E.M.M.A.

Is it just me or does everyone wonder where they’d be without their mum?

Last week I wrote to you about homeless kids on the Sunshine Coast. This week I want to tell you about one in particular.Lisa was born in a Queensland railway station, about 19 years ago.

She’s one of seven children, all of whom were taken from their mother and placed in foster care when Lisa was about 18-months-old.

Despite being separated from all her siblings, foster care was a very happy arrangement for Lisa.
She was permanently in the care of a couple with two older boys. She was the beloved baby girl and felt part of a family, until, when Lisa was 10, her foster mother contracted breast cancer. A year and a half later, she was dead.

Lisa looked away when she told me that bit. She shrugged and gave a little laugh, “That’s pretty careless, isn’t it? Losing two mums.”

By the time Lisa’s foster mum had died, the older boys had moved out, leaving Lisa and her foster dad home alone.

Lisa loves her dad, but she says it was really tough for him and eventually he enrolled her in boarding school. Lisa was still loved, but she was rudderless, motherless, for the second time in her life.

Then, in Year 12, Lisa went to a party, drank too much and had sex for the very first time in her life, with a boy she tells me she couldn’t recognise in a police line up. Apparently they were just kissing and then they weren’t.

It was quick, passionless and very effective. Less than a month later Lisa realised she was pregnant.

Boarding school was no longer an option for Lisa and her foster dad had moved to Armidale in New South Wales to study.

For all intents and purposes, Lisa was 17, alone and pregnant on the Sunshine Coast. And she’s certainly not unique.

There are no firm statistics, but according to local youth agencies, every year Nambour General Hospital discharges more than 200 new mothers under the age of 18 without any visible family or community support.

Hundreds of babies with babies, essentially on their own, right now, right here on the Sunshine Coast.

You can rant and rave all you like about unprotected sex and bad choices, but the fact is if we don’t take care of these kids, there is no end in sight to the trouble.

So now for the good bit.

There are lots of good programs for kids at risk. The EMMA (educating, mentoring, mothering adolescents) program deals specifically with young women like Lisa.

For more than a year, an organisation called LifeBridge, in conjunction with Sunshine Coast Youth Partnerships and Queensland Education have been taking young mothers under their wing, offering practical support before and after the birth, hoping to keep them engaged for more than two years.

EMMA aims to keep as many girls at school as possible. Alternatively the girls are offered literacy and numeracy classes as well as hospitality and child care courses.

We know programs like EMMA do many things. Participants are less likely to have further births at a young age, less likely to become dependent on welfare, less likely to be the victims of abuse or domestic violence, and are less likely to put their own health or the health of their child at risk.

EMMA is all about a hand up, not a hand out. And you know what? It’s not government funded.

Not yet anyway.

We can’t fix everything, that’s for sure. Sadly, we can’t bring back either of Lisa’s mums to help her. But there is something you can do.

On May 9 there’s an EMMA fundraiser at The Sanctuary Forest Glen. Tickets are just $75. Call Jody at Sunshine Coast Youth Partnerships for more information.If you’d like to find out more about the EMMA program, contact Lyn at LifeBridge on 5451 0555.