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Joyce and Friends

Joyce's Story

While in northern Uganda (Gulu) with actor Ryan Gosling, who is directing a feature film based on Jimmie’s book, Innocents Lost: When Child Soldiers Go to War, Ryan, Jimmie and the director of photography spent time with a young Ugandan girl named Joyce, three years old, who is suffering from severe burns throughout her body. She was involved in an LRA (Lords Resistance Army) ambush a year and a half ago. One and a half dozen people were in a vehicle in which she was traveling. The LRA did a roadside attack, which is common, and killed everyone inside except for her. She survived and tried to crawl away but they dragged her back and threw her into the car's inferno. She kept crawling out. On her third attempt to escape, the LRA wrapped her in a burning carpet. The webbing of the carpet burned itself into her scalp and the only reason she lived through all that is because Ugandan army forces engaged the rebels and chased them away. Doctors without Borders (Holland) separated her fused limbs, but she lives in constant pain and suffers from cerebral infection as well as respiratory issues. While she may have gotten the best care in Northern Uganda, she didn't get the best care available. If you could hold her and look over her body, as I did yesterday, you would see how badly she needs the best medical care.

Today, Joyce is an inpatient at a hospital in Gulu. We made the decision so that her immediate medical needs could be addressed diligently. She's in the infectious phase of TB, although her white blood cell count is relatively strong, which means we can wait to start her on ARV medication. Trying to build a support system around a child in a war-affected community such as Gulu, northern Uganda hasn't been easy but I think we did pretty good under the circumstances, especially considering the three of us felt we had to agree on all decisions.

Patrick, the inspiring ex-combatant who's been caring for Joyce since she was injured has done an incredible job given the challenges he himself faces. Theirs is real-life story of redemption and hope, for were Patrick not one of the lucky few Ugandan youth to leave the war alive, he might very well been involved in the LRA attack which wounded Joyce. That possibility, I believe, is what led him to this commitment. After ten years of exploitation and abuse at the hands of the Lord's Resistance Army, and then more dashed promises from a variety of foreign visitors, he is understandably wary. Waiting for us to drop the ball. As Ryan, Adam and I leave Uganda, the feeling is of having created our own fellowship around 3-year-old Joyce. Our lives have changed irrevocably in the span of a week, from having met Joyce, as well as the response to her story from friends, family and colleagues around the world. I was telling someone in Gulu that this one child wasn't the reason we'd intended to come, but in fact maybe it was the reason we were supposed to come.

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