One Month Later (from Dixie/God's Littlest Angels)

12 February 2010 2 AM!
Posted by Dixie

BBC London called me at 8 AM their time which was 2 AM Haiti time and I updated them on how the orphanage was doing a month after the earthquake. They spoke with me 5 minutes but of course, now I cannot go back to sleep! So I decided to watch a little bit of Anderson Cooper on CNN, because I really like Anderson, but I am not very happy with Anderson tonight!

Anderson has decided that it is better for children to be raised in orphanages than it is for them to be adopted into loving families. Where did he come up with this wisdom? Has anyone read a book by a child raised in an orphanage that said that it was the BEST experience in their lives? That living in a group of children was so MUCH better than having a Mom and Dad to raise them? I have never read a book like that!

Ask our foster son, JAMES, about being raised in an orphanage. He says he would have loved to have been adopted instead of spending his whole life from 10 months of age to now living in an orphanage. He missed out on a lot of family life…things a normal family do together. When he came to live with us, he did not know how to live in a family and what was expected from him!

I would bet if a poll was taken of Haitian children raised in orphanages, most would say they would rather have lived in a family setting. For every good orphanage in Haiti, there are probably 10 that are not so good. They try but without some sort of outside funding, most orphanages just scrape by every month and the children are not well taken care of. Anderson, report about these orphanages and talk to the children who are teenagers at these orphanages. Would they have liked to have been adopted and had a chance to better their lives rather than went to bed hungry every night and not got the education that they could have received if adopted?

Do NOT go to an American run and funded orphanage like Mercy and Sharing and show America and the world how well the children are doing in an orphanage. This is NOT a Haitian orphanage. Mercy and Sharing says they do not do adoptions, but there are children from Mercy and Sharing who are adopted by American Families. The orphanage just turns the children’s paperwork over to a lawyer and HE does the adoptions so they can say they do not do adoptions. It is not their main purpose in Haiti but children from their orphanage have been adopted into families! So Anderson, please do research before you report on an orphanage!

Haiti before the earthquake had over 50,000 children living in orphanages and IBESR has said that the number could be double that amount because many orphanages are not registered. UNICEF says there were 350,000 orphans in Haiti BEFORE the earthquake. Haiti authorizes about 2000 international adoptions per year. That is NOT a high percentage of children being adopted by foreign parents and many of those children are orphans with NO mother or father or just one parent who cannot care for the child.

Why does Angelina Jolie, who is in Haiti, not speak out for adoptions? There are times when adoption is best for the child! They never talk about that! My little Jerrensia, with bilateral leg deformities, will most likely be a beggar on the side of the road as an adult if she stays in Haiti! Tell me, Anderson, that this is better for her than going to the USA where she could be a doctor or lawyer or school teacher. Tell me that having her stay in Haiti and being a beggar is better!

But nobody wants to hear the facts. They want the sensationalism of kidnapping by American “missionaries”! Why are they called missionaries? They did not come to bring the gospel to Haitians. They did not come to live and work in Haiti. They had not even been in the Dominican long enough to be called missionaries! So why is the American journalists and Haitian authorities calling them missionaries? Did the group give themselves this title thinking it made them more legitimate?

Well, now that I got this off my chest and it is 3:30 AM, I will try to go back to sleep! OH one more thing, Anderson, you said that Haiti will have 3 days of mourning for those who died. The churches here are calling for 3 days of fasting for Haiti and those who LIVED! Get it straight Anderson, get it straight!

from Godslittestangelsinhaiti.org

Drew Brees is going to DISNEY WORLD :D

Matthew 25:35-40 (ESV)

35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

PRICELESS (Thankasolider.net)

To Save A Life

www.tosavealifemovie.com

I HAVE ALWAYS WANTED TO SAVE LIVES (From helmandblog.blogspot.com)

'I always wanted to save lives'

By Caroline Wyatt
Defence correspondent, BBC News

Members of the Army's bomb disposal unit describe the task they face.

Little more than 5ft, Capt Judith Gallagher probably weighs about the same as the backpack and equipment she carried on the long, hot marches through Helmand province that can last most of the day.

The marching in the heat and the dust is only a prelude to her real job - defusing the Taliban's roadside bombs.

On her first night in Helmand last July, working with Estonian forces in the dark by a canal, she defused nine.

"I always wanted to do a job where I could save lives," she says, in a matter-of-fact way.

"I don't find it scary. I don't think you could do this job if you were too scared - you are conscious of the risk to yourself, but you put it to the back of your mind and do what you have to do in front of you."

Elite unit

Capt Gallagher wanted to be a bomb disposal expert from an early age, joining the Army at 18.

The mathematics graduate is one of an elite who have passed the improvised explosive device disposal (IEDD) No1 (High Threat) course. Only four women have, and she is one of just two deployed to Afghanistan.

She admits her husband is not keen on her returning to serve in Helmand.

"Our families are only too aware of the risks."

The high-threat operators of 11 EOD Regiment, part of the Royal Logistic Corps, the British army's specialist unit responsible for counter-terrorist bomb disposal and Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD), must pass more than 200 exams during their training before they can wear the coveted badge of the ammunition technical officer (ATO) or ammunition technician (AT).

It is a process that can take anything from three to eight years.

It also requires the right temperament - an ability to face risk, work logically and methodically under pressure, and master any fear you might start off with about walking towards rather than away from a bomb.

So how did Capt Gallagher feel after defusing those first devices in Afghanistan, where British troops face some of the greatest threats they have ever encountered from what many describe as low-density minefields?

"Relief in a way," she says.

"When you do the job for real there for the first time, you've got one under your belt. The last thing you want to do is die on your first device."

For the full story online here for BBC online

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