Our Youth At-Risk

We will not change the world during our service and we won’t fix all Bulgaria’s problems while we are here.  I can accept these terms and will not be losing sleep over it.  I can’t say the same about coming to terms with the realities how little I can do for my kids.

I have gone red in the face explaining how work with youth ‘at-risk’ is not synonymous with dealing with ‘bad kids’.  They are faced with circumstances beyond their control and put into the sort of situations that force kids to grow up fast.  Work with these kids may demand more but it’s understandable considering these kids hurt more.   We can’t erase their pasts or replace the cards they were never dealt. We struggle to protect them while we have them and have no control over what may come once they leave.

Two years is a long enough time to find a few kids that you love become the real life examples of what a childhood at-risk puts them  all at risk of.  It’s these 18 year-old’s get swept up and trafficked, 

and these girls that become child brides at 13.