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DEL.ICIO.USGwinnett Children’s Shelter offers new life and hope
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I recently took a visit to the Gwinnett Children’s Shelter up in Buford and met with Nancy Friauf, executive director, who gave me a tour of the facility and opened my eyes to the realities of just some of the heart breaking stories that have come through their doors.
She shared stories of children who were so brutally abused and neglected it would leave you in tears, furious, or if you are anything like me… both.
I could focus on all the abuse and neglect that led some of the kids to this facility. Kids who have come from every walk of life from living in tents in the woods to the more affluent, and some who don’t even know basic hygiene or how to use a knife or fork.
To me, that is not the purpose of the Gwinnett Children’s Shelter. Among its many roles, the shelter is providing these kids a sense of what a real true loving and supportive home should feel like. Things many of us take for granted.
I am not here to talk about their devastating situations, but rather about how you can help 12 boys and 14 girls heal from their past and have a better present and an even brighter future.
The kids in the shelter have been very fortunate to have some very gracious donors in the past including one woman who told her friends and family she didn’t want anything for her birthday but stuffed animals to donate to the kids for Easter to some businesses such as a pharmaceutical company building a baseball field, and a builder who built the Girls Long Term Facility (estimated at about $500,000) for the shelter at no cost to house 8 girls.
These kids deserve our support and there are plenty of ways you can help too.
Most importantly, they need financial support, they have a big need for volunteers to serve in several capacities including mentors, they need more businesses to participate in their “Safe Place” program, and they need other items donated such as gift cards from the big box stores, grocery stores, and entertainment to cleaning, hygiene and laundry supplies, to even X-box and PS2 games.
Here is my challenge to you, to businesses and to churches throughout Gwinnett County and abroad: Step up and help the Gwinnett Children’s Shelter give these kids the love and support many of us were so lucky to experience when we were their age.
Call the Gwinnett Children’s Shelter at 678-546-8770 or visit their website at http://www.gwinnettchildrenshelter.org to see what part you can play in providing a better life for those who probably deserve it the most.
Permalink | Comments (23) | Post your comment | Categories: Woody Bass
Comments
By Katie
April 23, 2008 10:04 AM | Link to this
It’s a shame. Anyone can have a child but you have to go through hoops to adopt an animal.
Do you know why the State of Georgia cut back funding to shelters like these?? anyone???
By Michael H. Smith
April 23, 2008 11:14 AM | Link to this
Why Woodrow you’re just bitter, angry, have antipathy for people who don’t think like you. Yes you could have focused on the details of the abuse.
Tell you the truth, why don’t you Woodrow?
Could cause some voters to rethink why they put the same old people, from the same old two political parties, back into the same old elected offices, to do the same old things that insincere whiny complainers like you and I say have the power to do things differently because the voters gave them such power; if they would only use it for the right things, in the right ways.
Thanks for the link, Woodrow.
By Woody Bass
April 23, 2008 11:36 AM | Link to this
Michael: I considered it… but to be honest.. I didnt want to to do that to those kids and have to read about their horror stories and relive it in such a public fashion. I rewrote and redirected how I was going to do this piece 5 times before I decided on this version.
You know well I have no problem (otherwise) stating how I really feel… and I am sure you can read between the lines as to some of the things I would have said.
By Michael H. Smith
April 23, 2008 12:18 PM | Link to this
Oh, I did read the unwritten intended message. Probably did miss more than a few details. Perhaps the kids will read this, if so, I want you to know that your horrors are an onus - a legal moral burden - none of us should ever be able to escape.
Woodrow, thanks again for the link to their Website.
By Sabrina
April 23, 2008 4:18 PM | Link to this
Wow. I never thought anyone could be so bitter. (Michael)
I have volunteered at the Gwinnett Children’s Shelter for 4 years, and hold a spot on the Board of Directors-and I am only 17 years old.
The shelter does wonderful things, but they need support. Thanks for this article Woody. The kids will really appriciate it, because really that is who it is all for at the end of the day.
Happy thoughts!
By Michael H. Smith
April 24, 2008 1:41 AM | Link to this
Where do you get I’m against the shelter, Sabrina? Sounds like you got a personal problem to me, or with me. WOW! Because I feel as a person that abuse children are a legal moral burden that I and others should carry, bear and take a great deal of concern about YOU think I’M bitter?
I think you are really screwed up in the head Sabrina.
Think sanity first, you really need it.
By Sandy_G
April 24, 2008 12:42 PM | Link to this
Michael, Get a life. If a comment from a 17-year-old is so wounding to your personal sense of superiority that it creates such righteous indignation, you really need to get out more.
