MCH

Medina Children’s Home is a beautiful place and really does beautiful things for people, kids, community… It’s a wonderful organization and I am so happy I was able to be a part of it.

The home sits on about 400 acres and is right in the middle of the Hill Country, in between the little town of Median and Kerrville. The Home is 15 miles from Kerrville and about 8 miles from Medina. It is in the valleys of the Hills of the Texas Hill Country and is absolutely spectacular.

All of the native and exotic wildlife regulate this ranch and it is not uncommon to see multiple herds of deer in the front yards of the offices and living areas. It’s peaceful, secluded, clean, inviting and warm and if you have to be a foster kid, this is the place to be one!

A small creek runs through the property and it has been dammed up in two areas to create two large ponds. Medina Children’s Home (or Arms of hope as it is called now) is really two separate service based organizations.

One is for fostered kids or troubled youth and the other portion is for single mothers who want to create their life differently and MCH gives them the “hand up” to help them accomplish their goals and live an amazing life. It is funded and supported through the Church of Christ and is faith based on the principles of that religion.

They also have another facility that does the same thing in the Dallas area called Boles Children’s Home. With the combination of the two, the new name “Arms of Hope” was assigned to represent both the facilities. Both are really great organizations but the Median campus is really breathtaking.

There are general administrative offices in separate buildings, a Hospitality Center for guests and visitors and there are 9 cottages to house the foster kids or troubled youth. There are duplexes, houses and a daycare center for the single moms. There are also a variety of other homes that house staff and kids in the “transitional program.” Let me try to explain what this all entails.

The foster kids or troubled youth program is generally for kids who are struggling at home, have mild to moderate discipline problems and when the parents get to their wits end, this is the kind of place that can offer them some relief and help. There are also other parents who really don’t want to be troubled with their children and they do sometimes simply “drop their kids off” here.

Another large percentage of the populations of kids are long term foster kids who were adopted by some caring and well intentioned people. The scenario generally goes something like this…

A couple, who have 1-2 kids and are doing well in their life decide they want to give back and give a fostered child an opportunity to have a family decide to adopt a kid from a foster program. Generally, kids in the foster program, once they get outside of the infancy age, are not as appealing to adoptive parents as babies, so many times, foster kids who aren’t adopted by the age of three are forced to live a life in some kind of managed care or state facility.

“We are willing to spend the least amount of money to keep a kid at home, more to put him in a foster home and the most to institutionalize them”

~Marian Wright Edelman~

The well meaning parents decide they would like to adopt, let’s say, a 9 year old that was given up at birth or taken from a dysfunctional family…whatever… The family generally thinks that just placing the child in a loving and caring environment will cause the child to adapt to that environment…Many times, this is not the case.

Kids who have been abused or neglected as infants or even in the early developmental stages of childhood generally grow up with a variety of disorders…Disorders that well meaning parents with a goal to give a kid a “regular life” aren’t prepared for.

Studying, reading, counseling…All of those things are great tools to try and prepare you for what you are about to take on, but the experience is never like the textbooks and many, many times, those well meaning parents are simply lost and don’t have the tools to manage the behaviors associated with abused or neglected children.

In turn, what happens many times is these well meaning parents and their very functional family life becomes completely dysfunctional because of this misunderstanding or inability to manage the problems. The natural children start to lose attention as the family focuses all their energy on the troubled child and before long, the glass castle they live in starts to crack and crumble.

No one wants to “give em back” and when they get to a point where their functioning family has become completely dysfunctional, places like Medina Children’s Home and Boles Children’s Home are where parents turn to.

With coaching and support from educated people who are specialized in these types of behaviors get involved in the lives of these families, change can, and does occur. Many times, when a family is determined to make it work, as a team, this is a viable solution and many times families are brought back together, untied and able to manage the problems and get back to a “regular” life.

The hard ones to deal with are the families who have chosen to throw in the towel and simply let these homes take the children, raise them and allow the kids to come home on a holiday or two a year or a weekend visit or two a year. The really, really tough ones are the ones who don’t even do that…And there is no “greater” or “less” than of any one particular type of family…It is always varied and its always much more complex than even what I am stating here.

