we feel differently than we did before we took our journey to the Dominican Republic.  We are eternally grateful for this experience and thank you all for keeping up with our journey through this blog. The people from Las Matas de Farfan have given us something that will never leave us. Even though we only spent two weeks with these wonderful people their impact will last a lifetime.

On our last post it is only fitting to leave our audience with some of our favorite photographs!

Mi dios le pague por todo. 

Love Always,

Julia and Lauren

Day 11: 1/14/15 Funglode

 Today we all woke up in the beautiful Hotel Embajador and headed straight down to a delicious breakfast. Our day started early with a bus ride back to Funglode at 9:30am. At Funglode, we met back up to talk with Stefano Todde. Stefano has so many interesting and inspiring stories that he shared with us concerning his experiences in Zambia working with patients who had HIV. This was extremely relevant to us especially after visiting La Casa Rosada just yesterday. The next speaker was a man named Dr. Paulino. Dr. Paulino spoke about tropical diseases with us like Chikungunya, Malaria, Dengue, and many others! He focused on the mosquito born illness in the area of the Dominican Republic because it was the most pertinent to what we had just experienced. All of the speakers who spoke with us today were extremely interesting and answered any questions we may have had about the public health system in the Dominican Republic. 

Next we went to a beautiful restaurant for lunch. We ate outside underneath a giant tree. The scenery of the restaurant was amazing! We had chicken, salad, beef, rice, and passion fruit juice. It was delicious! Our friends from Funglode, Loriel, Mandi, Stefano and Christty, joined us for lunch as well! After we ate, we met back up with Dr. Paulino for a tour of a public health clinic in Santo Domingo. This clinic had dental, gynecological, pediatric, and other specialties all in the same building. It was very different from those you would see in the states. They took a lot of pride in the clinic and also told us they were working on expanding it in the near future. After the visiting clinic, we made our way back to the hotel, for a relaxing night off!

Casey Schwacke, S.N.

Day 10: 1/13/15 La Casa Rosada

It was our first full day back in Santo Domingo.  We started off the morning with a reflective meeting with the FUNGLODE staff.  This included all fourteen of the students, our three teachers, and the three program directors from the InteRDom, Christine, Lorele and Mandy.  It was nice to sit back and reflect on our experience in Las Matas de Farfan.  Each one of us shared our experiences and posed questions about the inequities in socioeconomic factors and health care.  This session was very helpful to come full circle with the first phase of our trip.  At the close of the meeting, the program directors provided information regarding our afternoon visit to La Casa Rosada.

After lunch, we headed to Casa Rosada.  This was something we were all really looking forward to.  Casa Rosada is a home for children with HIV/AIDS. The children ranged in ages from 0-15 years. They live at Casa Rosada because they were either orphans or their parents could not afford the proper medical care their child needed, or the parent/parents were sick themselves.  The parents  who chose to put their children in the care of Casa Rosada do not do so because they do not want their children,  but rather because they want what is best for their child and know that Casa Rosada is a safe place for their child to receive care.

Once we arrived we received a tour of the building and were told of the history of Casa Rosada.  La Casa Rosada literally translates to pink house.  This establishment began fifteen years ago when a young girl with HIV dreamed she lived in a pink house right before she died.  She passed away at nine years old, and in her memory Casa Rosada was born.   Ever since then , they have been supplying HIV/AIDS positive children with a place to live, receive medical care and treatments, education, as well as a staff that shows them nothing but love and affection.  Since the children are only allowed to stay until the age of 15, the staff of Casa Rosada makes sure they can find a secure family member for the child to stay with once they leave.  They also assist in medical payments until the child turns 18.  After this, they assist the child with finding a job, so that they can eventually support themselves and their medical payments.

When the tour was complete, we all gathered upstairs for our activity with the children.  The kids were in good spirits and appeared generally healthy.  First, we sang them a song about hand washing in English.  In return, they sang one to us in Spanish.  It was a lot of fun!  Then, we had an arts and crafts session with the kids that was focused around hand washing.  Not only were they able to learn some important information, but it was also therapeutic for them as well.  Throughout our time there, everyone was smiling, laughing, and truly having a great time.  The children were filled with so much love and appreciation.  Their happiness touched us all.  We were all in agreement that is was an amazing feeling and a fantastic day.

Unfortunately, due to privacy concerns we were unable to take pictures of the children.  However, we were able to capture a few of the facility itself.

Abigail King, SN

Day 12: 1/15/15

Our last full day in the DR started with a unique tour of the Colonial Zone or Historic City on Trikke scooters. Yes, I know scooters! Quite the way to ride in style! Along with our adorable tour guide, we went throughout the town visiting sites of the early Spanish settlers of the country including Columbus, El Museo de Las Casas Reales (Museum of the Real Houses), and had just enough time to get our souvenirs! ! 

Once back at the hotel, most of us jumped into the pool for one last swim. Finishing off our time in the sun, we were reminded all too well that we'd soon be returning to New England freezing temperatures. 

Through the wonderful Funglode/Interdom staff, we celebrated our last night in DR at the resturant El Conuco. Not only did we enjoy the wonderful cuisine, some of the girls got right to the dance floor! It was truly a great way to end the night and our time in DR with many laughs and precious memories!

