A Nation of Parent-less Children

Thailand- an orphaned nation

So, I came to this place thinking that I was going to be spending three months with 42 orphans. Truth. I came here thinking that the girls at the orphanage were orphaned by both parents, or forcibly orphaned by a mom who was remarried. Truth. I came here thinking the orphan situation was pretty similar in Thailand to the rest of the world, no more or less than any other place. Pretty true to my knowledge. I came here thinking that when a mother has a child, they love them and want to stand with them for life, raise them daily, document their first word, first hiccup and the name of their first boyfriend. That they want to be a part of their child’s life. I shudder as I write the reality of this one, but false. This is painfully false. I am living in a nation of orphaned children.

I came here with such a spoiled outlook on parenting and the love of a parent to their child, and I am so crushed at what the reality is. I remember going off to my first year of college and talking to my mom almost every day. I thought she might be getting sick of me calling her all the time until she clarified one day that she took pride in being a mother, and that it “made her day” getting to talk me. The fact that me interrupting her agenda at work made her day. That as she may be getting snotty looks at work for taking the third call from me that day to answer a question about the life of an adult, and that that same call made her day. My mom is so very much in love with me, and she has unknowingly set the standard for other mommas in the world so high.

But then I look at other Mommas in America that I have seen first hand. My best friend Jessi, her mom waking up in the middle of the night to put aloe on her sunburn. My girlfriend Sarah’s momma crying as she sent us off at the airport. My buddy Andrew’s momma willing to write a book about his experiences from a mission. Their hearts are just swelled when their baby’s walk in the room. They love so hard, so unconditionally, so intensely. They have momma bear protection capabilities and anaconda squeezing abilities. Their love for their children is just through the roof, and so beautiful, and so.. in my eyes, what it should be.

This isn’t the reality of motherhood in Thailand. If a mom is remarried in Thailand, the culture is accepting of the new husband to completely disown any daughters from the previous marriage. If the mom fights it, there is a potential for the mom herself to be put out on the street, and women are not lot likely to make it alone here. Supporting herself and her daughter(s) is next to impossible. So, in a survival mode, she holds her breath and unplugs her emotion and conscious and kisses her girls goodbye. And that’s it. Now as much as I want to scream at the woman in this scenario, my heart goes out to her, because her choice is so very difficult. Starve with your kids and watch them suffer as you have no strength to comfort them, or take what you can, walk away from the rest and be provided for.

My siblings and I used to ask these really disgustingly hard questions of if we had to choose between best friend number one and best friend number two to live, and if we didn’t choose both would die, whom would we choose? Really gross, I know. However, I remember the terrible feeling I had trying to think of a rational way to answer the theoretical question. This question or situation isn’t theoretical for these mothers. It is real, and as much as I hear their hearts cracking in making the decision, they are trying to make the best choice they can. I honestly could not imagine.

With that said, I feel like I can argue on these women’s behalf for their position. What comes next is to me, unjustifiable.

Laura, the incredible woman I get to be associated with for the next three months, has lived here in Chiang Mai for five months. She has learned some Thai and shopped in a Thai market for her family and conquered the terrifying transportation system here. Stopping at the transportation system, and adding in the detail of her being able to communicate, she gets to talk to people on the “Song tows.” (Song means “two” and tow means ‘bench.” This is a truck with two benches in the back.) One day Laura was riding the song tow into town and was having a conversation with a Thai lady. She managed to get across what she and her husband Matt were doing with the girls at the orphanage; essentially raising them with education, housing, safety and love. When Laura finished her explanation, the woman asked if she would take her kids to the house. Now stop for just a second, please. Reread what I just said. This lady wanted Laura to TAKE HER KIDS. Just take them. People from where I come from FIGHT for their kids. They have custody battles, go through courts, and have visiting rights. When DHS takes kids away from unfit homes, parents go nuts, they call them baby stealers and freak out. And then here is this woman, in the back of a truck, asking Laura if she will take her kids and raise them. Is this weird and awful to anyone else?

I remember again, my first year in college when I was first supporting myself. Bills suck. They were not my favorite gift of being a big kid. I remember wanting to get a doggy, and knowing that I couldn’t afford it, but if I got one, we would do it all together, and somehow I would make it work. Now I understand that kids are more than dogs. That I had a better paying job than most women here in Thailand have, if they have any job at all. That I had more opportunity to “make it work.” But how, how is this justified in their heads.

So, I thought maybe this lady was just a crazy when I first heard this story, but then it got worse. Matt told me that that is very normal here. That people are dying to give away their kids. They want to give them to the orphanage I am at, for us to raise them and get the free schooling. They will put the kids in monasteries when they are seven because they will take care of the kids for a while, fed them, school them, raise them. Matt got it through my skull that parents want to give their kids away, and I have worked on justifying it and putting myself in their shoes, but I just don’t understand; how do you not want your children. Not just one horrifying story of poverty and inability, not just one story of a parent that left and the remaining parent just needed a boost for a while, but a nation. A nation that is willing to orphan their children. That is ready to give them away.

Matt interviewed a woman yesterday for a position here at Breanna’s and learned that her two kids are in other child homes in Chiang Mai. I wondered if I was in a home because my momma couldn’t care for me, what she would do. I decided that, based off of her love for me J, she would work her tail off to work at the home I was at, as her occupation, so that she would be near to me. Because she loves me. Because she would want to help raise me and watch me grow up. But this woman was at an orphanage down the road interviewing, and my heart broke for her babies.

I realize that life is hard, that birth control is far in the distance in this country, and that abstinence is unheard of. What I don’t get is why parents are unplugged from their emotions, and willing and happy to give their babies away. To meet a woman on a bus and within 60 seconds offer to give away a child. It is a harsh, harsh reality, that the nation I am a part of, every child in this land, besides the American babies I am living with, are essentially- orphaned. Maybe they still live with the mom trying to give them away, maybe their mom just got remarried, maybe they already are living in a home or wearing the orange monk suit. But based off of what this culture has offered to share, the diagnosis is that parents want out, and children are unwanted. Ugh. May we pray for these kids…

I could go on forever with this. Looking at the psychological aspect of it, the attachment factor, the way that it trickles into the way that the kids and the entire culture looks at the Gospel and importance of Jesus, it’s just upside down. I’m going to end my blog as my mind continues to search for justification. Please pray for these girls. Pray for the hearts of the kids here in Thailand. The inescapable reality that they are not wanted, and how that will affect who they are, and how they will live the rest of their lives.