Melinda Kathy

How does a child heal from abuse? How should a caregiver help a child in that process? These are questions that Melinda Cathy addresses through her TBRI Caregiver Training.

“While recently in Russia, Sveta (name changed) and I went grocery shopping to feed The Harbor Vocational Training Center orphans, as well as the participants at my upcoming TBRI training event. As we loaded copious amounts of bread, vegetables, water, etc., onto the conveyor belt, the cashier inquired as to what kind of party we were throwing. When Sveta told her about our work among the orphans, the cashier responded with, “I tried to help those kinds of kids once. I used to be a teacher, but they are helpless. I don’t think you can do anything with them.” I tried to gently inform her that she was wrong and there was, indeed, much we could do to help them heal, if you only knew how.

The irony was that the cashier interacted with Sveta as if she was the professional she appeared to be. She was unaware that Sveta used to be one of “those kinds of kids.” Thirteen years removed from being a participant in The Harbor residential program, Sveta is now a beloved and vital part of the Vocational Training Center staff. She has healed tremendously, yet comments like these are all too frequent and pull her back to a past that is always present and threatening to undo her.

Though I have known Sveta for more than 14 years now, I have never seen where she grew up. I asked her to take me there. I don’t know if she would have been ready to do this before. We walked the path from the metro station to her orphanage. We stood on the grounds and she remembered, “That tree over there was where a guy hung himself.” “Behind that fence used to be a burned-out building where….” On and on she went. “That was my room.” “This is where we used to play this game.” We walked the path she walked to school. We went to the park she played in. I wanted to go everywhere Sveta had gone and hear every story she wanted to tell me. It was very painful for both of us, yet incredibly cathartic. I held her hands. I hugged her. We cried together. We laughed together.

She told me, “You know, every day they tried to break us. They did everything they could to humiliate us and keep us down.” When I asked her why she thought they did this, she replied, “They didn’t’ consider us to be fully human.” I told her how sorry I was for her past and all the horrible things she experienced and asked her how she was able to survive in such an environment. Sveta said, “Looking back I can see that at every step God gave me one person, like an angel, to protect me or believe in me, or help me.”