Fwd: Helping others

Kannu and Diya

Here's something from another charity that I help run. This is home start Hillingdon. It's a charity which helps families with young children. When families have problems relating to alcoholism, drug abuse, unemployment, mental illness, unable to cope or a variety of problems, the police or NHS or social services or other relevant bodies pull us in. We deploy one of our trained volunteers to help out the family. Usually the assignment takes between 6-9 months although it can be as short as 1 month or as long as 2 years.

The volunteers are brilliant. They are normal citizens. All who have kids of their own. And they devote almost a day per week helping out some other family. They don't get paid. And most of the cases are serious. They are one or two steps away from the family breaking up and being taken into care. And if a family breaks up, it really ruins the members. And once a child is taken into care, the probability that the child's future life is screwed is very high. Did you know that a child taken into care can cost £50,000 per year? So we look after 100 families per year. Even if only 10% families were saved, from a cost side we are very effective. But the main benefit is to broader society to keep families together.

You two were and are raised in a well to do family. If a bit strange with a nutty baba and the books and loud noises and museums and strange habits but seriously, there are so many other families which are in serious need for comfort. See this list of outcomes we aimed for and completed.

Oh and another thing kids. And remember this very closely. We have to look after family members. Most of my cases do not have family members to reach out to. And the lack of family can cause severe loneliness and if/when you have issues there is nobody to reach out to. So that's why I was so happy that Both of you kids are so nice and speak well and keep in touch with dadu and didu and piya and pro and of course us. And at end of the day kids, you've got to love each other. Be patient. And help others.

Anyway I'll talk more about these families as we go on.

Love

Baba