Brown Family Story - Take Heart. Roderick lives in Maningrida and shares his story of rheumatic heart disease. takeheart.tv
"My name is Roderick Brown. I live in Maningrida community. I'm a father of three. My first one is Curtis, my second boy's Dray, my third one is Devon. My partner's name is Danielle Turner. We all live altogether. I love living in Maningrida. I grew up in Maningrida my whole life.
The place, you know, close to my people, my homeland, and my kid's land, you know. Me and my missus didn't know about our first child that had this condition. She had a knee pain in all her joints, you know. We didn't know anything about it as well, until doctors told us that she had this rheumatic heart disease on her. It was a shocking story for me and my missus.
It was quite a tragic time to meet the family, because that was on the fourth year anniversary of the death of their first child.
A little girl that was diagnosed with acute rheumatic fever. To start with, she had moderate rheumatic heart disease, but very quickly, she deteriorated. And subsequently, died in a very short space of time. But normally, rheumatic fever doesn't really start till age five or fifteen, so it had really hit this family very hard. Whilst they're still trying to understand what happened to their little girl, now they're facing their second child going through exactly the same, at exactly the same age. -
When we had Curtis, it's kinda passed it on to our little boy, Curtis. Curtis he doesn't complain for the needle. He has been having this for quite a year, now. He's kind of used to it. Quite a few people out in Maningrida community that are actually on this condition, some would know, what it is, and some wouldn't understand. It's very hard in a community like this. You get overcrowded in just one house, it's not safe for my kids living in that open area. It's just too much, for my boys. -
Don't, cheeky, one, two, check!
Ever since when Dad didn't work, I had to, like, do it like, you know, just fully hand wash every time. Every after work, just, yeah, just didn't get a chance to afford to get a, washing machine, and really desperate to get a washing machine and a dryer, 'cause I got kids at this condition, you know, and it's very hard. Yeah, on that day when they installed this cupboard, I came back a few minutes later on, had a quick shower, came out, my kids were mucking around and next minute, he got cut on his finger there. I mean everything was just hanging and bleeding.
Didn't cry after that, when I took him down to the clinic, and like, I felt really bad, and then I went to the housing the next day and told them that, this wasn't good enough. We've got a bit of mesh and all that to tie, to block it, to have our privacy. And at night, people just stare, you know. During rainy wet season, it just rained. This water just come right in there, right behind where I'm standing, - Come, come one day, coming from bush, some families coming from out of town, other communities near, there's no way, out of places to stay for them, that's why we let them come stay here.
We know that overcrowding leads to rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease, and that the reason for that is, if in a small space, a lot of people share the same living environment, then it's easy to pass on infectious diseases. And this also relates to other illnesses, like trachoma, pneumonia, gastroenteritis, so, rheumatic fever is not unique like that. But the consequence of rheumatic fever is just so serious. As highlighted by the Brown family.
Now, suppose what is tragic about the situation, that the Brown family had a total of four children, and over time, all four children came down with rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease, and yet, nothing had changed, in relation to their living environment. - Normally, I'll just go to this local housing in Maningrida, ask them if, to provide a house for me and my family. It's been about four years now, I'm still waiting for it. Talking to Bo, she could help me out, to talk to the housing, if I can get a house, like a proper house, you know? It would be good for me and my kids yeah. It's good to have more houses in our floor, to all the people, that this condition, it would be good if they have, would have their own house."
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