A Lucky Woman

My apologies for the lack of cute pics and anecdotes in this post, but there weren't any for this bit.  This is the true and honest picture of all sides of this work.  Most of the time I love everything I do here.  And then once in a while, I wish someone else would do it for me.  Such is the way it goes though, with all things that are hard but worth doing. 

One of the first things I had to do when I got here was to fire Helen, one of our housemothers.  She is not a completely terrible-horrible-no-good person,  but she just was not right for the job.  We hire people to take on the role of caregiver (which is essentially a mother) for children that are not their own.  To be an encourager, a disciplinarian, a guider of ways and an unconditional source of love and support is not an easy job on the best of days.  And it certainly is not for everyone.  (It's actually not for very many people at all as evidenced by the number of foster parents in our own country).  She took the news well enough and once the dreaded task was over I set about finding a new candidate for the role.  It is commonly believed that any job working for a mzungu (westerner) is characterized by minimal work and an unconditional flow of cash; both of which are opposite in our case.  Needless to say, it is not an easy job to fill, so we took a recommendation from Florence, a trusted leader of another non-profit program and a dear friend. 

Lynet and I interviewed Caroline two days after I arrived.  She is a middle-aged woman with a warm smile and a quiet voice.  With great effort she looked me in the eye when answering my questions and her trembling hands gave away how stressful the interview must have been.  I later found she speaks decent English but was too nervous to think through the translations while we were talking so Lynet translated her answers.  I learned her story from Florence who accompanied her to the interview.   She used to work for a different children’s home until her husband died.  She had been required to live at the home so she had to leave when there was no one left to care for her own 6 children.  Her only option (since finding another job was near impossible) was to go back home to her husband’s place, and stay in a house on his family compound, as is the custom.  In order to have this roof over her children’s heads however, it is also the custom that she must be “inherited” by her husband’s brother as a second wife.   While they did not go into specifics, I learned that she was not one of the “lucky ones” as these two ladies described the women who get inherited by good men.  Without violating her privacy....it hurt my heart to hear the details.  

As distressing as her story was, it didn't feel like it was a slam dunk decision.  I laid in bed that night contemplating the interview and I was not completely filled with confidence.  She seemed genuine and kind, but she also seemed without hope and scared.  I have been a bad judge of character before and people can change drastically when they are no longer desperate, for better or worse.  And if it was the latter, my children would have to endure another caregiver leaving them and disrupting their home.  My first and foremost responsibility is to my children, to provide them with a loving, supportive and STABLE home.  Was she really the best choice??

Then I began to think about how I would feel and think about myself if I was inherited by a man as a piece of property.  What would I look to others if I had been forced to take such an option to keep my children safe-ish and fed?   I still felt like she deserved the chance to prove what she could be when she's safe and secure.  I prayed hard. Real hard.

The next morning I woke up with a sense of peace about these unknowns and with the confidence that Caroline was sent to us for a reason.  Prayers for the right person for this job has been sent upwards many times by many people before I even set foot back in Kenya.  We think she may be the answer we were hoping for and we have the faith to take that chance.   

Jacky (left) and Caroline in their Jemo House staff shirts

Welcome to Jemo House Caroline!