Unfinished Stories

Lives we are still walking with.

These are not finished stories. They are ongoing — and your support helps determine how they end.

Sierra Leone amputees Sierra Leone community Sierra Leone prosthetics Sierra Leone children
Sierra Leone

A Step Forward

Sierra Leone suffered through years of bloody civil war. Rebels sought to maximize terror by targeting children for amputation. Years later, Sierra Leone has one of the highest numbers of amputees per capita in the world, yet prosthetics remain almost unheard of there.

After we began helping one boy get fitted for prosthetics, word spread quickly throughout the community. Dozens of other amputees have reached out, hoping their lives can be changed as well. Our resources are limited, but we will do what we can to bring healing and practical help to this community.

India

Can We Change a Trajectory?

After revisiting a video from 18 months ago, I watched again the story of a thirteen-year-old girl named Mina. She said she spends 12 hours a day searching through garbage for items she can sell or trade for food. When I asked about her dream, she said she wanted to become a police officer.

Seeing her story again affected me even more than it did the first time and made me reconsider what might be possible. I thought, "Why not?" So I reached out to my contact in India to see if he could find her and help us explore whether we could support that dream.

He returned with the difficult news that her father had recently died and that she had moved away from the waste picker colony. I am not willing to accept that this chapter ends here. I want to keep looking for Mina and see whether we can help make the impossible possible.

India waste picker colony