Creatures of the Night

    My house is known for having bats living in the ceiling. Friday nights when we are all eating popcorn and watching movies it is normal to see a bat swoop in to perch in its home inside our ceiling. Since I have been here, we have all joked that the bats are the houses pets.
    This week we have had 2 bats fall from the ceiling. When this happens, the normal protocol is for one of the teenage girls to grab a broom and they push it outside. Typically one of the boys playing outside our home kills it. The older boys home came to our house yesterday to climb into the ceiling and exterminate. The boys couldn't find the bats, but we could still hear them screeching.They plan to continue there search Monday.
    Last night while all the girls were eating dinner, my two kids were sitting in the living room. Neither one of them have fully recovered from being sick last week, so I didn't want to torture them by making them sit at the dinner table. I was standing in the doorway between the kitchen and living room when I heard my kids screaming. I looked to find another bat flopping around on the floor. This was our third bat to fly down from the ceiling this week!
    As normal, the older girls stood up from the table and grabbed a broom. All 16 kids were crowding into the living room to survey the situation as Collin, the house-dad, and I were trying to get the kids away from the bat. One of the girls decided to try to step on the bat and then pick it up. As all the adults were yelling for her not to do this, the bat bit her. Of course, that was our fear and now we had a huge problem on our hands. What if she contracted rabies from this bat?
    The adults in the house sprang into action. Collin captured the bat and I called the nurse practitioner contact I have here in Guatemala. A lot of the missionaries literally began running around campus to get a vehicle, get a driver, get directions to the hospital, grab her medical history paper work. Others of us called the director to get permission to take her, get keys for the van, put the dead bat in a bag, and packed a bag for a potentially long night at the emergency room. The houseparents rushed her to the emergency room and I watched the other 15 kids at the house.

The dead bat in the bag.

    At the hospital, they gave her the first out of three vaccine shots for rabies and something to stop the itching from moving up her arm. The doctor's orders at this point are to watch for any extreme changes in her mood. The house-parents and I laugh at this. When aren't teenagers moody? How will we ever be able to tell if it is the rabies talking or her age? :) 
    Today she seems to be fine. Our prayer is for the Lord to take the rabies out of her body if it was ever in her body.