However, the rewards as an employee of an organization like this are monumental! The clinical Director and I have a saying about “rewarding experiences” when dealing with these people…

“Homeruns don’t come very often, but when they do, the crowd roars, the team cheers and celebrate and the feeling deep in your stomach is not explainable in words…”

A success story for this work environment is what we called a “home run”… Outta the park baby!! And when it happens, we cheer, celebrate and have that same feeling in our stomach! We had our share of stike outs as well but the homeruns are what kept us playing the game!!

“Every strike brings me closer to the next homerun”

~Babe Ruth~

The Single Mothers program is a wonderful program as well. If there is a single mom who has her kids and wants her life to be different, Places like Medina Children’s home can offer them that shift.

Generally these mothers come from abusive backgrounds, troubled lives, addictions, broken families, uneducated homes and primarily are lower socio-economic classes of people or from generational poverty.

“Raising a family is difficult enough. But it’s even more difficult for single parents struggling to make ends meet. They don’t need more obstacles, they need more opportunities”

~Bill Richardson~

The single mother program is not an easy program. It is designed to push your boundaries, step out of that box you are living in and forces you to reach for the goals you have. There are rules that apply to the “average” person that many of these women have never been taught or even heard about.

The program is designed to get the mothers and their children off of the “system” help them get good jobs or a good education and then good jobs and then cut you loose out into the world so you can have a spectacular life and create a spectacular life for your kids. It’s not an easy shift for many!

Its amazing how content we can become in misery!

Those who “work the program” and follow the rules, eventually will walk away from the experience with a formal education, a good job and HOPE for a brighter tomorrow! None of these programs are a “hand out” program and all of them are a “hand up” program. If you work any of these programs the way they are lined out, the future for you when you leave this organization is MUCH brighter than what the future held for you before it. DEFINITELY something I could stand behind and support.

The aftercare program is established for kids who are in foster care that reach the age of 18 years old and are no longer considered children. The harshness of the foster care program is that once you turn 18, you are no longer supported as a foster child. You are now an adult and your life is up to you. You are cut loose and have no support system to lean back on in rough times.

For those of us that are parents, we can readily understand that parenting does not stop when the kids turn 18. We are parents forever and are always coaching, supporting and caring for our children until the day we leave this place. We are the ones our kids turn to in troubled times or in times of crisis, times of greatness, times of confusion, etc… But think about foster children…

Once foster children turn 18, they are basically set out on their own and don’t have those models in their life. Statistically, you will find that foster children, as they progress, have a VERY high percentage of “troubles” in their adult lives…Drug and alcohol abuse, physical abuse, problems with the law, etc… Many people believe that its largely part of the lack of role models or support they have in their life compared to “standard” families.

What this program does is provide a place for kids who are in/out of foster care, 18-24 years of age, to learn “life skills.” It is a program that has strict rules and adherence standards but will offer kids with little or no family structure the opportunity to advance their life.

They will learn how to apply for jobs, cook, clean, open bank accounts, save money, buy a car, pay rent, deal with landlords, etc… It also provides them a place to live on their own while they are in college and teaches them all the ins and outs of life that we have been taught from our parents or other models. I know some of you might think this is just common knowledge but remember…Without the models many of us had, how would we have ever learned about those things?

If you believe in the old saying that children are our future then you must also believe that every child should be offered the same opportunities for success. Here is an opportunity for a large percentage of our kids that are forgotten about to have a real chance because for many, a life of foster care doesn’t provide much hope for the future.

They have been abandoned, neglected abused and now they are thrown out into the world where sharks and wolves are ready to pounce on them in an instant! And trust me, those predators are everywhere… I have witnessed their brutality and selfishness.

All of these programs are aligned with what I envision as possibilities for people; and to be a part of something bigger than myself always offers such great reward. Medina Children’s Home is absolutely something bigger than any one person can fathom and I was proud to be part of that organization.

When I started with Medina Children’s Home, they were in the middle of a transition. The old “power” had retired and the board of directors found someone new to “lead the way” in a new era with the vision and dreams of what had established this organization.

What generally comes with transitions like this are drama, disagreements, misunderstandings, communication breakdowns, terminations, resignations and new “blood” coming into the organization…I was one of the “new blood” and I was in it knee deep.

