When I left Los Angeles for Floating Doctors I was 27 years old.  It was a rainy LA early morning.  The streets were dark, empty, and glistening as my dad drove me to LAX.  We spoke in short spurts…most of that ride was filled with a silent apprehension, both of us knowing deep down that what and who I was leaving behind would be impossible to return to.

My Dad, having done medical missions all over the globe, knew what was in store for me. I had no idea of the incomprehensible changes ahead.  My journey with Floating Doctors has taken me a long way from the girl of six years ago…changed, re-shaped, and molded me into the woman that I am today.

As a soon-to-be mother, my mind is often pulled back to the countries my baby’s father, Noah Haas, and I have visited with Floating Doctors. I play back moments I shared with other mothers, children, and infants.  One moment above all has played in my mind’s eye over and over again during the 8 months of my own pregnancy.

It was 2010.  We were in the middle of our first deployment in Haiti.  We had been there for about a month, working hard, long days in the clinic. We were, also, ­­deep in the middle of construction of new schoolhouse on the clinic grounds to replace the one devastated by the earthquake.  Daily, we walked the ¾ of a mile from the beach where our small skiff came ashore to drop us off to make our way to the clinic, winding through the narrow passages of the make-shift tent communities that were set up in the surrounding fields.

I saw her one late afternoon, after a long day in clinic, the sunlight was fading, making dappled streams of gold pour through the gaps between the tents.   She was a beautiful, young Haitian woman, standing beneath a barren tree, holding a young baby boy swaddled in a worn out tee-shirt. He could have been no older than a week or two.  She stepped out into the path in front of us. She smiled shyly as she held her baby towards me.  He was beautiful.  I did my best to explain in broken Creole that I thought her baby was gorgeous.  I started to try to walk past her when she grabbed my arm and again held her baby out.  She said something that I didn’t understand.   “Tanpri, pran l ‘nan kannòt la.” She said it again, this time with a bit of force, trying to mask the sadness behind her voice.  I explained that I didn’t understand.  The young mother shoved her baby into my arms and again repeated her sentence, this time pointing towards the shoreline.   It was then that, without an exact translation, I understood what she was saying… we all did.  She was asking me to take this beautiful baby boy to the boat…to take him away from the rubble and destruction that he was born into… to give him a chance at a better life.  I stood there frozen with this baby boy in my arms. I could feel his little heart beating swiftly against my chest as my own heart broke.  In total silence, his mom and I locked eyes, hers pleading and mine fighting back tears for what seemed like forever.  I gave a slight shake of my head, unable to speak, and placed her son back into her arms and continued on, unable to look back.

This past October, 4 years and 5 months after that encounter, I sat surrounded by beautiful baby gifts… Graco Pack and Plays, swaddling clothes, Citi-Mini Stroller accessories, baby monitors…everything you can imagine.  35 wonderful, supportive, generous women attended my baby shower. While I sat unwrapping those beautiful packages full of pink lace and pristine baby gear, those pleading eyes washed over me in waves.  I kept seeing that young mother with her t-shirt swaddled son .

As I drove home after the party, my SUV packed to the brim with my growing family’s new gear, I wept.  I wept for the want that all children could be brought into the world with such love, support, and comfort, free of disease, with access to care, and the chance at a life free from the pains of poverty.

I will bear witness to that sad mother in Haiti to my daughter someday.  I will pass the experiences that molded my life to my child. I will tell her of my adventures…the beauty, the ugliness…the sadness, the joy…the despair and the courage that her Daddy and I have shared with the people we serve.  I want to share with her the true nature of giving and service expressed through action.  I want to help her understand that the difference between her and the one she is helping is a lot of luck, that we are all connected, some born to plenty, some not, but all deeply human. I want her to learn that to those to whom much is given, much is expected.

I am forever grateful to those that have supported me on my own journey into the magical, uncharted waters of my motherhood.  And I am grateful for all of you, our supporters, who have gifted us with the ability to be there for the mothers we are lucky enough to serve.  You make it possible for us to be available to care for mothers in distress during delivery, to be available in the middle of the night when a child is hot with fever, to save a child from the lifetime of consequences from a cleft palate or a heart defect., to provide prenatal care.  You make it possible to ease the fears of a new mom and see her face light up when we show her the heart beat of her unborn child on ultrasound.

None of this would be possible without you. I am grateful to be bringing my daughter into a world with people like you in it.  Thank You for what you make possible.

From all of us at Floating Doctors, Happy Thanksgiving.

Sky LaBrot

Chief Executive Officer, Floating Doctors