Assessing A Situation

A woman gives birth to a baby boy sixteen years ago and never tells the child who his father is due to the father being into a lot of illegal activities in the community. The child grows up only to lose his mother in his senior year of high school because she had AIDS. Now the entire family has turned their backs on him and his younger sibling for what they think of his mother. He has no home, doesn't attend school regularly and is now becoming a shadow of the father he doesn't even know exists.

There are so many things wrong in that scenario... well, it's not a scenario, it's a reality and it's a sickening one. So many opportunities to make things right, give a child hope, step in and help a mother identify her high risk behaviours prior to giving birth to a second child... So many reasons why respecting yourself, checking yourself and protecting yourself is vital. It's a vicious cycle that could have been a healthy bonded circle...

It saddens me... where does the community step in? What can be done for mothers out there that can help them make better decisions so that they can raise healthy minded, loved, ambitious young men and women? Is there still hope for this child? Is he lost?