Blessing Sonni

Posted by Mercy Ships staff on Oct 14, 2011 at 09:26 am

Blessing Sonni is a very courageous young girl from Liberia. In 2008, when she was eight years old, she took a fall at school and damaged her knee cap. When the knee began to swell and fester, she was taken to a local clinic for treatment – but without a positive result.

The infection became so severe that her face swelled, looking as if she had been horribly burned. Blessing and her mother appeared at the Mercy Ships gate, hoping they could get medical help.

Blessing had so much untreated infection she could not be admitted to the ship. The Mercy Ships Admissions department routinely tests incoming patients for infectious disease, such as Tuberculosis and Malaria, which could put other patients at risk. Blessing was sent to Liberia’s JFK Hospital for treatment before she could be admitted to the ship. After treatment with penicillin at the hospital, her lips turned black. The doctors attributed this to a reaction to the penicillin.

Betty Ann Mann, a crew member on the Anastasis, had a well-established relationship with Blessing’s family. Betty later introduced another crew member, Rosemary Wall, to the family. Counting on their friendships, Blessing and her mother appeared at the Mercy Ships gate on the dock, hoping for medical help.

After Blessing was admitted to the Africa Mercy, tests proved that her malnourished body had been attacked by noma, a malicious bacteria that had eaten away her lips and portions of her leg. Noma is a gangrenous disease that attacks extremely poor children, usually between four and seven years of age, who suffer from poor nutrition and lack of hygiene. It often attacks after a childhood disease when the immune system is weakened. Noma eats away skin and tissue, killing many of its victims within a month. Only about two percent of victims survive the disease, although it can be easily arrested with antibiotics.*

The volunteer surgeons performed plastic surgery, removing skin from Blessing’s neck to make a foundation for her new lips. Skin from her upper thigh was transplanted to her knee. Since Blessing’s recovery lasted from April to November, she had plenty of time to build her friendship with Rosemary. Blessing left the ship when the field service ended, knowing more surgery would be needed in the future.

When Rosemary went home to England, she spoke about Blessing to the congregation at Frinton Free Church, her home church. The members wanted to help Blessing get the additional surgeries she needs to return to a normal life. They raised the travel funds to get Blessing from Liberia to the Mercy Ships 2011 Field Service in Sierra Leone.

Blessing and her mother returned to the Africa Mercy for the young girl’s next surgery. A special bonus was receiving many visits from Rosemary during the recovery time.

Blessing is a fourth-grade student, whose favorite subjects are science and the Bible. However, she has paid a great price to attend school. She has had to live with jeers and verbal abuse from students and teachers. The teasing suffered from insensitive classmates often reduced her to tears, but she made up her mind that she would not give up. Because of the physical problem with her leg, the school offered her “free grace,” which meant she didn’t have to do all the things the other students did.

“I don’t want free grace,” she emphatically declared. “Whatever the others do, I want to do.”

“By HIS grace, she can go to school,” said her mother. “No one looks down on you once you learn.”

Blessing is a spirited girl who is also spirit-filled.  She loves to sing, and she leads praise and worship at church, where both of her parents are pastors.

“I want to be a professional singer to encourage people, uplift them,” she said. “And I want to be a pastor’s wife.”

*Information taken from Dr. Gary Parker’s presentation on Noma

Story by Elaine B. Winn
Edited by Nancy Predaina
Photos by Debra Bell

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