Yovani

I want to share with you Yovani's story because his is a good glimpse into many impoverished family situations here. And that is, messy. Very rarely do we have a family come in with a well-defined problem and a well-defined strategy of how to help. Often it's very complicated, there's a huge history, and 13 extended family members are involved each with their own opinion.

Yovani is 4 years old and has three older siblings. There is no father, and the mother has found herself in a desperate situation. In an attempt to make a better life for herself and her kids, she has chosen the three eldest children and moved in with another man. He has a job and can offer some financial stability.

This leaves little Yovani to live with his aging grandmother, Julia. Julis is aging and frail. She can't afford to raise another child, but she does what she can. She can't offer Yovani a lot of things, but at least he has a family member to care for him.

Yovani and his grandmother, Julia

A few months ago Yovani's mom returned to collect some more of her belongings, one of which being the only bed in the home. Yovani's mom insists that she needs the bed: there are more people in her home. But Julia and Yovani share just one bed and if it's taken from them they are left to sleep on the floor.

The entire situation escalated into a court case, which neither side could afford. Julia and Yovani gave their bed up in an effort to save money from going to court. They came to Mayan Families and explained the whole story and we fundraised for them and eventually got Yovani and his grandmother a new bed.

I remember how much I disliked Yovani's mother when I interviewed her. I didn't want to try to understand her. I wanted to judge her for abandoning her child. If it were my choice that day, I wouldn't have helped her at all. But Mayan Families has existed long enough to know that situations aren't as simple as they may seem, and even those in the wrong need help. Yovani's mother left our office with donations of food and clothing.

When you have so few options, most of your options are poor ones. Yovani's mom later told us that she had every intention of returning for Yovani some day. She probably thought she was doing the best thing for herself and her 3 other children in trying to find them a more financially-stable home.

I could never condone a mother leaving her children, but yet I see it all across the world. When I was in Hong Kong I was surrounded by Philipine mothers who left behind their children and families to work as a domestic in Hong Kong and mail home their salaries. In the US there are many Mexican mothers who leave their families to work in the States and mail money back. When one faces extreme poverty I guess you'll do anything you can to feed your children. Most of us will never know what it's like to have to consider that option.

Poverty is messy and complicated. Those of us looking in from the outside often can't understand it or know how to best respond to it. Sometimes I see people respond to poverty here and I don't agree with the way they're doing it. But at least they're trying. Sometimes we make mistakes at Mayan Families and we judge families too soon. But at least we're trying. And I'm slowly learning that sometimes the outcome doesn't even matter that much. At least we put forth the effort, the time, and the compassion to try. And those who see us mess up or fail, well at least they know that we cared enough about them to try.

Poverty will always exist around us, and those of us with the most resources are most prone to separate ourselves from poverty. It gets too messy so we walk away, because we can. We must fight this tendency. We must step out of our comfort zones, even if we fail. We must try.