My life didn't start out like you think it would. It's starts out in the slums. That's where I'm from. That's where my parents are. I also have 8 brothers and sisters and they don't live with me, at least not anymore. They did when were "growing up" but that was a life time ago. Today I'm 18, my mom is very sick, and my family is still in the slums making money any way you can imagine.
But let me take you back in time, back a year ago when I was 17. I went to live in an orphanage called The Havilah Family. Milly is the woman who runs it and she really does treat us all like family, and all the kids here (mostly girls) I see as my siblings. Being the oldest I helped take care of the younger ones. Life here is hard. We don’t always have food, we don't all have shoes, most of us can't go to school because we cannot afford it, we sleep on the floor, the clothes that we have are falling apart, we can hardly pay our rent so we never know if we will have a home next month or not.
Then a miracle happened, or so I thought. A local pastor invited all of us to his church. After going he told us that he wanted to help us! He wanted to give us money so that we could get food and pay our rent on a regular basis! So we kept attending his church. After time he said that he wanted to hire some of us to clean and cook. Jobs! A dream come true!
But that is where the dream ended and the nightmare began. Soon after I went to his house to work when it happened. He took advantage of me. I wanted to fight him off but he told me that if I did he would stop funding the orphanage. I knew that I could not let us go back to where we were, I didn’t want them to starve and maybe end up on the streets because of me. Then he told me that if I told, he would still pull the funding. So I was forced into a shameful silence. This happened time and time again. I thought that it would never end. Then it happened. The unthinkable. I became pregnant. The pastor wanted nothing to do with me or the child.
It wasn't until I started showing Milly realized what happened. Thankfully we stopped going to that church and stopped going to his house. Sadly we were back to square one. During the next 9 months I fell into a deep dark depression. I tried twice to kill myself and the baby. I tried to have an abortion. Everything failed. I felt miserable to put it lightly. Because I got pregnant we lost the funding but at the same time I was glad that I was rid of him. But now we were back to starving. I felt like it was my fault. I would look around and see the girls starving, see their pain when people made fun of them because we are poor, would try to comfort them when they got sick but had no money for medicine. It wasn't this bad when the horrid pastor was helping us. But then I got pregnant. I felt like it was my fault that everyone was suffering.
Milly told me time and time again that it was not my fault. She kept pouring into my life, all the kids did. So that eventually when I gave birth, a beautiful baby girl entered the world. I named her Havilah. The name comes from Genesis. It's a place where gold is found and this beautiful baby girl is my treasure. I now thank God that all the suicide and abortion attempts failed. She is my treasure and I love her more and more every day.
Today she is 2 months old. We are still struggling to get by each day. We pray that we can get money for our rent and food. That is just the immediate needs. That's not to mention that we don't have clothes (that don't need mending), soap (of any kind), blankets (the couple that we do have go to the babies), beds, money for school fees (so most don't go to school), shoes (we have to pick jiggers out of our feet), money to see a doctor, and the list goes on and on. I hate seeing the children go hungry. I hate to think about the day when my daughter stops breastfeeding and starts eating solid food because I don't know if she will be able to eat.
But though all of this I know that God is there. I know that he is watching out for us. If He wasn't I wouldn't have made new friends and you wouldn't hear my story. You wouldn't hear my daughter's story. I know that God is there because he protected me and Havilah. I know that God loves me. I know that He loves you also.
*Obviously this is not my (Christine's) story. This is the real life story of an 18 year old young woman named Celestine.
Milly is currently setting up a way for people to sponsor the children at her orphanage. Check out the blogs that my other teammates have written to hear more about the girls, Milly, and the orphanage. If you would like to donate or send items to Milly and the girls let me know and I will send you her mailing address and find out if she has a way to receive money set up yet.
