Solange Mwamini: A story of pregnancy, two operations and a miracle baby

Mwamini initially thought she would get some medication and get better in a matter of days. It was wishful thinking. The gynaecologist informed her that she needed an urgent operation. How urgent? In a week’s time. The acute appendicitis could be fatal in a matter of days if she was not operated on, she was told. 
“I cannot have the operation. I am four months pregnant,” Mwamini told the doctor.

 “You don’t need to worry. The operation won’t tamper with your pregnancy,” the gynaecologist told her. 
A storm started brewing in her mind instantly. A mixture of wild motherly instincts and pregnancy hormones flooded her entire being. There was no way she was going to let herself get an operation while pregnant. She was in utter panic. 

Sleepless in exile
“The operation will not affect the baby,” the doctor insisted probably after noticing her reaction. 
“You do not know that!” she told him. She was utterly incredulous.

What she didn’t tell the doctor is that her misgivings were multifaceted. Mwamini was still reeling from a traumatic loss of her uncle, a man she called dad because he had partly raised her. The man happened to have died during a surgery less than two months before. The trauma of that loss made her believe that she too, would die during the operation. The fact that she was pregnant made it so much worse. 
“One week,” the doctor emphasized as Mwamini walked out.  

Mwamini is a Congolese refugee living in Kampala. In 2016, her husband could not stand constantly worrying about the safety of his wife and their four daughters. So he brought them to Uganda in 2016 and returned home to war-tone eastern Congo to toil for them. When Mwamini went back home that day, she had no pillar of strength to prop her up. She had no shoulder to lean on. She called him on the phone and poured out her heart, but that was it. No hug, nothing.  

“Only God could come through for me. I felt finished. I knew I was going to die. I said, ‘Lord, it means now is my time.’ Then I said, “But look at these kids. Four children. The oldest is 11. How will she look after her younger sisters at that age? What will happen?’” she reminisces. 

She couldn’t sleep for several days. She would lie in the bed and just stay there, not knowing what to do. She didn’t know which decision to take. Whether to go for the operation and risk dying under the surgeon’s knife or not going for the operation and risk dying from peritonitis, a dangerous infection that is caused by a burst appendix. 

“So, I started praying,” she says. 

“Usually when I pray with a heavy heart and I need a word from God, I have my Bible near me. I open the Bible at random and whichever word I chance upon first, I try to see God’s voice in it. I opened the Bible during my prayer and it fell on Psalms 23. I took a picture of the scripture for remembrance,” she says. 

This was comforting, but only a little. She called her pastor and told him what she was going through. She needed him to pray for her. 

“I said, ‘If you can find a way to come home, that would be great.’” She says.

Try and remember
The pastor promised to come over and pray for her the next day. As soon as he got off the phone, he went to pray. He asked God for a word for the distressed mother. And God gave him a word, all right. The word was Psalms 23. The pastor called back shortly afterwards to encourage Mwamini. 

“When he told me, I replied and said that the same exact passage had been given to me. I sent him the picture I had taken. This was a good sign,” she says.

That night, Mwamini had an amazing dream. Unfortunately, when she tried to remember it, she came up with nothing. The next day, when the pastor came home to pray for her, he told her that he felt in his spirit that God had spoken to her in a dream. 

“I did not remember any such dream. He asked me to search my head and see if I had had any dream that I had forgotten. So I started searching and like a miracle, the dream came back to me in full,” she says. 

The dream
In the dream, Mwamini was lying on a theatre bed in hospital. There were four or five doctors just about to start working on her. Then she saw two angels enter the room. 

They were dressed in all white and light was enveloping them. They proceeded to tie up the surgeons and huddle them in one corner. The angels operated on her in silence. In her dream state, she could see her family and friends outside, crying, worried that she wouldn’t make it.

“I told the pastor about the dream and we agreed that this was confirmation that God would be with me throughout the operation. After narrating that dream, I felt free. It was as if all my burdens were gone,” she says. 
Mwamini called the doctor and told him that she was ready for the operation. 

Baby Hondi is born
Four months after the appendectomy, Mwamini went to the hospital, this time for the surgery that would deliver her baby. Because she had had a surgery during her pregnancy, she had been advised to opt for C-section because she was not in position to give birth naturally. The baby was born at eight months. 

“As I sat alone waiting for the operation to start, it occurred to me that no matter how many friends and family that were praying and wishing me well, they were not allowed to be here with me. I  would face this challenge alone. In my powerlessness, my life was in God’s hands. It was just me and God,” she says.

Even with the reassurance that had come with the dream mentioned above, it occurred to her that at the point of death, you are all lone. You are humbled by your powerlessness. 

“It was an introspective moment. I knew I was exposed but I knew God knew me. It made me want to be better so that when I eventually face death, I am not so ashamed of myself,” she says. 
She entered the theatre anxious of what lay ahead. 

“You are with child,” the surgeon started to prep her. “This is not like any other operation. We are going to make you sleep. We are also going to make the baby sleep. This means that we must balance the anaesthesia in such a way that it is not too much for the baby, and not too inadequate for you.” 

The surgeons thought they should let me know what they were up against. 

The mark
The operation was successful. When they handed her the baby boy, she noticed that he had what appeared to be a scar on the left side of the bed.

“I asked the doctor how it was possible that the baby had a scar on his head and the doctor said, ‘Remember the operation you had a few months ago, it seems we may have touched him.’” she says.  

She believes the mark was a wink from God to Mwamini, to remind her that He had been in control. To her, the mark is a sign of the covenant like Jacob’ s limp after he wrestled with God. 
God was here.

Expert weighs in
Medics at Henrob Hospital Zana where the baby was born comfirm that Baby Hondi was born with a mark on his head. One doctor explained that you can’t cut the uterus as well as the amniotic sac and the pregnancy remains. 
“It’s like, you have a two-layered bag inside the abdominal cavity. In that bag, is the foetus. The [appendix] is in the cavity also alongside the bag. The first layer of the bag is the wall of the uterus. The second layer is the amniotic sac that contains the fluid the baby swims in.

“You could make a cut on the bag as you do the appendectomy. However, injuring the uterine wall, as well as puncturing the amniotic sac would lead to the fluid leaking out and a miscarriage. Chances of the baby surviving a cut to the uterus are really slim,” she said. 

Baby Hondi Jacques Mugaruka is two years and two months today. The mark is about two inches long, and perfectly flat. It’s in the shape of a dagger. Hondi aptly translates to ‘Here I am’. And what a handsome boy he is.