On the World Race it’s quite easy to get comfortable in the novelty of different ministries, adventures, and change. You can easily begin to think this Race is about you and fulfilling your own desires. Ha! While I’m guilty of getting into this mindset, I’m quickly convicted and reminded why I’m on this journey.
After spending a month in Cambodia at the Adventures in Missions base in Siem Reap, I was a tad let down that I would be at another Adventures in Missions base the following month in Chiang Mai, Thailand. (Not that there’s anything wrong with being at an AIM base, but I was ready for a change). We would be staying in the recently acquired Zion Hostel in Chiang Mai along with two other teams on our squad. They asked our teams to be in prayer of which ministry we would be a part of this month. I didn’t even realize there were options in ministry! Our TL, Calli, told us that two teams would be working at the hostel and one team would be working at a foster home for children with disabilities and special needs, Hope Home. In our team meeting my eyes instantly welled with tears and they began to stream down my face. Calli wanted our input on where we felt God was leading us to serve. I could not hide my partiality. Of course, I want to live and serve with my heart postured towards genuine service in whatever the Lord has for me, but everyone knows my heart for children overcoming trauma, especially in the foster/adoption realm (thanks Calo!). My immediate tears provided a natural segway for me to share my opinion and heart. Through tears I choked out my passion and heart for those kids and desire to serve there.
After some wrestling with the Lord, I had mentally prepped for if our team was not assigned the foster home. Maybe this was the chance and opportunity for other squadmates to fall in love with these special needs kids? However, God supremely blessed our team and ordained us with the opportunity to serve at Hope Home!
My new team, the Wildflowers, would be leaving by sung-tao (Thai red truck taxi service) each morning at 9:30 to journey to Hope Home. This 30 minute commute each way ended up being yet another blessing from the Lord. It was a guaranteed hour each day we had as just our team to be intentional with one another. This ended up looking like time to share our current personal struggles, areas we needed accountability in, confession of falling short, and most sweetly, time to lift up our praises and prayers to our Heavenly Father. There is power in the time of the morning commute, you just have to be intentional with it!
Back to Hope Home. It was initially established 10 years ago by a British woman named Judy. While working as a missionary in Thailand, Judy discovered the need of a young Thai girl named Sasi with cerebral palsy. Judy, seeing the need and opportunity, began to foster Sasi and care for her in her home. This opened a huge door to a community of Thai children with special needs! Realizing the fuller sense of need and opportunity, Judy created Hope Home! She began fostering more children and taking in children as a day program. All these kids and needs required more hands and help, and they began hiring additional help.
A young 20-something named Becca with her own background of growing up with a close family friend with muscular dystrophy heard of Hope Home. After actually visiting Hope Home, Becca immediately felt at home and knew God was calling her here and has now been a part of Hope Home for six years and is fostering her own Thai child with cerebral palsy. Becca is only 26 now! Judy and Becca are the backbones and driving force behind this beautiful organization. The depth of their hearts for these children is unreal. The love of Christ is so evident in everything they do, which is the only logical reason this place is able to exist. They have completely given up and turned over their lives to follow the calling Christ gave them. They are so blessed and honored to serve in this way, but let me tell you, it is hard, grueling work and a mostly thankless, neverending job.
By appearances Hope Home operates as a sort of group home, but technically it just has Judy listed as fostering seven Thai children (seven is the legal limit one household can foster). They just happen to all stay in a big home with a whole scope of equipment for physical therapy, sensory needs, occupational therapy, and medical attention. With all of them having pretty low-functioning diagnoses and needs, they require a whole team of staff to help support and work with the children at all times. Within the home they have several kids with cerebral palsy and other sever diagnoses on top of that, along with Downs syndrome, autism, premature birth and developmental delays, and children with various other health issues. For the most part each kid requires one on one attention to meet all their physical, mental, and emotional needs, which they are able to offer.
If a child is born with special needs in Thailand and you have money to support him/her, there still aren’t a ton of resources or school to offer the adequate care needed. If born into a poor family, there is little to no opportunity to properly care for his/her needs. There are still many hill tribal groups that live in rural villages that don’t have any access to medical facilities. These families without opportunity to care for their special needs children often relinquish their rights and now with the new legislature are sending them off to the institution. It’s terribly depressing. I truly hope I’m misunderstanding something and this isn’t in actuality the real situation.
The mission of Hope Home is to empower each child to meet their God-given potential. That means working with each kid on his/her level to give him/her the best life possible. Some kids have the opportunity and high function ability to go to school in the morning, while others with more severe needs stay at Hope Home the whole day. Each morning they have physiotherapy which works and stretches the muscles of each kid to tone them and keep them limber. As volunteers we had the opportunity to read to them during this time as a soothing distraction from the discomfort of physio.
After physio is lunch, nap time, and then school in the afternoon. Everyone attends school together in the main room of the house. Normally Becca or another Thai staff facilitates this. It’s taught in both Thai and English, allowing each kid to grow up knowing both languages. Many kids are non-verbal and have low-cognitive abilities making it very difficult to gauge how much they know and to ensure they are learning the material. Although do NOT underestimate them just because they’re nonverbal! They understand waaay more than you think.
