Doamna Flori
Doamna (Mrs) Flori joined the organisation as a social parent in 2001, after being a teacher with Health Aid since 1999.
On the children she cares for
…The youngest of the home… …is very dear to me. Especially because I’ve had her since she was little, and I got attached to her - and I hope this has happened with the others, becoming attached to me as well. I think they have, because if it were not so, our relationship would not have been so sound. The young one is 1 year and 11 months old - her name is [-----], and we have had her since the 10th of May 2003. She is a perfectly healthy child, a good child, eats well, sleeps well, and she doesn’t create any extra problem.
Has she become negative?
Yes, she has. She hasn’t received treatment since 1st of January 2004 - though her tests had been good since last year, October 2003. But the doctor said she should go on with the treatment - as an extra precaution - though there were no big problems. Nor are there now, and there shan’t be.
There are two 11 year old children; -----, a very intelligent and clever girl - a very affectionate child, with special qualities. She learns well, reads a lot. Like any child of her age, she would like to play more… …She likes being smart, dressing nicely, even using make up. She is a good child.
I have another boy of her age, -----, who - he is somewhat lazy. We’ve tried with steady efforts to improve his schooling. I know that boys are generally more difficult, and it is harder to keep them in line. But he was the last child into the house, and it seems he got used to the extra care he received - throughout the years he’s considered himself the youngest, and that he should have the smallest jobs, especially relating to school. He wants only to have a story, a game, a drawing, and so on.
Next there are the older children. -----, who was 15 in June - she is a strong-willed child. But, unfortunately, her intellectual level is quite low. Although she has a strong will, she can’t retain what she learns. But on the other hand she is a very clean and tidy child, who takes care of her belongings very well. She is always willing to help with whatever needs to be done. She never hesitates to help me with the housework. She is a very, very sensitive child - a child who got attached to me; she suffers at the idea she might upset me somehow. So she cries and until you tell her clearly - “I am not angry with you, and I am all right” - she doesn’t stop. She is an extremely sensitive child.
Next there are the two boys. -----, he is 15, and the most revolutionary in the house, if I can say. He is very tall, and he thinks he can dominate the others by his sheer presence, and there is no need for other kinds of behavior. But he is also quite sensitive - sensitive and warlike at the same time! One must know how to handle him in order to help him. He is generally pretty negative - he doesn’t want to do anything - but if you explain to him what’s the use, of what you are asking him to try, then he agrees and he cooperates.
----- is next. He is 14, a very clever child, very good at school - he is intelligent, he works a lot, and well at math. He doesn’t like Romanian, but this doesn’t mean he won’t be able to do something further. He is quite attached to me, too, and we work together nicely.
On how she came to the organisation
My qualification has nothing to do with what I am doing now. Only, perhaps, that I am a mother as well - that’s the only explanation I can give - and the fact that I love children made me do this, and explains my presence here now. I am, by profession, a machines construction engineer - so I used to work in a completely different area. I came to Health Aid after seeing a newspaper advert - medium qualified personnel required. I did a test, as customary, and an interview. And I was hired, and worked as a teacher from 1999 to 2001 - when I became house parent.
On the decision to join the organisation
When I received the proposition of accepting this job, the first group of people to talk with my own family: my husband and my son, who knew I was working with positive children. At the beginning they had no reaction but it’s one thing to do this as a paid employee - and quite another thing to involve yourself as house parent. Now the problems are more complex and they require from you as person and from the family much understanding and tolerance.
When I talked to my family — I mean brother, sister, mother, father…. …[at first] I told them it’s about some abandoned children, with health problems, and after a while - but not very much later - I told them it was about some positive children. And who have special needs: they need much affection, understanding, much attention - and I personally think I’ve given them these, and I keep on giving them.
There were some isolated cases when relations (between friends) became cold. Either there was not enough time for parties, meetings and so on - or that was the way they understood this situation. The children go to my place, to my family in Bucharest and in the countryside, where I have relatives. So I’ve had no problems - I mean with my family, not my friends.
