By Lori Carlson
PLF is committed to building relationships with other competent organizations to bring services to children who lie outside the periphery of the core services PLF can deliver. We are beyond grateful to have found such a partner in Safe Haven Medical Outreach. They are a small and highly effective organization who work with mostly rural families of children with disabilities, bringing them much needed therapy, resources and community.
We have always been aware of the presence of children with disabilities in the villages where we have schools; we have mourned the loss of older siblings that have had to stop school so that they could stay at home and look after those home-bound siblings while parents worked in the fields. We have watched these children suffer without the kind of equipment they need and watched the parents suffer without the skills or knowledge that would enable them to best support their children. It has always made us feel so helpless and it’s been a source of great frustration. And heartbreak.
Mother and her son when we met them in 2006
This young boy has been in our periphery since 2006. It’s always been a struggle to keep his siblings in school because of the requirement that they stay home and look after him.
Once we got him into his first wheelchair, we advocated on his behalf mercilessly until we got the school to let him come to class with his brother. (Children with disabilities are not usually allowed in public school in Cambodia at present). So we had some very small victories but could do little to get to anything close to real solutions for the family.
Then the family suddenly disappeared, as families do, when their lives are connected to the land but they do not own any. All we knew about their whereabouts is that they had gone even deeper into forest, possibly lost to us forever.
Then one day, three years later, we were out visiting families in another village entirely, and the mother came running out from nowhere. We were very happy indeed to see our little friend again and happy to see that he looked well, all things considered
We immediately called our friends at Safe Haven and he’s now been provided with a custom-fit wheelchair that will assist him greatly. PLF will transport him and his mother to Siem Reap for appointments at Safe Haven where their physical therapist can work with the mother to teach her how to do exercises with her son, hopefully improving his quality of life exponentially. He and his mother will also have regular access to occupational therapy and health education, and in Safe Haven, the mom can also potentially meet other mothers of children with similar issues and find some community and support.
How grateful we are to Safe Haven, and to the universe for bringing this family back into view; they were never forgotten by us and their reappearance came at exactly the moment when we actually had some solutions to offer them.
When things just come together in that way, you know they are right.
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