Community Voices: Mumbejja Susan Guttabingio
Spiritual Healer and Herbalist

Mumbejj’s family is ‘servants to the king'.  She is married and has 6 children. As Mumbejja does not speak English we relied on Harriet Nsubuga for translations. Hariet is a Health Educator in Mukono District. And a District-Based Trainer (DBT) for Theta. Her work involves monitoring Traditional Health Practitioners in Western Uganda Kashari District.

Harriet: The spirits chose her to become a healer.  Among the people who were at home she was the one that was chosen. The spirits came on her when she was around 4 years old and she was told that when she grew up she would become a traditional healer.
C: What was the experience you had at 4?
T: At 4 she began to be diseased, she used to be sick.  When she went to the hospital there was no disease to be seen.  She was then taken to a place where the ancestors told her family that when she became a woman then she would be okay and become a healer.
C: After she was told she would become a healer did she continue to be sick?
T:  She still became sick; it was not until they finalized the traditional healing training that she became fine.
C: How old was she then?
T: At the age of 30 she became normalized.

Mumbejja in her shrine.  To her right is a record books provided by Theta to keep track of her patients and their conditions and treatment. She will tie the traditional bark cloth over her dress before calling the spirits to ‘come down on her head’ is she believes a spiritual diagnosis is needed .

C:  What conditions does Mumbejja normally treat?
T:  She is proud of treating HIV-related illness, as well as syphilis, peptic ulcers, and jaundice. After being trained by Theta she is now confident in counseling. When the patients have a mental illness she calls the spirits who come on her head (to assist her). She has seen many children who suffer as she did.
C: Does she treat them differently, or the same as she was treated?
T:  When the mothers bring those children to her, they have the feeling that their children are being bewitched.  She tells them that it is the spirits that are attacking them and they will settle down in time.
C: Are there certain dreams that are important in discerning a calling?
T: From the age of 4 to 8, normally those children don’t come with dreams. But from the age of 8 and above they come and say they dreamed this, dreamed that. It might be something spiritual and they try to cool them down.
C: An example of a dream?
T:  Such dreams: ' I dreamt a very big man telling me to construct a big house somewhere with baskets and pipes within that house'.
C: Are the children being asked to build a shrine?
T: A shrine definitely.
C: How did she learn that certain herbs heal certain diseases?
T: She came to know herbs through dreams, the power of the spirits telling her such and such herb cures such and such virus.  She combines 5 different herbs to make a drink, but she gets (this information) at night. The spirits tell her what herbs to combine.  The same for syphilis, the spirits tell her.  In the morning, she can even write them down,' oh, they told me this and this'.  And if she is not sure of an herb, she goes to another traditional healer to tell him or her that I dreamt such and such an herb, and I don’t know the name.

C: How does her herbal treatment help someone with HIV?
T: Her treatment really works. She has people who are using those herbs and they are living positively, their HIV-related conditions don’t disturb them so much.

C: Many people in Uganda associate traditional healing with witchcraft. What can she say to those people who think what she does is witchcraft? How can she help them to distinguish what she does from witchcraft?
T: Other districts also have a committee at the district level that monitors the traditional healers. At the sub-county level there is also a committee. But what they do, they have a check list. If one claims to be traditional healer in a certain village they interview the person using that checklist.  They screen them accordingly. If you are found doing unlawful work, they discriminate against you, and you are not considered to be a good practitioner.  Those doing the bewitching are there, but normally they come from other districts.
C: Some Ugandans say all possession is witchcraft; all healers that use possession are witches.  What can you tell them?
T: The difference between those who are possessed and those that do malpractice they find out through interviewing them.  If they are doing malpractice they take them to court, the traditional healers have a court.  If they are found guilty, they are sent to prison. They are there but the healer association knows how to handle them.  Because of poverty someone may put up a signpost but not be doing the real work.
C: What are some of the challenges of your work?
T:  Most of her clients come in when they don’t have money,  like seeking treatment for HIV/AIDS.  When someone starts her herbs it is like starting ARVs, it is for a lifetime.  When they have started, then they come in and need more herbs and she wants to help them.  This young boy has no job; she gives him a little herb and tells him to continue to look for some money so that he can get a full jerrican. 

This young boy has no job; she gives him a little herb and tells him to continue to look for some money so that he can get a full jerrican of herbs for his HIV condition .

T: Another problem, some believe they have been bewitched.   Because of the signs she can now identify who is sick by just observing and the outlook of that person. Like this young guy, he thought that those people with whom he was working had bewitched him because he was so much loved by the boss.  Yet it wasn’t the case.

