Saving Lives @Rahima Moosa Mother & Child Hospital

Walking in the shops this weekend I was stunned to see that Christmas decorations and cards were already on the shelves – where has this year gone?  All of South Africa swept up by the Rugby World Cup spirit and the win of our amazing Springboks has seen the last few weeks fly by filled with hope, nerves on edge and an amazing community of spirit.

I held on to this hope as my heart also plunged thinking how hard this time of year is for so many of our beneficiaries.   Having walked the chronic journey with their ailing children for the past year (and often so many years before this one) many parents and caregivers are simply exhausted as December looms.  This November and the thought of Christmas or the end of year is something many of them face with dread.  Dread that stems from the fact that they have no more emotional energy let alone additional funds to help their family celebrate.

This is where you all come in, as amazing donors you have helped us keep the hope and dignity alive for so many beneficiaries and health professionals this year, ensuring that we can keep the momentum of the “Bokke’s spirit” rolling on into Christmas and beyond.  During the year, because of your generosity, we will be able to do another Footprints 4 Sam Superhero Food and Toiletry bucket drop in December to make sure that doctors and health professionals have something to give families who are in need this Christmas time.  We also have #GivingTuesday coming up on 28 November 2023, so hopefully this key day of fundraising will also help us build up additional capacity to keep our bucket programme and efforts of renovation at Rahima Moosa Hospital well on track.

Since our last update we have celebrated Mandela Day at the hospital, where together with our amazing donors we painted two patient areas that were in desperate need of some tender loving care in the neonatal ward.  These two rooms have been on my heart for a long time, as any child being cared for in those spaces previously literally looked like they had been forgotten at the end of a dreary and forgotten corridor.  Now the spaces are bright and airy and have a sense of warmth again.  A huge shout out to Universal Paints and the team at Hamilton’s Brushware who did the hard work and heavy lifting in ensuring that these two patient rooms could again be safely used.

We also celebrated #HatsOn4CPC which is a worldwide day of remembrance for Children’s Palliative Care.  Across the Country, our Corporate Donors and the community we support in the paediatric hospitals came together – staff, parents and children wore silly hats as a reminder of the importance of Children’s Palliative Care and how important all the principles of palliative care really are.   – Children’s Palliative care is all about teamwork, compassion, kindness, dignity and hope as well as quality of life while living with a chronic or life limiting illness.  All of these beautiful values which continuously resonated as we watched the Springboks battle game after game – eventually bringing home the much-coveted Web Ellis Cup.  Their journey to their record fourth Web Ellis Cup and Rugby World Cup Victory was paved by their resilience and ability to overcome adversity just like so many of our incredible beneficiaries and the health professionals that care for them!

May the end of this year be a blessed one for you all and may you have the strength and resilience and above all hope to look back on the year and stand proud because of the difference you have made in so many children and parent’s lives!

Thank you never seems enough!