When Rosibel enrolled three of her daughters at the Compassion center near her home in Honduras, she thought they would get their education fees paid for and maybe a few hot meals. But she never could have imagined the journey her family would begin when her youngest daughter, 3-year-old Yuliana, had her first medical checkup.
“I couldn’t afford medical evaluations for any of my children,” says Rosibel. “We barely had money to eat. Right after my girls were registered in the project, they went to the doctor for the first time. Their results not only showed that they were underweight but also that my daughter Yuliana had a heart murmur. If not for God’s intervention through the project, she would not be alive.”
In the weeks following her diagnosis, Yuliana’s Compassion tutor monitored her closely, making sure the little girl had plenty to eat at meal and snack times and sending home extra groceries with Rosibel. They also arranged for Yuliana to see a local cardiologist, but it was determined that the girl’s surgery was too advanced to be performed in Honduras.
“We couldn’t rest until we knew Yuliana would get the care she needed,” says Lilibeth, the project director. So while they worked on improving her overall health and getting her weight up, they also researched ways for Yuliana to get the life-saving heart surgery she desperately needed.
That research led them to a foundation in Colombia that agreed to take on Yuliana’s case. But she would have to travel from her home in rural Honduras to the bustling city of Bogotá. “We had never been outside the country before and I was afraid to leave,” says Rosibel, “but the life of my daughter was on the line. I didn’t know how to read or write, but the project staff always supported me.”