After getting hired and getting a feel for the flow of the organization, learning the rules and getting solid in how the program operates, I went to work. I was not only an advocate for the children, I was an advocate for the houseparent’s and any person who doesn’t believe in the “trickle down” idea of power structures, you just have not been faced with this complexity yet…It is a very real thing.

I was stuck in the middle of loyalty to the “old blood” and an adherence to the “new blood” and it wasn’t just the kids and the houseparent’s that were struggling in this…It was the organization as a whole and I was one of the team members assigned to help with this transition and filter as much of the harshness away from the kids and houseparent’s.

I was always aligned with the people, the emotions, the concern and the KIDS…THE KIDS were the most important thing in this facility and when struggles like this take place, often times the kids and staff get put on the back burner.

My boss, the Administrator, well she was “old blood” and had been at the organization for quite a few years. She was up against the new blood and didn’t mange the conflict she had very well in regard to her duties as an administrator to the kids and houseparent’s. She was trying to hang on to the old ways and those were sinking quickly…She was refusing to get off the ship and was going down with it, and sadly, she was taking others with her.

Because of her conflicts, she was getting overly stressed with the fight and in turn was bailing the water of the sinking ship right on the heads of those under her. I don’t think she was doing it intentionally, I think she was doing all she could to survive and in turn was sacrificing those she was designated to lead. Survival is brutal and animalistic and she was simply trying to survive.

In turn, she became spiteful and opinionated and would not reason with anything outside of her view of what was taking place. She didn’t trust anyone and was starting to be an island in and of herself. She was closed to having it any other way than her way and this limited my ability to create change in the house parents and the kids. She started to make decisions that seemed to be spiteful to those who were resistant to her… It was getting ugly fast.

I was trying to find what side I stood on and found that both sides didn’t include the kids and this was not what I signed on for. If I could not be part of the solution, then I was just a part of the problem, so I went to speak with her and be up front and honest.

I explained to her that I felt I was not getting the support I needed to live up to the mission of the home and asked her for guidance. Her response was there was nothing she could do and her hands were tied. I told her that the only option this left me was to go above her head and talk to her boss.

If honesty is the best policy, she wasn’t aligned with this one either. From that point on, I was marked as trouble and she started to make me an outcast.

I started the job with a full scope of what took place at the facility. I was privy to all incidents and information about the operations of the home and its employees. After my meeting with my boss, this started to fade. Closed door meeting, hushed conversations as I entered the room, excused from conference calls…she was pushing me out.

I decided to uphold my professionalism and go and speak to her again about my concern. After explaining what I was seeing, she advised me that any efforts to go above her head would be viewed as aggressive and not part of the team and I would suffer the consequences of that and could lose my job… I was stuck!

BUT…

I am fully aware that “stuck” is totally of my creation and I refused to create “stuck” in my life. I had an impeccable professional record and didn’t want it scarred with a spiteful boss and started to look elsewhere for a job where my skills would be appreciated.

I wanted to be supportive of the kids but a termination was no way to continue that support. I knew if I left on my terms, I could still be involved with the kids at the home as a volunteer or at the very least a visitor. If I was terminated, I would not be allowed on the property again, and I knew this!

Truth, at times, can look like a defeating trait to have but it is part of who I am and I decided to keep with who I “BE”. When I was asked by other staff members about things in relationship to the organization, I was truthful. When they dug deeper with questions, I was truthful and eventually the truth started to hurt me professionally with this organization.

An opportunity presented itself that allowed me to SHIFT again and I decided to give it a shot…An ad for a Social Services Director appeared in the newspaper one day, I put in my resume, was granted and interview and was offered the job. I respectfully tendered my resignation with the Home and took a new, un-walked path in my life. But the experiences I had before leaving Medina Children’s Home were life changing for me and I still am connected to that organization.

You cannot help but learn more as you take the world into your hands.  Take it up reverently, for it is an old piece of clay, with millions of thumbprints on it.

~John Updike~

The administrator is gone, most of the “old blood” has either resigned or adapted and life moves on at Medina Children’s Home where they still create great things and still have many home runs to cheer about.

This was part of my process, and I trust the process… My life is truly richer from my time I spent with Medina Children’s Home and I only hope that my time there enriched others lives; but really, in my heart, I have no doubt!