Seso

This is Seso, who is seventeen years old. She had Trismus; a spasm of the jaw muscles, causing her mouth to remain tightly closed. A condition she has endured since she was three years old. But even though she was unable to open her mouth, she managed to eat by pushing her food to the side of her cheek and into the back of her mouth using her finger.

Eating like this made her uncomfortable and she did not want to visit family because of her condition. She was the outcast in the village, and rarely went to school due to ridicule from other students.  Seso had very few friends and no hobbies.

In 2013, she came across Project Harar after meeting the father of another boy we had treated recently in a nearby village. That year, she was treated by Project Harar’s medical volunteers. Seso was fitted with a distractor, a medical device that stretches the jaw. When her jaw could open only slightly, she could not stop sticking her tongue out! Seso was so happy that she was able to open her mouth for the first time in nine years.

In 2015, we went back to visit Seso. 
We were delighted to see that she can eat properly now and that she has made new friends. Her dream is to help other people by becoming the first doctor in her village. She’s on the right track now by going to school and attaining the second highest grades in her whole school. Her life is definitely going in the right direction!