on being discouraged

I try very hard to celebrate the successes, to be thankful for what I have and I've been really working to keep the positive things focused on the blog lately but as evidenced from the weekend's entry, I'm not always successful.

But it gets discouraging here because everything, every single thing, is so hard. Some days its hard to have the energy to keep fighting the battle.

Why should it take 4 months, >10 meetings with 3 NGOs, 2 UN agencies, 4 MoH departments. 2 hospital departments and two weeks of stalking a pharmacist to get a drug that is provided by the Canadian government FREE for all Burkinabe kids (vitamin A)?

I keep hoping that something, anything, just one thing, will go smoothly, easily. That PlumpyNut will rain out of the sky. That we will get the liquid kaletra before Aimane dies.

We are all trying so hard, working such long days and nearly every weekend and it is never good enough - that's probably whats hardest. Maybe that's part of why most of our local colleagues throw up their hands and say "it can't be done" - like the Vitamin A story (at the beginning, several people told me that Vit A was not available to the hospital, that there was nothing that could be done about the fact that we didn't have it).

We do have victories and despite the fact that i am really discourged, I think, I hope that we are making progress; but none of this comes easily.