How I Got Stitches in Costa Rica

So here’s the story of how I got stitches in Costa Rica: 

A couple of weeks ago, my squad was at a kids ministry in Los Chiles (near the Nicaraguan border). We had an amazing morning with a group of kids, talking and singing about Jesus. 

After the ministry, as usual, we played soccer with the children. We did a guys versus girls match and had so much fun! The field was pretty small, and wasn’t actually a field at all – but we made it work. At one point, I had the ball and saw several tiny bodies running at me. I got caught up in between a few of them, and fell to the ground. 

As I fell to the ground, I looked down at my knee expecting to see maybe a few scrapes. Instead, I saw a gaping hole in the top of my right knee. My immediate thought was, ‘yeah, I’m gonna need stitches’. (There were a couple of stray, ragged rocks from a huge pile nearby that I fell on.)

All of the kids were worried and someone ushered me to a nearby house to wipe up the blood. I walked into the kitchen of a family I didn’t know. Some women from the church started wiping off my leg. As I looked up, like 30 kids were staring at me, with concerned faces.

As we waited for the car to pick me up, several kids came up to me. They showed me their scars and told me the stories of how they got them. 

When our ride finally rolled up, I realized that we would need to go back to our home in the jungle in order to get my insurance card and passport. As we passed down the long road to our jungle home, we stopped at a neighbor’s house – I assumed to ask for medicine or advice. I assumed wrong. Our host ran in the house to pick up a bottle of goat’s milk. 🙂

We finally made it into town. I was dropped off at a clinic to wait for the doctor (with no translator). After waiting an hour for the doctors to get off lunch, they finally reopened the clinic and I was allowed inside. I went in by myself and had to rely on my little Spanish to explain what happened and how I thought I needed stitches. 

I gave the receptionist my passport and they asked where I lived in Costa Rica. I had absolutely NO idea what the address was. All I could say was that I lived in the middle of the jungle in Los Chiles. And this of course, became very comical for the clinic. Before I knew it, there were about 6 employees asking me questions and laughing. I became known as the gringa from the jungle. 

Soon I went back to a room to speak with the doctor. They asked me to lay down on a table to look at my knee. I was a little reserved when I saw that the sheet had a blood stain on it.. But the doctors kept telling me that it was fine, so I just went with it. 

They explained what they were going to do, and I was able to understand most of it. I had to trust that they knew what they were doing. I just laid there as they numbed my knee, cleaned it, and then (I assumed) put stitches in. They wrapped it up and gave me instructions of which I only understood two things: don’t bend my knee & only clean it with soap and water. 

When I got back to my squad, everyone asked if I had gotten stitches. My response was, ‘I think so?’ The next day is when I found out that I did in fact get stitches, and that they had given me six. 

I got my stitches out after 10 days (before leaving Costa Rica) and I spent two and a half weeks not bending my knee. When my squad first arrived in Colombia and found out we were living on the fifth floor with no elevator, I was skeptical. But I’ve made it through. 🙂 

This experience was interesting to say the least! I have officially gotten stitches in a foreign country, and I did it not fully knowing the language. Because it was considered an emergency, I didn’t have to pay a dime. And I’ve almost fully recovered now. Prayers that it continues to heal so that I can participate in ministry fully!