Rose:  The young boy came here and thought he was bewitched, but because of the signs and symptoms that he had, Mumbejja saw that he was HIV positive. Then she didn’t (become possessed) in order to learn the diagnosis of those spirits, she just started giving medicine and advising him to go for more testing and abstaining.  Also she had condoms and told him if you are staying alone, and feel like bringing someone in, just use these condoms to avoid more infections.
C: Individuals think they are bewitched but in fact they are HIV positive. Could she give an example of how she treats mental disorders?
T:  If such a person comes here, there are some danger signs, she may not know the cause of the mental illness.  There are so many causes, it may because of worry, and it may be due to malaria, due to an accident. For her, she doesn’t handle many of these cases and sends them to the medical personnel.

C: What have you learned from the Theta training, how has that benefited you?
T: Theta training has helped her, especially the collaboration between medical workers and traditional healers.  In the past the cooperation was not there; each side did not give respect to the other. Now she goes to their clinic, they also come and visit her.  Secondly, through the Theta training she learned many danger signs, like dehydration. If one brings in a child who is dehydrated, a child that is convulsing, she can no longer stay with such cases. She writes a referral and sends the child to a biomedical worker. In the past, they used not to send away those people who had mental illness, they would stay with them, thinking they could manage, staying with them for a long period and yet there was no change. But now, through the Theta training, they learned what they could really do.  They no longer keep such cases, they refer them.  And the counseling, she gained more skills in counseling which also the medical workers do.  She can do better counseling here.
C: How does the community view her work, and has it changed since she has participated with Theta?
T:  The community has really benefited.  If a child comes to her tonight, the child might be convulsing.  (The family) think she might have something to cool down the child.  She does the first aid, and then she refers. People with problems other than the illness also come in:  problems in marriages, domestic violence, some who are poor, some come for love potions. ‘Do you have something, I want my boyfriend to love me so much!’ They come in with many problems other than illness. The certification for the 2-year training made her more popular and has brought more clients than before.

C:  Do you have a support group?
T: She has founded a small group of about 10.  These are widows who are without resources, and they are getting help from her.  She doesn’t have any financial support and is appealing to you if you can help.  She has a vision to renovate the house in front and make it a clinic, selling not only traditional but modern medicine, so that if the clients come here they can also try the modern treatments.  But that is still a vision.
C: Musawa has a beard; does it have special significance to her as a healer?
T: There is a reason as to why she has those beards.  They started to come when she was growing up. When she tried to pull them off she got blisters, very bad, and even the swearing.  Not until the spirits told her please let those beards stay there.  So she just trims them, using scissors, up to now, and she is also saying her nails are not like other people’s nails.  They have different colors although she is not using nail Qtips.  There is also a reason why her nails are like that.
C:  In some traditions because a person has different hormones, he or she might have access to different or more spirits. Is that true for her in her tradition?
T:  It is true; it comes from the grand, grand, forefathers and it goes on spreading.  It makes a difference, as she is the only one in the family that was chosen.
C:  So it comes through the family, were their others also chosen as healers?
T:  Those spirits normally chose the person they want.  She is proud that they chose her to do all those things.  In her family there are people who need to be chosen but are not chosen.  That is what she was trying to stress.

Mumbejja asks ’ Would you like that, that I call my spirits?’ When we respond affirmatively she begins her preparations, placing her leopard skin up over her shoulder and lighting her pipe. She draws in the smoke as she shakes her rattle, then begins a chant. With a gasp the spirit has taken over her body and begins to speak. The voice is soft, high pitched

When she has finished Mumbejja puts down the pipe and fans herself.

T: That is how they diagnose. 
C: Do you want to tell me what was said?
Rose:  It is traditional language.  She calls not one, but all of the spirits, so she gains their powers. When they come on the head she asks the client and the client has to put down money. Her fee is 2000.  She was saying in this instance she could not work on the client. For her, she does not want to take money like sugar. There are certain people who are interested in whether they can get a kilo from a client, but for her. If she does not manage the case, then please, don’t waste your time here, go elsewhere.  If she is through with it, that is the way she does it, and they go back.

Speaking to Caitlin: One time she got a visitor like you.  She was so excited that a musongo came here one time, visited her, and participated in making fire. She said you are so welcome to her place and she is happy.
Rose: And she was saying what herbs treat what conditions, In the month of April she going to introduce another herb that will strengthen her medicine.