1st Panic Attack

So I had my first panic attack this morning. The day before I had sat in on a lecture about the plight of people with disabilities.. How they have been fighting for their rights as human beings in the community as well in their own homes. I guess to make what he was saying real, the lecturer pulled out an article that was dated a week ago. 10,000 Albinos have gone into hiding the article stated. I read further. People, specifically in Tanzania believe that the body parts of Albinos brings wealth and good luck. So they are being hunted and killed for their body parts which can fetch about 5 million shillings. I immediately thought of the Holocaust and the killing of thousand of Jews. I was shocked.. This country isn’t 40 years behind America, its all the way back in the dark ages, I thought. I didn’t know how I could continue sitting there listening to this. Then the lecturer focused on Kenya and how people treat their own disabled population. Before coming to Kenya, I was told about some ways Kenyans deal with their handicapped children. Some ways include tying them up in their rooms, keeping them in the house or letting them wander the village getting beat up by others. I was appalled when I heard this. I didn’t know how a human being could do this to another, let alone their own child. However, I never heard the reasoning’s behind it. The lecturer told us about a friend who had a child with a disability. There are no services here for families with children with disabilities. There is no day care, no special therapy or schools and no respite for these families. When parents have a special needs child and they have to work to put food on the table, who takes care of them? If they leave them to run around the house, they would come home to a house totally destroyed. I could almost see the reasoning’s behind it but still didn’t want to believe it. During the rest of the day, I was in a trance. I didn’t know how to deal with the information I was given. I went to bed still thinking about everything. At 5:30 the next morning I woke up and cried and I couldn’t stop crying. I felt so overwhelmed. I didn’t know what I had gotten myself into.
During our session, I asked a seasoned volunteer, what do I do? How can I survive my 2 yrs here without feeling defeated? How do I handle the times when my students are caned, abused or even taken advantage of? When other teachers don’t even respect the children they teach? She said, you are going to have days when you just want to run into your room, crawl into bed and pull the covers over your head. You will cry and wont be able to stop. But you will have days when you look at your students and know you are making a difference. Just focus on your students she said. There is a lot that needs to be worked on in Kenya, and its not going to change overnight but you can be a part of that change. When I got home I got an email from my mom who reminded me that even though America thinks it’s better than the rest of the world, we are the exact same, we just hide it better.