Doreen Update

Since Doreen joined our family in July 2014 it has been an interesting journey.  After losing the only mother she had ever known, Doreen came to us full of conflicting emotions.  She has never been part of a structured family so it has been challenging for her to adjust.  In the past months we have seen much growth in her and we are thankful. 

Took Doreen out for her first hamburger

 

The school she was attending when she came to us was a coed boarding school near where her grandmother lived.  It was a very rural and basic school with no field trips or laboratory and had very limited resources.  The teacher to student ratio was terrible.  Her grades were not good; she was failing most of her classes.  We quickly realized that Doreen is a bright student with potential but the environment she was in was not good.  She had gotten herself into the wrong crowd and as we all know, peer pressure at that age can cause poor choices to be made.

After much prayer we began searching for a better school closer to home.  Because of her poor grades we were turned away again and again.  We had almost given up when God opened the door at a Christian private school in a town nearby called Bungoma, Beulah Girls High School.    We knew it was a divine thing when we walked into the principal’s office.  The principle and founder of the school is one of John’s old high school teachers who was a big influence on John.  She runs an all-girl boarding school and has a huge heart especially for girls who are having various difficulties both in their personal lives as well as academically.   She really is a mother figure to her students.  After sharing Doreen’s story with her she agreed to take Doreen under her wing. 

 

 

Doreen began attending Beulah Girls in February.  Since that time we have already seen improvement not only in her grades but also in her character and as a whole.  Her grades are slowly getting better.  She comes home for all her school breaks.  That’s an extended weekend every month and half, a month after each three month term and an extended Christmas break. 

We are thankful to be Doreen’s family and play the role of guardian/parent to her.  The teenage years are hard for anyone and with Doreen’s past they seem to be particularly challenging for her. There are a lot of behavioral issues that we have had to address with her as we try to help her grow into the young woman we know she can be.  She’ll be an adult soon and our prayer is that when she finishes school and leaves our home to find a life of her own, she will have learned valuable life lessons and be able to make wise choices for her future. 

John recently went to see her for Academic Day, it’s a bit harder for me to make it these days without our own vehicle. 

 

John with Doreen and Linzy who was one of John's former students at
Serve Academy where John was a primary school teacher for five years. 

It's hard to capture Doreen smiling =)

 

Doreen is a little shorty =).