This is Ahmed. Ahmed is from a city called Nasiriyah, Iraq, and he was born with congenital heart disease.
Like most parents who give birth to a child with a heart defect, they noticed something was wrong with their son so they quickly took him to the local doctor. Unlike many parents in the West, however, Ahmed’s didn’t have access to a doctor or hospital that could say anything more than, “Your son has heart disease. I’m sorry, there’s nothing I can do to save him.”
Since Ahmed’s birth, his parents have heard the same message spoken to them over and over again: “Your son has heart disease but there is nothing in this country that can be done for your son.” Still, this didn’t stop their pursuit of a remedy.
Several years later they heard that Ahmed could receive surgery in Baghdad. The family quickly packed and arrived at the hospital in the capital city only to find doctors leaving the hospital apologizing that they had run out of time to save Ahmed.
Instead of losing hope like so many would have, they never let up looking for someone to save their son. That five year search ended just a few days ago when the Vice President of Iraq worked to include Ahmed in our Remedy Mission.
So a few days ago they quickly packed up the car again and drove to an unknown city with the hopes of healing Ahmed’s broken heart. Unfortunately, this amazing story of hope and restoration doesn’t lead to a healthy, happy heart so smoothly.
On their journey to be included last minute in our Remedy Mission just a couple days ago, Ahmed and his parents were in a tragic car accident that left both mom and dad in critical condition.
Since they were still close to their home town of Nasiriyah, they were taken back to their local hospital where Ahmed was entrusted to his uncle in hopes that he could still make it north and not miss yet another chance to get his heart healed.
Ahmed sat on the floor today clutching his ankles because the position helps him breath. While he sat there looking so vulnerable, his uncle told us that unless there was a miracle, Ahmed’s mother wasn’t going to survive the accident. I asked him what it would mean to Ahmed’s parents and family to hear that Ahmed’s heart was about to be made well. He smiled…
Ahmed is scheduled for surgery in the next few days. For all of you who have ever donated to the Preemptive Love Coalition, Remedy Mission is your success. We are so grateful for all of your hard work to make this happen.
Remedy Missions are international pediatric heart surgery teams that we bring to Iraq to to perform lifesaving heart surgeries and develop the infrastructure for the future. If you’re on Twitter this week be sure to use the #Remedy or #RemedyMission hashtag to describe all the good news coming out of Iraq this week via @preemptivelove and @babyheart_org. If you’re on Facebook, “Share” this story with the button below.
Photos by Heber Vega.