On starting as a house parent
It really mattered that had I worked, not for a long time, but an important one, as a teacher. I was able to form an attachment with them. [Just as, if we like] our first teacher in primary school it provides an extraordinary impulse for our further schooling - the same happened with me. From the very beginning I was close to them and open - I took much care of them, and they liked and loved me from the beginning.
I tried to be so open to them that they would tell me any kind of problem they might have had. I would say that was a learning period, when the connection between the children and myself was made - and when I became a house parent this connection had already been made, and they did not consider me a stranger any more. I was already close to their soul, to their problems, to their childhood, their growth, to all kinds of health problems - and when I became house parent I did not have any surprises.
…They did not find strange that I did not leave for home any more, and that I stayed with them. On the contrary, they were happy that I did not stay a certain number of hours and then leave - and all the activities we used to do before could go on unhampered now. Before if we painted, danced, sang, we were forced to interrupt ourselves. But now our time together was much longer.
On Her Family
I am married, I have a son. My family participates a lot in my work, and they take care of these children as much as they can. There are periods of time when my husband and my son live here with me, but there are other periods when I go home to my place. But those times are seldom, because children are sensitive when I go....
And these children are special. They can’t stand strangers moving around them. When strangers appear here - it’s not about them, but my absence. Because they know when I am here, they are protected - they know whatever might happen I am here with them…
…But when I leave, two things might appear suddenly: first that instability, because I am not here, and the second - I don’t know.... their relation with [other people] is not very open. And they generally refrain themselves… and all the problems that crop up in my absence are told to me when I return.
How old is your son?
My son is 29 - he is not a child, he is mature, and he takes much care of them and he is around them a lot. We were together at the seaside - we’ve been together for four years with my husband and my son. And my family participates in the activities involving the normal running of this house and family.
On the children’s biological parents
It’s an extremely delicate subject. I have never been in such a situation, and it is very difficult to talk to a child about the existence of his family, to talk to him about mother, father, brothers and so on. ----- and ----- are the only ones from our house who are visited by their families. The rest of them don’t know any of their parents, mother, father, sister, brother or uncle.
I don’t consider this a good thing, that two are visited and the rest of them not. This situation provokes envy, and all kinds of bad feelings, which are difficult for them. So, I spoke with everybody about his family, and I explained to each of them that it’s possible that - having been abandoned in a hospital, then taken in by Health Aid, then moved to a family house like ours - their parents could lose track of them. …Perhaps their parents didn’t know the place they can pick them up from, or they had a phone number which changed, or were living in a distant corner of the country. They didn’t have much time to find their children, or they had younger brothers with bigger or smaller problems then theirs, who needed more attention from their parents.
But, when they grow up - at 18, each of them may seek out, and put a lot of questions to their parents.
The questions they put to me are not easy at all. There are puzzling questions. [-----] asks me: “Why does [his sibling’s mother] visit her? I said - on the one hand, because all the time her mother kept in touch with our organization, she’s never lost contact. And on the other hand, she has money and can afford to do that. [-----] asked: will they take away [his sibling]? I explained to each of them that if [-----]’s mother could afford to take her with her, and take care of her, of course she would take her…
They ask: what’s going to happen to them? I explained to them… …they will attend special, professional or technical schools. Each one of them will earn a salary, allowing them to have a decent life - they won’t go to the streets…
What other kinds of questions do they ask?
Why hasn’t anybody looked for them up to this age? Why don’t - for example, [-----] doesn’t have a birth certificate, though he will have one soon – but why weren’t his papers done? Why was he left in the hospital? Were we abandoned because we are ill?
You temper negative feelings toward their parents?
