I wrote a post on November 10th with the dream that HHI could touch the lives of another 10,000 children in the last 2 months of the year. Well, we did it!

Our partners in Uganda, Medical Teams International, were able to successfully lead HHI trainings in 145 villages. They trained 4,507 parents – men and women – and they are each caring for an average of 2-3 children below the age of five, meaning that HHI reached another 9,014 to 13,521 children!!!

The team reported: “in the first week of the training, parents and children were unkempt, but in the last week; when summarizing with baby massage and baby cues, hygiene and neatness was at its maximum signifying that there was adoption and putting to practice what had been learnt!!!! And the peer educators vowed to continue training those that require the knowledge during their own free time!!!”

These are just the first of the outcomes, and they are of huge significance! The parents stated that they enjoyed learning new information and they liked it even better when it comes via someone who is of their own community, which is how they received HHI’s education.

Bravo Uganda!!!!

A three-part series highlighting different perspectives of women involved with Hands to Hearts International.

Part 3: Ugandan community leaders Florence Okun and Norah Awio use the skills they learned during the HHI training when caring for their own families.

By Laura Barker

“To be a child in Uganda is not easy,” explains Norah Awio. Especially in the north, where decades of war have forced millions of people into refugee camps, being a child means having to endure countless hardships. Because “children. . . have no right to speak,” sexual and physical abuse is common. They work hard fetching water, collecting firewood, digging, and selling agricultural products. Their families often lack the funds or proper clothing to send them to school. In a place where “child labour is the order of growing up,” the education and training provided to parents and caretakers alike through Hands to Hearts is refreshing and widely welcomed.

Norah, 36, and her husband live with their five children and several more dependents in a modest one-room home in Kampala, Uganda. She works six days a week as a legal officer for the Locan Rebe Women’s Group, resting only on Sundays, when she attends church and catches up on housework. As a leader in her community, Norah works to mobilize women and tries to promote HHI training. It’s a difficult task, as many Ugandans are skeptical of help from outsiders, assuming it will cost them money to participate in their programs. But Norah knows firsthand the positive effects of HHI’s services and works to recruit more women whom she knows will also benefit. Although these women might initially be wary, once they attend the training, they too sing HHI’s praises. Some women can’t stop talking about it and soon begin to recommend HHI to their own friends and family members.

Florence Okun is another community leader and past participant of the HHI trainings. Her grown son is now studying at Makerere University in Kampala, but she continues to care for many people in her house: her brother, her mother who is paralyzed, and 8 other children that she has taken in. Some are orphans and others are the children of family members who are unable to care for them. “I decided to take some of these orphans because their parents are extremely poor and single mothers,” she says. “Secondly, I have a kind heart and. . . only one son.” Florence, 42, is also a member of Locan Rebe, a group formed by internally displaced women from northern Uganda “as a result of war and poor living conditions.” She is the Local Council 1 for her zone, a low-level government position responsible for general cleanliness in the area. In addition, she owns and manages a small hotel in the city.

Florence HHI’s new video – Share this YouTube with your Friends!

Like Norah, Florence is very appreciative of the early childhood development education she received through HHI and says she acts differently with her family because of it. She spends more time with her children, who are now more likely to tell her stories and bring their friends home. She learned that children develop all their senses as they grow and that they “require love, close attention, and encouragement by [the] parent.”

Norah, too, has learned to make more time for her children. “I used [to] think that giving children food was enough for them,” she says, “but during HHI trainings I learned that having time for your child [is] very important. . . and you become not only a parent to that child but also a close friend.” Because her work is exhausting, she never felt she had enough time to give to her children. But now she says she carries the younger ones around “with love” and chats with the older ones about how they feel and what is on their minds.

In addition to changing the ways in which they respond to their children, both Norah and Florence emphasized the positive change HHI has brought to their community as a whole. The women have become closer through discussions about the best childrearing practices. Being involved with Hands to Hearts, they said, has “restored their relationships.” “HHI brought oneness in our community,” says Norah. Florence agrees, concluding that “the level of love has increased.” In a country where the atrocities of war have touched the lives of every citizen, this is indeed a powerful statement.

~Unknown

Dear Friends,

I am just bubbling over with joy, pride, love… this comes from learning that via HHI’s partnership with Medical Teams, there are now 300 new HHI villages trainers in the war-torn area in northern Uganda. In just the next 6 weeks, they will lead trainings for parents in 145 villages – meaning before Christmas or Hanukkah, HHI will contribute to the healing of about 3,800 parents, and almost 10,000 young children!!!! (beyond the 6,000+ women and 36,000 children we’ve already touched).

This is the power of HHI’s model — we teach and support other groups to apply HHI within their own programs, in their own communities where the healing is most needed, and in this way our reach is exponential!

Please help me tell the world – beautiful things are happening!!!

With love and gratitude,

Laura

Voices from the Field

A three-part series highlighting different perspectives of women involved with Hands to Hearts International. Read their stories.

