On my mission to Japan, me and my companion (or "dode," as we referred to our missionary sidekicks in our unique English rendition of the Japanese word "doryo"), were asked by a local Mormon Japanese family to give a priesthood blessing to their baby who had been born with a cleft palate.

In preparation for that event, we fasted the day of the blessing.

Having dodedly and devotedly denied ourselves food so that we could be spiritually-focused on the task before us, we went to the hospital and entered the room where the baby was being treated.

Taking one look at the unfortunate child, I promptly fainted.

Hitting the floor, I came to and found myself looking up into a circle of concerned faces hovering over me, backlit by bright overhead ceiling lights. Kinda like a near-death experience, I guess.

I was never able to figure out how following priesthood-blessing protocol by faithfully fasting beforehand--only to then faint on scene and not be able to perform the scheduled ordinance--was my destined fate on that non-blessed day.

Perhaps if I had been more in tune with the Spirit and requested my own personal priesthood blessing prior to going to the hospital (one complete with the anointing of consecrated oil), I would have been able to concentrate on blessing that child.

Instead, I end up losing consciousness and communing with the linoleum.

And I never heard back on whether the priesthood blessing given to the infant healed its cleft palate.



Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/2013 05:31PM by steve benson.

of the medically-trained surgeon.

A cleft pallet is not visible. It's on the inside of the top of the mouth. A cleft lip is visible. I presume it was the latter.

Assuming he fainted upon seeing the child's deformity? Or did he faint at that moment for lack of food?

. . . in conjunction with the fasting, they worked together to bring me down. Glory be to God.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2013 05:57PM by steve benson.

. . . is interchangeable, at least in everyday parlance.

"Babies may have cleft lips with or without cleft palates. Cleft palates may also occur without cleft lips."

http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Cleft+lip+and+palate



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2013 05:53PM by steve benson.

"Babies may have cleft lips with or without cleft palates. Cleft palates may also occur without cleft lips."

I believe a cleft palate without a cleft lip is pretty rare.

At any rate, whatever.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2013 05:55PM by steve benson.

Chump Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Babies may have cleft lips with or without cleft
> palates. Cleft palates may also occur without
> cleft lips."
>
> I believe a cleft palate without a cleft lip is
> pretty rare.



A cleft pallet may or may not have a cleft lip, unilateral or bilateral. The terms are very specific, medically.

It's difficult to look at a cleft lip (what would be visible) if it's not been seen before.
It happens. We've experienced it.

I think, just guessing, the fainting was from lack of food. That happens - very common, I would think. Also locking the knees.

. . . that the cleft palate without the cleft lip is not often seen. Can we move on, or do you insist on remaining hung up on this?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2013 06:05PM by steve benson.

This is probably the 5th time this week that I've thought to myself that I'm not at all impressed with SusieQ

Indeed. What's up Susie?

This is entirely correct. Just in case anybody wondered whether Steve had the correct intel on this or not. (It usually isn't "not" with him!)

I also agree that in "common parlance" many people, including medical personnel, say "cleft palate" meaning a combination of cleft lip and cleft palate. Too, I assume that as Steve says they were called to the hospital to bless a baby with a cleft palate then it was a cleft palate, as the parents who called the missionaries likely knew their child's specific diagnosis. As it was so visible, it was likely a cleft palate/lip and they said cleft palate meaning both, which is not unusual, as above.

It is likely that Steve is also correct with his own diagnosis in that the combination of fasting (possible hypoglycemia) and unexpectedly seeing this visible type of birth defect (yes, they do vary in degree) could have caused the faint. It could have been the hot lights too. I've had this happen to me in the OR at times when I didn't eat breakfast and some sights or sounds got to me as well as the stifling mask and gown that can make you hot and claustrophobic. (Of course, I'm a legend of squeamishness, for a nurse, but anyway...).

So yet again, Steve would seem to be right on both counts. Don't you hate it when that happens?!

LOL re the near death experience. Next time we have a thread on that topic Steve will have to 'fess up that he has had one too.

http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/ears/cleft_lip_palate.html

Now you're an honourary 'nurse', giving in to black humour about a medical situation. :)

In any case, what happened after that? Did they take you to ER, or give you some juice, or take you out for breakfast? Why couldn't you go back to give the blessing later? Or did someone else do it?

Details - we always need more details!

(And did the parents, or your comp, or anybody else actually think a blessing would be curative?)

I think that the requested Mormon priesthood blessing for the child was more for the emotional benefit of the family which, of course, was hoping that it would benefit the baby in some sort of physical way.

I never heard that it did--and, equally, of course--don't believe that it actually cured the condition. (Plus, we weren't called back to render further oily aid).

This is the kind of skepticism that comes from living in the real world, where one bumps one's head up against facts.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/2013 05:28PM by steve benson.

"A cleft pallet is not visible."

That's why he fainted. Expecting to see a cleft pallet, he thought the child was healed when he walked into the room and, therefore, that the entire mormon thing was true.

Do I get to derail the thread by stupidly arguing that it was probably laminate and not linoleum that Steve fell on?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2013 06:10PM by steve benson.

Maybe it was like a King Lamoni experience. Did you wake up prophesying?

As the parent of two cleft affected children (don't ever use the term 'harelip' unless you want to be cheerfully punched in the throat by a mother), I can sort of understand the dilemma. What drives me up the wall is the "shocking" pictures they use to get people to donate to the cause of third world children getting necessary surgeries.

I'm going to go with the lack of nourishment that led to the fainting. Most of the time my kids got a grimace pre-op, nobody fainted.

Poor Steve :-)

And I would also tend to agree with your diagnosis that my fasting set me up for failure. :)



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2013 06:42PM by steve benson.

Maybe because I am just plain fixated on how I hate and despise ( I don't even know that those words are strong enough) the fact that the MormoneyInc. sends out teens on missions when they are just plain not old enough to be exposed to some of the adult experiences they are bound to be faced with.

This is one of those experiences. Steve, glad that you did not wake up needing stitches!

Haiti was a place many years ago now that a child of mine was sent on a mission. She was NOT prepared at all by the so-called church for what she was going to see there. My husband and I attempted, first of all, to persuade her to request a different mission (we were not in favor of her going out on a mission at all, as we had left the church in every way except an official resignation) but she would have none of that. This is the place she had been called by the Lard to go period. So from then on out we attempted to educate her on what she was really going to see and experience in the poorest, dirtiest country in the world. However, books did not prepare us for the half of it.

I believe that to this day she has emotional scars, and probably nightmares, of want that mission did to her. But, she is a TBM, we are the apostates, and to share much of the real story of her mission is something she still to this day has not done, and I will be shocked if she ever does.

Oh pleeze, may she find the truth someday about her church.

I always start laughing when these threads go off on a tangent.

I still get a chuckle remembering when someone wanted to point out how lame his ward members were because they plopped raw cookie dough down for him. Perhaps he envisioned a thread of lame ass ward moves but instead, it went off on a discussion of correct food handling procedures and if baking temperatures could redeem the dough.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/2013 05:34PM by steve benson.