Written/Photos by Janelle Amoako SN

Day 8: 1/11/15 Campo Day 2 Hondo Valley, Elias Piña

Today was our second clinic day. We were situated in the local church  in a town called Hondo Valle in Elias Piña about 2- 3 hours away from Las Matas de Farfan. We provided health care to over 150 residents of the community; women, men and children of all ages. We set up four nursing stations where we worked in teams of three. Our nursing assessments consisted of completing subjective and objective data including the medical health history. Many of the chief complaints consisted of stomach pain, skin itchiness and joint pain. The clients we saw that complained of a stomach ache explained that they felt something moving inside their body, we believed it to be parasites. Many people had parasites. Over half of the adults we saw had systolic blood pressures of 140 and over. Almost everyone were prescribed medications to manage their blood pressure but many reported lack of money to buy their medications. Some do not remember the last time they received medical attention in a hospital/clinic. Some didn't know how old they were.

As the church based clinic came to an end some of the students had an opportunity to visit another site to set up a second clinic. The second clinic area was at  the greatest distance from the center of the town. It was mainly agricultural  community where the workers attended to the crops but did not own the land. Most of the workers lived their entire lives in small wooden  houses near the fields they tended.  As we traveled up the uneven dirt road and through a stream, we saw adults and children walking around.  None of the children had shoes. As the agricultural workers arrived, we began assessing their health. Their living conditions were reflected in their health. Unfortunately every worker we assessessed suffered from one common issue: hunger.Three girls in a row sat down and complained of the same concern. Each had pain in their stomach, particularly early in the morning, so they would vomit to feel better and then they could have breakfast, yet the pain never really subsided. One said she used salt and juice of a orange to take away the pain. Now we were there to provide some simple pharmacy medications like Tums or Tylenol, but how do we fix hunger? How can we see the physical effects of malnutrition and not be able to do anything? We had some calorie packed peanut butter, but only enough for one pack per person. As our time came to an end, we had to leave through the back door to avoid being bombarded by people with more medical problems.  The personal products we gave away as we were leaving to try to give at least something to those who were waiting --- since we had no more supplies.  The most heart wrenching part of it all was sitting in the back of the truck to leave and having the entire community standing around us in hopes that we would stay and help them.

This was one of the most eye opening experiences for a group of nursing students to see, as we had to physically leave people who still needed help. We are all in this profession to help and heal others, and to leave someone behind is devastating. And these were not people who complained of a headache just to get pills, they genuinely wanted to be helped and could care less about having a bottle of pills that would eventually run out. Today we smiled, laughed, and cried together. The experience of today and the ones prior to this have molded us into one. These experiences have influences our perception of health, need, love and life.


By: Daniela Pena, GN and Kelly Benson, SN

Day 7: 1/10/15 Field Day/El Cecada/ Santa Lucia

Today was fun filled day, better yet a total shift from what we have experienced the past few days. Our field day was originally planned  with several activities for the children of las Matas but it turned out to go smoother than planned. The children were stoked to play baseball (which they take very seriously), soccer, frisbee, jump rope, and bracelet making (which turned out to be popular activity). Over a 100 children from ages 2-14 participated and received goody bags that contained crayons, candy, oranges, glow sticks, beanie babies, sun glasses, hats, and stickers.

Field day ended at noon. We transitioned our day by taking a trip to El Cecada where we had a delicious lunch with nursing students from San Diego university. It was interesting to hear their purpose for being in the DR as well as how their nursing program was structured. Apart from this we took a small tour of the retreat center and took pictures with amazing scenery. 

We then took a trip to meet the women who started the Nutri-Fort movement.  Nutri-Fort  is fortified peanut butter supplement given to malnourished children and adults. It was interesting to hear how these women initiated the movement with literally nothing and how they their business has expanded. This Nutri-Fort workgroup of women served to empower the women of this community. This occurred within a patriarchal society. We were astonished to learn that these women do not work for themselves but for the business as a whole. We ended our time at El Cecado by buying peanut butter and "dulce". The money that they made will help pay for their electricity bill.

Our day ended with attending Mass at the Catholic Church, Santa Lucia of Las Matas de Farfan. The people of this community take religion as a source of strength and hope. We were honored to have been invited to the front of the church at the end of mass to be acknowledged publically by the congregation.

To wrap up our night, we went out dancing to El Clasico, a small night club in Las Matas, where we danced to a variety of music, bachata, merengue, salsa and even techno. It was quite an eventful day and definitely one to remember.    

Written by: Maria Montoya

Photos by: Maria Montoya, Emily Nugent, Caitlynn Wright

Day 9: 1/12/2015 Travel Day Las Matas to Santo Domingo

Day 9: 1/12/2015
Back to Santo Domingo

Today, our journey has ended at Las Matas De Farfan. It has been very difficult for us to say our goodbyes to our host families since our experiences have touched us significantly. It is a bittersweet feeling to be going back to Santo Domingo. During the ride home there were a few military stops. We also stopped to buy some sugar cane which was very interesting to see!

After the five hour bus ride back, we arrived at El Embajador Hotel. What a complete difference! Most of us spent the afternoon by the pool trying to get some sun! After our time in the pool, we decided to end our night by going to a fancy restaurant right outside the hotel called "Argentinos." We enjoyed the cuisine. What a wonderful evening we had!

Written by: Natasha Escudero, SN

Photos by: Natasha Escudero, SN and Emily Nugent,SN