another little one's story

One of our younger students frequently came in with painfully infected earlobes from cheap earrings that she reacted to. Her aunt says she insists on wearing them. But no one at home teaches her anything about removing and cleaning them, and when she has an infection, they don't do anything for it.

I took her old earrings off, and told her to please not wear them, that I would bring her some that would not infect her ears. I bought the better quality earrings at about four dollars. I gave them to her, knowing that there was a good possibility they would be taken away, but hoping they wouldn't.

Sure enough, she is now without them. When asked where they are, she just tells me she lost them. And that is what she thinks. She doesn't know how it works. Often when we give an item to a child, the parent or other relative will take the item and either keep it for herself, or sell it. I can still remember when I bought a little 3 years old boy, his first underwear. I gave him 5 pairs. By the next week his brothers had stolen and sold all but one, and that was only because he was wearing it.

Then there was the teen who received a new bed after the floods ruined his. His step father, tied him up in a chair and beat him because he wouldn't let him have it.

This just shows how we absolutely must be able to interact with the family as well as the child. The family needs the Lord too.