Dental Clinic in Village

I was fortunate enough to be able to work in the dental clinic rather than having to do some of the manual labor that some of the other women had to do. I learned how to load anesthetic syringes. Clean the instruments and help the dentist when needed. I was thoroughly amazed at the strength of these people. From little children to the adults, they were so grateful for an opportunity to get some relief. They probably didn’t even know about fixing cavities. They were coming to get teeth pulled, and they were happy to have this opportunity.

Brian, let who ever wanted to, pull the easy teeth. Most of us took turns.

It really was incredible, we ended up working at night as well, because the men wouldn't come during the day because they had to work. But there wasn't any electricity in the clinic. So a couple of the nights we were pulling teeth by head lamps. We had people come just to hold the lights so the dentist could work. One night Brian had to pull a really bad impacted wisom tooth. It took him an hour to get it out. We ended up holding the poor guys head up after a while because he couldn't hold it up anymore. Brian said that was the second hardest tooth he ever had to pull and he did it by flashlight in the jungle of Guatemala!!

There was this one little girl who was having some trouble with the anesthetic shot. I’m not sure if she had an abscess or what, just that she was being a little emotional about the situation. My heart went out to her, and I reached out to hold her hands and comfort her, as I did so she broke down more and started to cry. The dentist, Brian, stopped and nonchalantly asked me to back off a bit. As I did so, he went in and finished numbing her. As I stood back and watched, my heart going out to her, sending my vibes to let her know she wasn’t alone. I watched her toughen up. She stopped crying, and just did what was expected of her. When he was done, he then motioned for me to go ahead. But as I did so, I realized she was stronger now. She had actually grown. While we were waiting for the anesthetic to take affect. Brian explained to me, that by coddling her at that moment I was enabling her or giving her permission to cry and be weak. When I backed off, she had to rely on herself to get through it and actually found strength she didn’t know she had. Had I not actually witnessed it, I wouldn’t have believed him. It wasn’t till later, as I was talking on the phone with my sister, that something we were talking about sparked this analogy…

Here we are on Earth working through our own trials and problems. And here is Heavenly Father standing back in the wings so to speak, just itching, dieing to put his arms around us, but has the wisdom to know when to wait and give us the chance to find our own inner strength and grow. Recently I’ve had a couple of things really jump out at me, you know those aha moments. I think I knew this, but I don’t know if I knew it in this actual sense. It was first brought to my attention by my visiting teachers, when they came earlier this month and gave me the VT message. Elder Richard G. Scott in talking about the premortal existence said “We lived in the presence of God our Holy Father and His Beloved Son, Jesus Christ, in a premortal existence…We were told: “’We will make an earth whereon these may dwell; “’And we will prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them; “’And they who keep their first estate (that is, to be obedient in the premortal existence) shall be added upon;…and they who keep their second estate (that is, to be obedient during mortal life) shall have glory added upon their heads for ever and ever’ “You were taught and prepared for the circumstances you would personally encounter in mortality…Your memory of premortal life would be kept from you to assure that it would be a valid test, but there would be guidance given to show you how to live. Our Father’s plan for salvation in this life with the opportunity of returning to Him would be called the gospel of Jesus Christ.” (Ensign Nov 2005) Then just the other day I came across this quote from Elder Neal A. Maxwell: “I don’t think God is too interested in real estate. He owns it all anyway. He does seem to be incredibly interested in what happens to us individually and will place us in those circumstances where we have the most opportune chances to grow and to carry out our purposes” In the Lord’s loving and omnipotent micromanaging of our lives, we each have been given customized challenges and opportunities that can prepare our souls for eternity. All our trials, problems, experiences are to help us grow, I knew that… I have a testimony that Heavenly wants so very badly for us to succeed and won’t give us anything that we can’t handle or would make us fail. He has provided us a way through every one of them. As hard as it seems at the time we are facing some of these things, if we hold onto that promise, we will come through it. And if we have the attitude of, what can I learn from this, we will actually become better people. The thought that each of these trials, problems, experiences was customized for my individual growth and I actually agreed to them. Somehow gives me more strength to keep plugging on, and even helps me to overcome the thoughts of feeling sorry for myself.