Mom stories
One of the reasons we started The Well to reach families of bar girls, not just the women themselves, is the power that family has in a Thai girl's life, particularly her mom.
Tik, 16, had to rush home Friday evening to her village to help her family. I wasn't clear on exactly why. A week earlier I had sat for a long time with Aw, Tik's bright older cousin, and Aw's mother, trying to convince her to join The Well. Aw had declined, her mother concurring, saying she had to fend for herself. Yesterday Tik called another student to report that now her mother is telling her to go back to bar work.When we first met Tik, she indeed looked like a young bar girl, 16 going on 25. Within days however we started to see a real girl again. She was the one at the beach who showed Mae how to look inside a jellyfish to find the starfish it had eaten. At the same time, she remains one of our highest risk students for going back, because of her mom. We're praying hard, and will try to work something out with her mom.
Sometimes it's just neglect. I asked Pear, 13, what she understood it meant when we said we loved her. She looked at me blankly then looked away.
I asked her again. "Do you understand what it means when we say we love you?" She slowly shook her head. "No one has ever told me anything like that before."
Pear told 2 of our workers that her mother has told her father, who is in prison, that she is now a mistress to a Western guy (me). Yeah, right. I met Pear's mother once, when she came by to request $30 to help pay her rent, a gift which I authorized. Obviously she can think of no good reason why I would care for her daughter. I'm actually sort of used to this sort of thinking, and it's one of the reasons I am very careful to never be alone with one of our students. Gai, our house parent, will take Pear to visit her dad on Monday, and hopefully not only straighten things out but use the situation to explain just why we are different.
On the positive side, little Mae's mother came to visit yesterday. They actually had not seen each other in a few years. Mae was eagerly at the gate. Her mother was very warm and affectionate. Perhaps this is the break we've been praying for to help Mae open her open her heart to us and to the Lord.
Write a comment
- Required fields are marked with *.
