Some changes...

I'm trying to freshen up the good ol' blogspot here. It may change a bit every day until I lock into something I really like. Have fun though dealing with it : )

Ciutelec...the elderly home where we do a worship service each Thursday afternoon. Major changes happening there. Quick background first. Okay so during Communism kids were born healthy and then abandoned. Shoved together in cribs, without any bonding, they developed Reactive Attachment Disorder syndrome. 2/3 of all children who experience abandonment develop this of some degree. There are young adults living in Romania who were serious victims of this disorder. If you were to see one today you would think that, of course, they were born mentally retarded and their behaviors so destructive and violent that, of course, they should be in a round the clock special care facility.
Well, the thing is, the worst of these young adults were scattered among old peoples' homes during Communism. The government trying to hide them... Well, communism is over and there are hundreds of these extremely destroyed young adults living in our area alone.
They cannot live on their own. They are in all definition of the word - destroyed. They can be very violent and throw large and dangerous (to themselves and others) tantrums. They live in facilities where they are beaten because they are not controllable. They are growing older and there seems to be no place that accurately meets their needs, both physical - emotional and spiritual.
It's a very ugly leftover of Communism.

Well, like I said before, a lot of these teens and young adults as they grew older during Communism were hidden away in old people's homes.

Ciutelec is now going to become home to 31 of them next week. 2 of these young people arrived 2 weeks ago. Today one of them, not exactly attacked, but tried to hurt me. Thankfully he didn't break the skin anywhere. Other than being a little scared I was okay. What scared me the most was that I could not get out of his grip - he was stronger than me. And, I was pushing one of our residents up the hill in his wheelchair and he started rolling down the hill. Finally a staff member, after I yelled to her for help, yelled at him to let me go. He began a string of really awful swearing and hand motions to accompany it.

This is just 1. 31 more come next week. Ciutelec has gone from being an old people's home to now a psychiatric ward of sorts. The current residents are really scared. The staff has promised to "isolate" these 31 in a seperate building. And, Ciutelec recently cut staff so that leaves - as one resident explained, 1 staff for the 31 new residents per shift.
It is going to turn into Hell there.

It is not the fault of these young people. It is the fault of pure evil and the communism that it tried to mask itself behind. All I could think today was "this young man was most likely born a healthy baby boy...and now he is destroyed."

To keep those 31 new young people isolated in a building - what kind of life is that like?
And, for the staff at Ciutelec who is used to working with old, sweet people in wheelchairs...to now work with seriously mentally ill young adults. Whew. That is going to not work so well. I'm sure that physical abuse is going to become quite common.

I feel so empty for words to even pray about this. I just want to say "God, look at my heart - do you see the hurt over how this is going to turn out for everyone...does it have to happen this way?"

The new people coming....
The current residents....
The staff...

Very, very rough transition next week. Please pray as God leads you. I'm sorry that my thoughts were everywhere. It is difficult to explain what you understand once you see.