This summer has been a whirlwind of activity for HHI – with demand growing and our capacities expanding to meet these. Recently HHI’s lead trainer, Sujatha, led a training for 29 women who work as caregivers, foster mothers and hospice workers for almost 200 orphaned and vulnerable children. All of these women and children are a part of a wonderful organization called Reaching the Unreachable (RTU). The training was such a hit, that it was featured in RTU’s recent newsletter.

Here is what they wrote:
One of the important programmes of this summer was by “Hands to Hearts”. The resource person Mrs. Sujatha Balaji gave training to our staff and trained Foster Mothers on cognitive skills, language development, therapeutic massage, songs & story telling, with focuses on children. The trained people are expected to disseminate the learnt skills to others. We also requested the regular support of this organization. During the programme Brother asked me to rush to the training hall; when I entered I was surprised seeing small children lying on mats and the mothers massaging their legs, the children were enjoying it by half close their eyes. During this training we could hear the joyful shouting of the children and mothers from the training hall. This was one of the joyful events of this month; we expect good results from coming months onwards.

Pictures from the training -

Women working in groups – learning about a baby’s cues of engagement and disengagement.

Who doesn’t love massage?

 

The women and children enjoy the Puppet Show as part of learning about language development.

I was recently asked to nominate mothers that I know who are initiating positive change and making our world a better place. I consider myself fortunate to know many of these women, one in particular is HHI’s Master Trainer in India, Sujatha Balaje. Here is what I wrote to nominate Sujatha for an honor that would fit her perfectly….

Sujatha was a natural fit when Hands to Hearts International (HHI) needed to find our first local Trainer in India. She was smart, capable, vibrant, and tenaciously committed to serving disadvantaged children. HHI is dedicated to improving of the health and well-being of orphaned and vulnerable children through improved early childhood care. Sujatha began HHI’s operations in India and she single-handedly established HHI as a new model of excellence in care for orphaned children.

Orphanages often live in an atmosphere of mistrust and apprehension, they do not welcome outsiders into their facilities for fear of judgment and negative exposure, though the caregivers are desperate and eager for training. Sujatha worked over time to build trust with each individual orphanage and slowly her efforts paid off in spades. In the first year and half she provided 20 HHI trainings on early childhood development to 277 caregivers who care for over 1,800 orphaned and vulnerable children!

When I have gone to orphanages to speak with the Directors about what differences they have noticed since Sujatha has trained their caregivers, many of whom have only a few years of any formal education, the first thing several of them said was simply, “we haven’t had a baby die since the HHI training.” As if this was not powerful enough, they continued to describe their children as sick less often, recovering their health faster if they did get sick, needing less medicines, gaining weight, being more responsive to the caregivers and easier to soothe. They also reported that the women were now more responsive the babies, calling them by their names for the first time, more confident in their work, more nurturing to the children and that they practiced improved hygiene.

While I know the HHI Training to be extremely useful, what has taken it to the next level, to actually bring about the magic connection between orphaned children and the women that care for them – the most critical ingredient in child health – is Sujatha’s passion for Hands to Hearts’ mission and the individual connection that she makes with every woman and child she works with.

When I visit orphanages in India, I can immediately recognize Sujatha’s presence. If she has given training there, the first give away is that all the women flock to greet her with smiles on their faces in babies in their arms, eager to tell her stories of how “their babies have gained more weight this month!” I also witness the women singing and dancing with the children, giving all the children massage, and the women refer to the children by name and with a new empathy – the bonding that happens go both ways.

I am honored to know Sujatha as a friend, colleague and inspiration. Her children are fortunate indeed, but beyond that thousands more children who do not have the touch of a mother have a new chance at love and care because of her tenacious work, talent and dedication.

India has a problem, a crisis of monumental proportions and which effects those with no voice, at least those with no words to defend themselves. Last winter India released reports that estimated that 10 million baby girls have been killed in India in the last 20 years – I would go so far to say that that this could be described most accurately as “sex selective genocide.”

In a radical and long overdue move, India’s Central Adoption Resource Agency is now striving to make it easier for Western families to adopt their baby girls. In a recent article in the UK Times, they underscored the crisis as such:

INDIA is to urge couples in Britain and other western countries to adopt
thousands of unwanted children languishing in orphanages throughout the
subcontinent and save them from a life of poverty and emotional destitution.
There are more than 11m abandoned children in India, where a
growing number of newborn babies are being dumped anonymously in cots placed
outside orphanages in an initiative to deter infanticide.
About 90% of those abandoned are girls whose poor young mothers cannot afford to keep them. They face a bleak future as beggars, prostitutes or menial labourers if families cannot be found for them.

