The Forgotten Child

I wrote this about two years ago and just came across it again.  It serves as a reminder to me that every time I walk into a classroom and open my mouth, I have the opportunity to make a difference in the life of a child.  Oddly, I think those potential differences have little to do with the subject I teach.  I'm posting this as a reminder to myself that no matter how hard and tedious some days may be, I'm blessed beyond belief to do this work.

The Forgotten Child

We will call him Despair.  He has many names, among them, Fear, Hurt, Self-Loathing, and Loneliness.  He has a sister, or a brother, or thousands of them who share his name.  Despair is one of the Forgotten Ones.  A child whom no one cares about.  There are people who say they care, but when it really matters, Despair finds himself alone.  When you think about a forgotten child, you think of a child whose parents were taken away by war, sickness or death.  In most cases children become forgotten through the far more insidious ways of neglect and abuse. 

We all know this child.  He is the one who was born to parents who didn't want him.  He was the one who got left behind in a divorce.  He is the one whose parents are in jail and he is being raised by other family.  There are many stories of his beginnings, many excuses for why he was forgotten.  They matter, but what matters more is if he will continue to be forgotten. 

If Despair is “fortunate” he has the chance to attend school, where he is even more neglected.  Despair stays away from people, because people hurt him.  He sits alone because no one wants to sit near him.  For you see, Despair wears the same clothes all week because he has no others, unless he wears his mother's jeans and tennis shoes, hoping no one will notice.   No one taught Despair to wash and to take care of basic hygiene issues.  So some days he smells.   Despair doesn't eat at lunch, because he can't afford to and doesn't know that he can ask for help.  Despair walks the hallways in fear of being taunted for being different.  He will be mocked, hit, tripped or pushed everyday.  Physical wounds will heal, but the spiritual and emotional wounds will never go away. 

If Despair is “lucky” there will be one teacher, or one counselor who will take an interest in him.  But this interest is short-lived.  It centers around passing a class or going to the next grade.  This is all overshadowed and made unimportant by the fact that Despair will drop out of school in 9th grade to get a job.   

Despair believes that he has no worth or value in the world.  This will be constantly reinforced by teachers and family who consider him lazy because he doesn't work in class.  No one knows or cares that Despair stays up with his drunk mother at night to make sure she is ok.  No one cares that Despair takes care of younger siblings and doesn't have the time to do homework or study.  No one thinks about what pain they are causing this child when they raise their voices at him or verbally abuse him in front of other student. 

We all know this child.  We know that statistics show that he will start dealing drugs so he can buy food for his family.  We know that he is likely to join a local gang so he can belong to a group who will look out for him.  We know that  he will do anything to feel valued. 

You've heard that it takes a village to raise a child.  In the case of Despair and his friends, this is true.  It will take more than one person to make a difference in his life.  It will take many people and many acts of kindness to show this child that he has inestimable worth.  It will take time more than anything.  The real question is, will the people in this child's life take the time to make a difference?  Will they go the extra mile, spend the extra money, take the extra time and commit to the journey? 

If they will, they will find that the time spend investing in this child and loving him will be one of the most rewarding things they have ever done.  But most of them will never take the time.  Despair will become one more causality in the war of indifference that we choose every day not to fight.  

Please look around you and find the child in your life who fits the description of Despair.  Choose to make a difference no matter what.  You may be the only one who ever says a kind word to this child.  You may be the only face of Christ that he or she ever sees.  Please choose to love the unlovely, fight for the weak, and be a shield for the hurting.  There are more of these children around you than you think.  Look closely,  and then act.

Martha's note:  Sometimes something weighs so heavily upon me that I have to write about it.  As a teacher, I see these children every day.  Sadly, I also see them in the homes of people I know.  Neglect happens on a small scale everyday in normal, happy families.  These children need champions.  They need someone  who will show them unconditional love and acceptance.  As someone who has dreamed for years of starting my own family, I see these children as a God-given opportunity to be a mother for someone who may not have one.  It's a hard calling, but I believe we are all called to help these children.  I pray daily that God will allow me to see these children as He sees them and to guide me as I try to help them.  Please join me in the fight to save these children from the futures that are ahead of them.  This writing is dedicated to Edwin and Kris Bumpass who made sure that Alie Grace would not be a forgotten child.

Dear Brother

Dear Brother,


You died on this date several years ago.  I don't know how many years because I avoided reading your obituary, death certificate or anything else that might provide a cleaned up account of your existence or lack thereof..  I'm not actually sure this is the correct date for that matter.  It was the third week in June, that's as close as I can get.

I don't know how else to start except to scream: I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.

I spent most of my childhood not saying or thinking this because it was wrong to hate someone.  I hated you for how you treated me.  I hated you for scaring me all the time.  I especially hated you for locking me in that big wooden box under your bed.  You were flat out one of the meanest people I've ever known.  I don't think childhood hatred is really hatred, or even an absence of love.  I think it was just the strongest word I knew to use for how helpless and angry you made me feel.  But you know what I  actually, really, truly hated about you?  I hated that not once, in 30 some odd years of being my older brother did you  ever stand up for me or protect me in any way.  Not once.   I hated you for repeatedly taking advantage of the blind trust I had in you.

As we both became adults, I tried to let go of all of this.  I at least tried to get over it.  I tried to be your friend.  I was so happy when you had children, I think I saw it as a way for you to redeem yourself somehow.  Or maybe it was to redeem me.  I tried to listen to you and be on your side when you got divorced.  I swore to you to protect your children if something ever happened to you.  When you got so sick, I sent you all the money I could as a college student so you could afford your medicine.  I found you places to stay when you came to see the kids.  I kept you apprised of how they were doing.  I ran interference between you and other family members.  I did everything I knew to take of you.  That was how I loved you.

You were a sick and distressed  man.  I know you were in pain, hurting and confused.  I know you did not want to be a burden.   I blamed myself for years for not doing more for you.  I hated myself for not answering those last phone calls.  It took many years and still it is hard for me to believe I couldn't have saved you if I had tried harder.  I would have done anything to help you if you had let me.

I am so incredibly hurt and angry to this day about your curtain call.  I need to understand but know that I never will.  I don't know what to tell your children when they are grown and ask about their father.  I don't know what to say to the families of my friends when they take the same exit.  All I can do is cry with them and hope that somehow I can show them that there is still life left in them and that death is not the end.

I've done everything you have ever asked me to do.  I have done everything to be the aunt/father to your children that you can no longer be.  I've failed miserably,  but I did do my best.  I like to think that if you were still here we would have been friends.  Or at least that you would be proud of me and finally approve of me.

For the first three years I thought about you thousands of times a day and dreamed about you every night.  I was shocked one day to realize you weren't everywhere in my mind.  But without fail on your birthday, Christmas, anytime we have a new baby born into the family,  a grandparent passes away, or the third week in June, I turn into a person I am afraid to be.  The depth of my sorrow seems like a wide gaping mouth ready to swallow me.  I don't understand how I still feel this way after so many years.  I don't understand why you still haunt my dreams.  I don't even know I've dreamed about you until I wake screaming.   I don't know what else to do to make myself back into who I was. I don't even know if that is who I really want to be.   You shattered my world and I hated you for it.

I've stomped on your grave and cursed you.  I've screamed until I had no voice and cried until I had no tears.  I have wrestled the devil, God, and everything in between trying to understand. There is a huge emptiness inside me for a brother who was never what I needed, but that I am afraid I learned too late how to love.

I miss you, I miss you, I miss you.