FROM: Bush Bun­ny Bren­da DATE: Feb­ru­ary 17, 2024 IN MEMORY OF MADELINA On Sat­ur­day night, Feb. 10th at 8:30pm, my phone rang. Nev­er a good sign. Head Fos­ter Moth­er, Gil­da was breath­less and very upset as she told me that Baby Madeli­na (who had been doing fine after being released from the hos­pi­tal 5 days before) was in crit­i­cal res­pi­ra­to­ry dis­tress. I raced down there, took one look at the infant, and said ‘let’s get to the hos­pi­tal’. Madeli­na was mouth breath­ing at a rapid rate, and had a very dis­tend­ed abdomen with a low grade fever. The Head of the Emer­gency Room placed an IV into her lit­tle hand, giv­ing her the strongest bron­codila­tor she could take, and IV antibi­otics, as well as the hospital’s pre­cious oxy­gen. All this helped, and her res­pi­ra­tions slowed. She slept through the night with lit­tle change. She then slow­ly declined the fol­low­ing morn­ing despite everyone’s efforts, and at 3pm on Sun­day, baby Madeli­na grad­u­at­ed to Heav­en to be with Jesus. It was very upset­ting to all of us, as she had fought so hard to get bet­ter after her seri­ous bout with malar­ia. We think that her aller­gic reac­tion to one of the med­ica­tions, as well as the liv­er dam­age that malar­ia can cause, were the cul­prits that led to her demise.

Baby Madeli­na with Fos­ter Moth­er Felicina.

WE MISS HER DEARLY, but she is in the most per­fect place now with Jesus. He gave her a new body that allows her to play to her heart’s con­tent.  Please keep her Fos­ter Moth­er, Felic­i­na, in your prayers, as she was hit the hard­est of all of us. She cared for this pre­cious infant for the entire year that Madeli­na was with us. Madeli­na had just had her 1st birth­day on Jan­u­ary 18th.

Baby Jumai­da. No cloth­ing as she had a fever.

This week has been a bit rough on all of us as we still have baby girl Jumai­da in the hos­pi­tal, slow­ly recov­er­ing from an uniden­ti­fied infec­tion. She is now eat­ing bet­ter and on the road to recov­ery. Please keep all of us in your prayers, as the needs of our 58 chil­dren are the high­est pri­or­i­ty we have.School is now in full ses­sion, and every­one is set­tling into the school year rou­tine. THANKS FOR ALL YOUR LOVE AND PRAYERS, FOR THEY TRULY KEEP US ENCOURAGED.

BLESSINGS,  BUSH BUNNY BRENDA LANGE AND THE BALAMA STAFF