Part 1: Sasha Rabsey, a donor to HHI, went to Uganda to see first-hand how the program empowers the women it serves
Part 2: From caretakers in India’s orphanages to mothers in the most remote villages, Master Trainer Sujatha Balaje educates and inspires
Part 3: Ugandan community leaders Florence Okun and Norah Awio use the skills they learned during the HHI training when caring for their own families
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Part 1: Sasha Rabsey, a donor to HHI, went to Uganda to see first-hand how the program empowers the women it serves

by Laura Barker

The most common sentiment Sasha Rabsey heard from the Ugandan women after their two-day training with Hands to Hearts International (HHI) was, “I will never be the same. My children will never be the same. We must teach this to all women.” Sasha, a donor to HHI, was invited by founder/director Laura Peterson to participate in HHI’s pilot program in Kampala, Uganda in February, 2010. What moved her most was that women’s lives will be forever changed by what they learned; the skills they acquired cannot be taken away, and will be passed from woman to woman, further enriching the whole community.

Interested in service-oriented organizations that target women and children, Sasha was introduced to HHI by a friend who told her it was “a sure thing.” She wanted to identify an organization led by someone who truly had a good heart, and immediately recognized that quality in Laura. When Sasha was invited to participate in HHI’s first trip to Uganda, she jumped at the opportunity. “It’s important to me to see the programs I donate to in order to get a deeper understanding of what they do,” she said. “I want to inspire other people to donate to small organizations, and seeing the program’s work in action gives me much greater credibility.”

Once in Uganda, Sasha spent her days participating in the HHI training sessions taught by Mukisa Lydia from Uganda and Master Trainer Sujatha Balaje from India. Lydia translated what Sujatha was saying and did a wonderful job making the women laugh. Together, they taught the participants baby cues (such as how to read the body language and facial expressions of infants) and baby massage, but most importantly, information on nutrition, health, and child development. The women in attendance those two days did not take this education lightly. Unlike American women, who often take learning for granted, Ugandans must struggle to receive an education. Children often go to school during the day, but are also forced to work all evening making money for their families by selling peanuts or other goods in the streets. The participants grabbed at the information and took notes throughout. They made a point to tell all their friends to come back for the second training session, to be held the next day.

Despite her fatigue, Sasha was asked to stay until the very end to lead the closing discussion on the women’s perceptions of their HHI training. This turned out to be a pivotal moment of her experience. “Not one of them criticized the program content, not even when probed. Americans would have been so quick to point out everything that was wrong. They didn’t say it was just ‘ok.’ They couldn’t control their enthusiasm.”

The women that HHI reaches in Uganda and India do not have access to many resources. They are good mothers and want the very best for their children, but the circumstances of their lives often prohibit them from being able to give their children opportunities. In Kampala, many people live in the slums, and women there often take care of a dozen or more children. Some of these children are their own, while others are grandchildren or the children of other family members who have died. However, even without money or extra resources, women here can make a difference in children’s lives simply by being mothers and caretakers. As Sasha talked to the participants during and after the training, this new found sense of empowerment was what struck her most deeply. Previously these women didn’t realize the importance of their role in their society, but left the training feeling excited and proud. What they heard from HHI was, “YOU have an impact on this child’s life!”

Since her trip to Uganda, Sasha has gotten involved in other international organizations, but says that Hands to Hearts will always be the model she uses when deciding where her money will go. “What Laura does is so amazing because it empowers women simply by imparting information. She’s changing the world, one child at a time.”

Its fair to say, that Sasha’s life will never be the same either.

I have returned to Uganda and I have had the pleasure of meeting up with more than 40 of Hands to Hearts’ graduates. I am always eager to conduct follow up interviews with those who have participated in HHI’s training on early childhood development. What have they remembered? And what difference has this had in their lives and the lives of their children?

When asked, “Since the HHI training, is there a difference in how you spend your time with your children? If yes, could you please describe/explain how?” The women and the men described with great enthusiasm and pride that they now make more time, all through the day, to spend with their children. There was the overwhelming response of decreased physical discipline (“not beating my child anymore”), increased awareness and understanding of the child’s communication. The parents are feeling much more confident in how to respond to their child, and they are more at ease in caring for them. Again and again, it was reported that they feel they have developed a more loving bond with their child and their children are responding positively.

The children of HHI’s graduates are more likely to seek out the company of their parents and feel safer with them. The parents are now consciously trying to create loving bonds with their children, they give baby massage, play games, tell stories and spend time singing to their children. One mother reported that because she learned that her baby was learning language before he could speak, she spent more time talking and singing to her baby. The outcome she noticed is that her child now has a larger vocabulary than other children his age.

We also ask HHI graduates if they have made changes in health practices. This is surprisingly one of the most popular sections of HHI’s training. Parents report significant improvements in nutrition, hygiene and sanitation practices and they quickly notice that their children are sick less often and gain more weight.

When asked if anyone else has noticed changes in actions of our HHI graduates, again we hear very noticeable and positive outcomes. They report that both their children and their neighbors have noticed. The children are found to be discussing these changes amongst themselves and they now seek out and enjoy spending more time with their parents. The neighbors have observed that the HHI graduates are calmer, more gentle and nurturing with their own children and the children in the community, so much so that some of the neighbors now call them “Grand” (like Grandparent) as a term of respect and in recognition of their loving manner with all of the children. Many of these neighbors have approached the HHI graduates, asking them what they are doing and why. Now HHI is overwhelmed with requests for more and more training.

Let the love flow!

Special thanks to Christine Chaille, Frank Mahler who created HHI’s brilliant training materials with the input of our fabulous India team, led by Sujatha Balaje. You have touched the lives of tens-of-thousands of babies with more love.