Oh, and if stories of abused children are what you crave for your own personal entertainment and titillation, perhaps you could visit the shelter and have them recount some of the horrors that innocent children are put through and have to live with the rest of their lives.
Suffice it to say, these are the most innocent victims in our society. They don’t ask to be born into the situations that many of them live in including physical, sexual and mental abuse, neglect, parents with substance abuse issues, domestic violence, etc., etc., etc.
Michael, Let me tell you about my personal experience with a boy that was in my Sunday school class years ago. He was 9 years old and was living in a one-room, weekly motel across the street from the church. His mother was addicted to crack, he had been taken away from her more than once by DFCS and then returned when mom supposedly got “her act together”. He would come to church whenever the doors opened, he would show up even at board meetings and would sit quietly and listen. Sometimes, he came to church dirty and smelling bad because he had no clean clothes. Many times, the snack we had in our Sunday School class was probably his breakfast. One morning, he seemed very quiet and withdrawn. When I asked what was wrong, he didn’t want to talk about it, but later, when the other kids had left, he looked up at me and asked me, “Why do people do drugs?” God only knows what he witnessed while living with his mother, but out of respect for him, I didn’t ask for details, I just tried to help.
One of our church members would buy him clothes, take him to eat lunch after church and invite him to her home to play with her kids and tried to make contact with his mother. We found and contacted an aunt who lived in another state and let her know what was going on and eventually he was sent back to live with her.
I still think about him and wonder if he is doing okay. All I can tell you is that when you look into these children’s eyes, you see their pain and you don’t need to hear the details.
In the metro Atlanta area, stories like this play out every day. One that comes to mind is one that I heard when visiting a woman’s shelter in Cobb County about a young mother with a toddler and a baby who were living on the streets in Cobb county. They were practically starving when they were picked up and brought to a local shelter. Mom had been unable to breast feed and had been feeding the baby with individual serving containers of coffee creamer from a fast food restaurant. The baby was within 24 hours of death and had to be rushed to a hospital. Thankfully, the baby was okay and the family was cared for.
Even in the direst of circumstances, these people are human beings and deserve their privacy and whatever shred of dignity they have left. Go and visit one of these places sometime and you’ll get it. All it takes is to meet one of them face-to-face and you’ll understand.
By Cindy
April 24, 2008 2:33 PM | Link to this
Michael, I don’t think people are interpreting your comments in the way you meant them.
By Bruce Wilcox
April 24, 2008 11:01 PM | Link to this
Mr. Smith, may I suggest you reword the statement. I know by your writing over the years I truely believe, by some, it was just an innocent mistanding.
By Michael H. Smith
April 25, 2008 6:43 AM | Link to this
You are exactly right Cindy they really don’t get it. But that is their right to twist anything into any form they like to suit their pleasures. I’m a big boy, I can handle it. Whether it is from a 17 year old or a 99 year old person. I wake up with myself everyday and I can live with that.
Some moments , like many others I’m sure, I have times of solitude when conscience speaks to me of all the inhumanity. The one that gets to me the most is child abuse. It gets to my wife even worse. I usually have to try and calm her down to stop her nearly uncontrollable crying in order to keep some composure myself.
My sarcasm toward Woody was intended to scold some of these hard-cases that think cutting taxes is more important than taking care of abused children. My goading Woody about details was for much the same reason - to crack some of these hard-heart-NUTS who spend our money on pure foolishness and cut funding for people who only need a helping hand in life, not a handout for the rest life, because they think that idiom plays well with the conservatives. Never do they try to think of win-win scenarios. Leave such things to the the churches and charities. All good and fine but somethings in life are a legal moral burden for individuals and their governments to bear that should be an inescapable reality.
Woody didn’t have to reveal names or identities to tell the story, no one’s dignity would have been shredded, so there really was no need for any abused victims to feel belittled in the eyes of anyone. But that was Woody’s choice one with which I don’t have a problem.
Nearly everyday on the news we get the gory details of some horrible act done to child in some place far away but when it is revealed closer to home, the message usually hits home.
By Cindy
April 25, 2008 9:06 AM | Link to this
Michael,
I don’t think anyone intentionally twisted your words…they just didn’t realize what you were saying and the reasoning behind your phraseology…which unfortunately led to a downward turn of events.
Your updated version is crystal clear and heart-felt. It would take help to misunderstand it.
