Thank you for your Aug. 9 article on the Sisters of Mercy’s 150 years of service.

I’m lying in bed with my right ankle in a cast. This is the second time the Sisters of Mercy have saved my bacon.

The first time, in 1968, I was 23 and teaching school at a Kenyan Friends (Quaker) mission school. During vacation, I went with 24 young people on a voluntary work camp.

We were building a water catchment basin in a thorny area. The thorns scraped my legs so much, they got infected.

I ended up delirious. The Kenyan district commissioner took me in his Land Rover to a nearby hospital run by the Sisters of Mercy.

In those days, hospitals in Kenya provided medical care, and patients’ families provided their food. My family was back in South Portland. It would be weeks before they even knew I was sick.

The commissioner’s wife brought my first meal. After that, the Sisters of Mercy brought me three meals a day from their own table. About a week later, I was well enough to go back to my school. They never asked for payment.

Forty years later, when the sisters were building Mercy Hospital’s Fore River campus, I donated.

Two weeks ago, about 6 p.m., our puppy was playing with a golden doodle friend. They knocked me down; my ankle broke and was dislocated.

The rescue squad took me to the ER of my choice – the Mercy on State Street. A doctor and five strong men put me under and pulled my ankle back into position. By midnight, I was on my way back home.

Five days later, when the swelling in my ankle went down, pins were put in to hold it straight until it healed. I went in to Mercy at the Fore at 7:30 a.m. and was back home by noon. By Labor Day, I’ll be able to walk again.

Thank you, Mercy.

Susan Gilpin

Falmouth