Heat & Hydration

Today was hot. Well, everyday is hot, but for some reason, today it really hit me. I think that I was verging on heat exhaustion. Acclimitizing to heat involves the expansion of blood plasma and extracellular fluid & increased rate of sweating, all in order to keep the body's core temperature cooler. An acclimatized person will require more fluids than someone who is non-acclimatized.

I have been drinking about 4 liters of water per day and still feelnig thirsty. I don't know what the tempurature outside is, but inside teh clinic, the galvanized corrugated steel roof radiates heat back down on us like a broiler oven. John says the roof is at least 130 degrees, and during this trip, insuluting reflective sheets were installed on most of the clinic building. The sheets were donated by a company that has a distributer here in Honduras in San Pedro Sula.

This morning, we ran out of water. We have been using the large 5 gallon "water cooler" jugs and have gone through at least a dozen of them. I began to conserve the water I had left, and by noon, had had less than a liter. I felt hot. The air was sticky and not moving at all. I started to get sleepy, I couldn't concentrate, I had to go somewhere else for a break.

I found myself sitting in a chair in front of the open door to the men's sleeping area. A hot breeze cooled my skin and made it tingle all over. In front of me was a small concrete porch, cinder block latrines to the right, the satellite dish to the left, and the red dirt just beyond the concrete porch. Beyond was a brand new chain link fence the men are building and just beyond that, the neighbors "yard" with a single coffee tree that had many ripe berries. Three chickens grazed among the grasses growing there. As I cooled off a little, another three chickens came walking by right in front of me from behind the latrines. I got up from my chair and chased them back and forth two or three times in a comical fashion until they had all squeaked underneath the new fence.

I had cooled off a bit, went back to clinic, finished my water. About an hour later, we were treated to a long thunder & lightening storm. Clinic finished early, and I got out a soccer ball for our first game with the kids. It poured down rain and we slipped and slid all over the muddy red field in front of the clinic. We got so muddy that we just showered with our clothes on.

-Suzanne Atkinson