By abused as a child
April 25, 2008 10:33 AM | Link to this
most people dont understand the long term affects of being abused.. i as a child was abused both physically and mentally by my father.. mother ran intervention all my life.. she protected me the best she could. when i was growing up they didnt have people or services that helped an abused child.
most dont understand the long term affect that it has even after they get help. i as an older adult look for acceptance even now. i know my father loved me in his way.. but i also know he grew up in a very very physically abused house. the pattern was carried on through him and stopped there. he was not as bad as his father was but that was all he knew. he didnt even realize he was doing it. im not giving excuses just a reason. to his dying day i could never measure up in his eyes for the most part. as he got older he got better.. just like wine. he mellowed out.
most dont realize that mental abuse is just as bad as the physically abused. both cut the into the childs mental well being. they are using looking for acceptance where ever they can find it. i am glad that woody didnt go into what happened to those children. there is no need to tell their stories.. they have to learn to accept what has happened to them and live with it. and this way they dont have to know that their story is all over the net. no there wouldnt be any names.. but they would know who they were talking about and so would the people that are around them and know that they live in the shelter. woody was able to get his message across without hurting these kids even more. and thats what it would have done.. even though their names werent used they would know.. and why hurt they anymore than they already have been hurt enough
By Alexis
April 25, 2008 10:57 AM | Link to this
Bleeding heart liberals! All of you should be ashamed. Having these shelters open and functioning just encourages deadbeat parents because they can just rely on someone else to care for their children after they are removed from their home. It is a disgrace. These orphanages should be shut down and parents should be forced to take responsibility for their children, and a policy of forced sterilization for the mentally weak and the indigent should be reinstated in this country.
By Cindy
April 25, 2008 11:13 AM | Link to this
Alexis, I call BS on your post, but thanks for stopping by to stir the pot.
By Michael H. Smith
April 25, 2008 1:06 PM | Link to this
For many abused people getting some of the hurt out does them more good than harm. Far more so than hiding behind the fear that someone might find out. The courage of abused people that allows them to tell of abuse often removes that fear or any stigma they may have once felt and places it where it rightly belongs.
My Dad was a good man. Like all good men he had redeeming virtues. He also had fatal flaws like all good men. He could destroy all the good he had accomplished over a lifetime in a split second. I’ve learned caution when speaking to my grandchildren , by far more than I ever used with my children. Like I said, my Dad had redeeming virtues.
By Cindy
April 25, 2008 1:20 PM | Link to this
He could destroy all the good he had accomplished over a lifetime in a split second.
I don’t even know yet what I want to say…but that one statement defines alot, doesn’t it?
rough day. I’ll comment more tomorrow when hopefully I feel human again.
By Michael H. Smith
April 25, 2008 1:34 PM | Link to this
Treat that statement with this in mind, Cindy. He never actually destroyed all the good he ever done. It simply appeared that way at times. That statement probably applies to millions of people across this country.
I’m sure some will try to make more of that statement than exists. Like I said , I’m a Big Boy. I’ll deal with.
By Cindy
April 25, 2008 2:00 PM | Link to this
I understand and will not pick it apart or make more of it than what you meant.
The statement was very thought provoking. I’m just amazed sometimes how a statement or persons actions can impact us. And how they are sometimes completely unaware.
It’s true you know…that we never forget how a person makes us feel.
By Katie
April 28, 2008 7:57 AM | Link to this
Alexis right back at it Cindy. I think we know the routine.
By Sheri
May 5, 2008 12:30 PM | Link to this
I think that all of you have lost focus on the shelter, this article was to bring awareness to the service that the shelter provides to youth in our community, it is not about your personal pet pieves. The shelter provides a safe haven to youth and in this day and age which is honorable. The shelter needs support, financially as well through your acts of service. If you would take the time to volunteer at the shelter or simply get involved in the life of a youth in your community you would truly understand why this is so important. I have been working with youth for over 10 years and this is one of the few places I know that provides support to the youth and their parents to help them deal with their issues in order to create a safe home environment that is not government run. Rather than talking about it be about it — donate your money and time.
By Bob
June 18, 2008 11:39 PM | Link to this
That would be East.
By Bob
June 19, 2008 10:14 AM | Link to this
Here is the map.
http://gwinnettvillage.com/alliance/images/PDFs/GwinnettVillageMap.pdf
By aundrea
November 5, 2008 9:45 PM | Link to this
my name is aundrea…i just recently got out of gwinnet childrens shelter.. before i went there i remember i had alot of needs and wants from my parents that i knew my parents couldnt supply for me…now that i have spent some time there having thosr things would be nice yes, but i know that there are other kids out there that i know cant have them and i dont even ask for them any more…gwinnett vhildrens shelter changed my life…