Read more at India pleads: adopt our orphan girls. As much as I would want children to remain in their own countries, the first priority and most basic priority is that every child have a home.

Studies show that for every $1 spent on prevention the savings are anywhere from $7 to $30.

Last week while doing contract work at a residential therapy program, I was poignantly reminded of why I began Hands to Hearts and why our work is so critical. I was reintroduced to the seemingly endless list of families in utter crisis who were spending over $23,000 for their teen to spend 7 weeks in treatment. Last I knew a day in a psychiatric hospital cost over $800/day. YIKES – and these are the visible costs, the costs to the family, community, schools, and child – rarley can these be neatly tallied in dollar values.

HHI’s model is designed on a simple of model of giving thousands of our world’s highest risk children the best care possible, while in one of the worst case scenarios – that of being orphaned and growing up in institutions. Who is respsonsible for these children – deceased, ill, or profoundly impoverished parents, the communities (also grappling with similar issues), the governments (they get my vote!)? Or does it make sense that while Americans who are adopting a small number of children from the country they can make a contribution to not only ensure the best possible care for their next child, but can impact thousands of children left behind and the communities they came from? This makes sense!

I know that adoptive parents pay steep costs to adopt overseas, its expensive and due to this the families that make this choice often make considerable sacrafices to do so, and many families simply cannot afford to adopt. Adding the small fee for a child to come from a orphanage with Hands to Hearts nannies (anticipated to be about $1,500) on top of the already great expense of international adoption can be viewed as overwhelming. But step back for a moment and put things in perspective. If you are paying this fee – this is YOUR CHILD! Most people have been talked up more than this buying a car and add that on to your mortage and you would never even notice.

For HHI to reach thousands of children we must find the way that this can become a sustainable model, which means finding those who have a vested interest in seeing nurturing care for orphaned children. Until now, HHI has been generously supported on the donations of my friends, familiy and foward thinking foundations like the James R. Greenbaum, Jr. Family Foundation. This is getting us off the ground, but these are not long-term solutions, our small group must grow. People must join us, get involved, create awareness and cause the demand that children who are adopted from overseas are “Hands to Hearts children”.

The cost will be minimal, but first the demand must first be created. Please go forward and talk with potential adoptive families, let them know that they can not only find children who have had quality care, but they can make this the model for entire countries to ‘adopt’ as policy.

Contact our partners at Journeys of the Heart and ask how you can find an HHI child – then go tell the world!

All orphanages who have had HHI’s support have demonstrated improvements – some dramatic and some more modest. The outcomes are heavily dependent on the quality of management and support that the caregivers have and thus that they can pass along to the children. Yesterday I visited at an orphanage that whose caregivers received HHI’s training in July of 2006. The management and all of the caregivers have fully embraced HHI’s practices and the improvements in child health were amazing. The Director reported that even after eight months, the caregivers are still using HHI’s techniques to nurture the 36 children in their care.

The outcomes she reported for the children were that their improved health has remained consistent and they still have significantly less trips to the hospital, this has meant that children are able to be adopted (in country) much faster and are spending less time in the orphanage. The children are now singing, laughing, smiling, making eye contact, and they now respond to their names being called. The caregivers carry the children tenderly, not “like logs of wood”, they respond immediately when children cry and consistently give the children more attention. They show greater empathy and are bonding with the children, calling them by their names, singing to them as they spend time together and overall they are happier and take greater pride in their jobs.

Today our trainer conducted a follow-up visit at another orphanage that received HHI’s training a few months ago. This orphanage is in a very difficult situation, today they only had 3 women caring for 57 children! They are not able to apply many of HHI’s recommendations, as they can barely feed and diaper all of these children. However, what was interesting to note was that even in this compromised state the women reported that they felt more confident in how they provided for the children, each child now had their own crib and the sanitary conditions showed improvements.

I never cease to be amazed in the tenacity of people’s will and their ability to overcome seemingly unbearable odds to make a difference in the life of another. HHI is not a panacea, it is a tool, an extremely simple yet powerful tool, that when applied can make monumental changes in the lives of orphaned children and low-income women.

I am about to return to the US and HHI’s accounts are almost empty. This provides me no end of frustration, but as much as I grumble, struggle and fuss to about having to raise money from people/foundations/companies, I recognize that what I do in an honor. My creation has touched the lives of thousands, in ways that I can see and ways that I will never know of. I cannot compare the challenges I face with those of the people HHI serves. I am continually inspired by their compassion, courage, hard work and dedication.