VOLUNTEER SHARING BY
ADWINA LEUNG, VOLUNTEER, CHILD CARE HOME
(1) Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Hello everyone, I am Adwina Leung. I joined Mother’s Choice family in 2007. I am now working as a volunteer in the Wee Care group.
(2) Please share how you first get connected with Mother’s Choice.
Many years ago, I have seen the articles in the South China Morning Post introducing Mother’s Choice, but at that time I had to take care of my two children studying in the UK. I had to travel to UK three times a year. I thought then, when I don’t need to take care of them in the future, I’d go back to Hong Kong to join Mother’s Choice as a volunteer. Finally, in 2007 I could devote my time to volunteer work.
(3) What’s your most memorable moment/experience in your work with Mother’s Choice, and why?
There are many unforgettable experiences. First of all, let me introduce, Mother’s Choice has three areas of therapists, they are physical therapist, speech therapist and occupational therapist. Because I have been a volunteer for quite a long time, I get to watch them to do sports with the kids a lot. When I had time, I asked them to teach me how to help these children with special needs to exercise, especially those children who are often bed-ridden. Because they lack exercise and often bed-ridden, their muscles are very stiff. I often thought I hope I know these massages or exercises that can help them to relieve them of their physical discomfort. If their body is very stiff, they can’t sleep well. The more they can’t sleep, the more irritable they are, the louder they cry. So was there any way to help them? The only way is to carry them, spread out their hands, massage slowly and gently, and massage their feet slowly. When their body is all comfortable and relaxed, they will fall asleep easily and they will cry less. So I think it is very useful to learn this from these therapists. It is especially useful for these children.
One of the children, due to a special situation in his family, he came to us in short notice. He is a boy, around five years old. When he came, he refused to eat, no matter how we tried, he closed his mouth tightly. The only thing he would only drink is milk but he needed to have solid food at such age. What could we do then? So, Child Care Home discussed with me, “How about you take him to a quieter environment, try to pamper him gently and slowly, and see if you can encourage him to eat?” It took almost a week before he began to accept me to feed him. In addition, his father told us that he is picky at eating, but I found out that it’s not he refuses but that he wasn’t given a chance to try. So we trained him gently and slowly until he started to eat. By the time he left Child Care Home to go to the second institution, he has started to eat by himself. Also, he rarely got out of bed when he was at home. His range of activities is within his bed, so his feet rarely got to have exercise. For example, he doesn’t know how to play with the activities at our playground. He didn’t know how to slide a slide, he didn’t dare to go up the steps, nor did he dare to slide down. So I took him to the playground, like the playground across our place, I taught him to step on it slowly from the beginning, hold on the rails, one step and then another step to go up. There is one more funny thing. When we changed diaper for him, because he is quite a big boy already, we gave him a stool to stand on and then put on the mat. He knew how to step on it. After changing the diaper, when he stepped down to that small chair, he didn’t know how to walk down. Because he was scared, he never tried, not knowing how to step down from a small chair. Because he was in the nursing room that day, I had an one-on-one time with him, since I had time I let him stood on that small chair for 15 minutes and I sat on another stool accompanying him while he stood on the small chair for 15 minutes. I kept looking at him, slowly and gradually, he got it. He knew how to hold the back of the small chair, squat down, sit down and walk down.
How do we volunteer? We need to have time, have patience, and we need to have confidence in the kid. We want to give him a message, let him know that: you can do it, and let him try. If he doesn’t give it a try, he will never be able to learn. I can easily carry him down but he won’t be able to learn it, isn’t it? So we must use this method to take care of these children. We have to face it positively. It’s not just that you love the kid, or just carry him all day long and not letting him get his hands on things, that’s not the way. We want him to face his future positively. When he gets to this Child Care Home, we will take good care of him. What if when he goes to another center without such good care? What should he do then? He doesn’t know how to eat, then no one feeds him, right? These are very basic survival skills and we have to teach him these. Say when I gave him a pack of biscuits, I will teach him how to rip it open. If you don’t know how to tear it apart, you won’t know how to eat in the future, right? So the only thing you have to teach him is how to rip it and then he can take it to eat. It isn’t that I tear open for him and he gets to eat immediately, that’s actually very fast. So that’s what we need to do, this is the reason.
(4) What’s your hopes/dreams for the future of the children we serve?
Of course I want them all to be happy, and live healthily ever after. My biggest hope is that they would be adopted and have their own permanent family. This way, their future path will be better well tread, and they will be physically and psychologically well too. Then they can grow up healthy and thrive well.
(5) Is there anything in addition you’d like to share but we didn’t ask?
There is a good news! In January 2021, we had a good news: one of our children who was adopted to the United States. This child whom I just mentioned, she cannot move her body and has to lie in bed all day. Her vision and hearing are not very good, but now when we call her, she knows how to look over. She also likes music very much. There is a music box by her bed which is always on. She started to cry if she wanted you to carry her. She is quite particular about the position of being carried because her body has begun to harden, if you carry her uncomfortably, she will continue to cry. you then have to ask her, “do you feel comfortable the way I carry you? Is this good?” She will respond in her own way: If she doesn’t cry, it means okay. This is a great news!
In addition, I am very grateful to the family who adopted her because she is the third child adopted by this family through Mother’s Choice. The first one is Siu Ming (pseudonym), he also needs to stay in bed like this girl. The other one is Tai Man (pseudonym), his eyes are not perfect. But both of them are very happy there in their new country, growing up so happily, and they are very tall now. Tai Man used to use nasogastric tube for medicine and food but now he can eat a big pizza. I saw him eating it like this. Aren’t you very happy to see these? We hope the adoption process could speed up so that more of our children can be adopted.
No matter what their situation is, there is hope. No matter how bad the situation is, hope is always there. All of us share this same hope and so is our goal.
(6) What’s your hopes/dreams for the future of Mother’s Choice?
Of course my dream is for Mother’s Choice to help more people in need. Mother’s Choice care for the children, as well as serving unmarried mothers. I hope the mothers will be well taken care of. As for the children, I really hope that we have more volunteers to join this big family, then we can take care of them even better.
No matter what their situation is, there is hope. No matter how bad the situation is, hope is always there. All of us share this same hope and so is our goal.
**
GET TO KNOW MOTHER’S CHOICE INFO SESSION
Learn more about Mother’s Choice or how to become a volunteer on our team by joining the next Get To Know Mother’s Choice Info Session via Zoom. Sign up here please.