Class consists of going through the English and Thai calendar (did you know Thailand uses a Buddhist calendar that says its year 2561?!), singing various songs and interacting with each child individually to make them feel included and part of the experience, and ending with a story or lesson. While we were there we saw them learn about the parts of the body which included finding various plastic body part pieces scattered across the front yard. Regardless of the child’s special need and abilities, every single child is present and involved in school. Whether they are grasping the concepts or not, they are given the opportunity to participate in each activity. They get to put the stickers on the page even if they can’t understand or move their hands in that way, the staff just helps them. Maybe it seems pointless to have them do this. The child doesn’t seem cognitively or physically able to grasp these activities, so why do them? To ensure they have every opportunity to learn and grow and most importantly to show them they are seen, known, loved and worthwhile. If you just stick them in a corner and ignore them, what does that communicate to them?
While our team was there we got a perfect balance of helping with the kids and interacting with them and also doing behind the scenes grunt work that Becca and Judy never have time to accomplish. We got to sort through thousands (and I mean thousands) of photos of the children taken over the last couple of months to organize them by month and child. Becca is adamant that each child should have a record of their life and identity available to them as they get older and are one day adopted (hopefully). She doesn’t have any control of what information they have about their initial birth experiences and birth parents, but she can ensure that they have plenty of documentation and evidence of their time at Hope Home. Such a beautiful, thought out gesture! We also helped in painting bookshelves and creating different elements for a sensory room in the making. We helped cut out and create educational projects Becca thought up. We helped with creating a new brochure, writing articles for their website/blog, and other important things Becca and Judy just simply do not have time to get done.
We recognized it was a delicate balance working with foster kids. They are already working through the loss of their parents, trusting their current caregivers, and preparing to receive a new adopted family. There is already enough confusion and mistrust around caregivers. For us to come, work closely with them, and allow them to get attached to us and then leave at the end of the month is purely selfish on our part. It would make us feel good, but it’s reinforcing the belief that everyone will get close and leave and no one actually cares for these children. We were so blessed to have the balance of interacting with the kids while supporting the full time staff there and also doing the behind the scenes work.
God is so good and ordained our time at Hope Home so beautifully. We met one of the girls with a bad lung condition making them very weak and always filled with fluid on top of already having cerebral palsy. Regardless she is a beautiful, happy child who giggles and wheezes at everything. One day Becca brought out a toy she had tinkered with and crafted specifically for this girl. It’s a Frozen Elsa doll that spins and sings at the push of a button (kind of like a pedal for a keyboard adapted specifically for her). It was an opportunity for the girl to start and stop the toy at her control by leaning her head against the pedal. When she finally got the hang of it and the music played continuously while Elsa spun and danced, the girl absolutely lit up and beamed the biggest smile. It was such a beautiful moment to witness!
We got to meet a little baby born prematurely and giving him developmental delays as his only special need in the home. He is 1.5 and a tiny, little thing although he is generally stone faced. No matter how much animated baby talk you offer or contorted, cheerful facial expressions, his face would remain completely neutral. So serious for such a little thing! Witnessing moments when he would get delighted enough to smile and giggle was the most priceless gift to behold.
There was a 21 year old guy who was born with cerebral palsy and recently suffered a stroke which has drastically reduced his abilities (lack of head control, ability to control and move limbs, etc). They are working with him to regain some control and hopefully get back to the point where he can sit on his own and color pictures or other enjoyable activities for him, but for now he mostly just sits with his head tilted down and doesn’t ever seem fully present. I had a moment with him where I bent down, held his hand and felt him gently squeeze back. I softly and sweetly repeated his name to him and saw him respond with a jolting head movement and an undeniable smile. It melted my heart.
Becca’s foster son with cerebral palsy is entering adolescence and is obsessed with Marvel superheroes. Each day we would read him superhero stories during physio. With limited limb movement and control, he uses his feet to do various tasks rather than his hands and arms. His wheelchair is close to the ground and allows him to scoot around with his feet. To look at books he has to jaggedly turn pages using his feet. With all the book repair we did at Hope Home, that 5-minute superhero stories book was needing repaired almost daily. My teammate Katie took it upon herself to draw up a personal picture book for him featuring all his favorite superheroes and a darling picture of him and Becca featured on the pages. This could then be laminated and flipped through regularly without getting damaged. I got to witness the moment where Katie first showed him her creation. The joy and coos of excitement where heartwarming. She scrolled through the pictures time and time again at his prompting.
So, so, so many beautiful moments we got to witness and be a part of. Although we came to serve them, I’m certain that we were the ones who left the most blessed. To meet and know each child there and know the depth of love the staff has for each child and the amount of care they get. Again we got to witness the embodiment of Christ’s hands and feet for these kids!
Although I have already written five pages about my experience at Home Home, I could go on and on. If you have any other questions or want to know more about something, please comment or let me know. I’m thrilled to brag about and share more about this phenomenal organization.