…Yes, because if you cultivate hatred toward the parents in such a child, who keeps on asking questions about his family, you embitter him. Their health condition might get worse having these thoughts. Each one of them is full of thoughts about how their house is - what their parents look like…
On prejudice against HIV
I haven’t encountered such a thing personally. But there hasn’t been the chance. People on our street have a good opinion about us - they are very thoughtful, and they admire the children and the house all the time. And we have always received appreciative words concerning our activities here.
But - there is a but - I don’t know… I never told, and I was never asked, if these children might have health problems. So I don’t know if our neighbours know the problems the children cope with. They know they are abandoned children and that they have health problems. But they don’t know which kind of problem.
…Nobody has asked me clearly “Is there any problem with these children?” There was a rumour, from mouth to mouth, that there were some children here, in something they called a kindergarten. I explained to them this is not a kindergarten; it’s a home, a family, who look after some children with problems.
The truth is we haven’t been living here for a long time. We’ve been here for three years and I guess there is plenty of time for such questions to arise from those around us. But the neighbours took us the way we are.
On Prejudice at school
At the school, indeed there were problems - concerning their integration in mass education. The [other] children’s parents are quite suspicious, reluctant - the teachers are bad and blame the parents, because it is hard to admit straightforwardly, “I don’t want him because...” They tried all kinds of reasons, with more or less discretion and subtlety, in order to avoid such confrontations.
So, a masked prejudice.
Not always masked... [One day] the children were in the street, coming home from school, and others called after them - “AIDS, the AIDS ones” …Of course it hurt them, they came right home, they told me. And I explained to them their illness is not as serious as it seems.
But on that occassion they asked me to explain to them, word by word, what everything was about, if they would die, live, how long they would live, what was going to happen with their treatment… absolutely everything. And I explained to them.
I usually talk the same to everybody, regardless of their age, and perhaps some understand more. But I talk to everyone, especially to avoid wrong information traveling from the older ones to the younger ones and the other way around. And I told them as long as they were under treatment, and went pretty often to the doctors and had their tests done, there would not be any problem. You don’t die from this disease - those from outside, who behave towards them like this, are uninformed.
And this is indeed a problem: people are not well enough informed - people don’t know what this illness is. HIV is not as serious as hepatitis B. But people have a different perception when you say hepatitis. They don’t know this hepatitis could be of different kinds and can be more serious than what the children have. The children’s illness can be staved off, is under treatment - as long as you don’t place a wound on another wound, you don’t have any problem.
On concerns for the future
What worries me the most? I am worried that years have passed - the present day treatment is very good, but I hope for advance. I mean, we’ve heard, and read, that everybody is fighting for a possible vaccination, which could solve and cut the roots of this misfortune and… …perhaps we can save these children, too.
I only say this, because - I don’t know. …I am worried that years have passed and - they are children who have suffered from this misfortune since their early childhood, and I don’t know how long their bodies will resist.
On the arrival of a baby foster-child in the house
When we took [-----] and I brought her home —I really wanted to have a baby at home, because a baby like [-----] creates a nucleus around which the family can gather. We tried to become closer to one another through her.
…Everybody forgot about problems, about everything, and focused upon [-----]. Often they are angry with me because I don’t always let them feed her and wash her, but I am afraid they might drop her…! She was baptised - we did this in the yard with the children - with all the other houses invited, all the children and their parents. So it was a very special moment for them – [-----] is her godparent, he held her candle at the baptism.
A final word
I am sorry I came to work with them at this late age - because I am pretty old, compared to them, and I’ll have to leave them at some point. [Doamna Flori starts to cry]. Not because I want to, but because age will require it. They are too young compared to me - and I don’t know if I have time to experience the happiness of seeing each one in their own home.
This is the only thing that torments me. I’d like to see everyone in their homes, and be able to help them as much as I can - it’s the only thing I want. And that all of them should live - I couldn’t stand to lose anyone.
…These minor things… …these are momentary upsets, not to be attended. There are many more serious things to think about.
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