I woke up today without problems during the
night. I actually slept quite well,
which surprised me. I could tell I was
feeling much better, but was still cautious with my food choices. That seemed to work out well, since the rest
of the day went quite well. Throughout
class I still had some trouble focusing, but I think the bigger problem is that
I haven’t been studying. I’ve had a lot
of other problems that were more pressing.
Later, Samantha and I went to a training about
anthropometry, which is the technical term for weighing and taking the heights
of children. I did have a basic
understanding because of Peru, but I definitely learned things. We have a hanging scale instead of the table
one I used in Peru, but I am familiar with it now. Afterward we had the joy of putting what we
learned into practice! Now, I am already
familiar with the psychological warfare that takes place between hysterically
screaming children and the people charged with weighing them from Peru. That doesn’t make it enjoyable, but it is
tolerable. The first child we weighed
was almost 2 years old, and her sound-making abilities were nothing short of
world-class. Eventually we finished her
measurements, and by that point the boy of almost 4 years was already
crying. That’s never a good start. Getting him into the harness for the hanging
scale was a challenge, then his thrashing prevented an accurate measurement for
some time. Then was the height, which
was no better. Hopefully all of the
children aren’t quite that difficult, but chances are that we will have some
who don’t want to cooperate. Sadly,
these children were fairly typical in terms of stunting for this region of
Guatemala. Their weights were slightly
below average, but still far out of the “underweight” category that is based on
age vs. weight. However, in terms of
stunting, which is described as age vs. height, they were both in the severely
malnourished category. This occurs
because they are being fed something, which maintains their weight, but it is
not sufficient to correctly augment their physical development. Stunting is an indicator of future shortness,
weakness, and undeveloped brain functions.
Our study will be trying to tease out the root causes of stunting in a
place with such abundant natural resources.
As I have said before, it is completely different than anything I have
ever done before, but I am very excited for the lessons I will be able to learn
through this opportunity.
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