Children's Voice Article No Place Like Home By Carrie McVicker
Seth and Ruth White As a child, Lynn faced an array of unseemly
options. Her neighborhood offered all that her overwhelmed,
single mother tried to shelter her from--crime, poverty, and
drugs. By the time she was 15, Lynn had dropped out of school
and left home, angered by her mother's inability to provide
enough money for rent, food, or clothes. On the streets, Lynn
developed a drug and alcohol addiction that would continue for
years. She also gave birth to three children, each of whom was
quickly removed by the child welfare agency and placed in her
grandmother's care. But when her grandmother died suddenly, the
children were moved into three separate foster homes.
Remarkably, Lynn retained a sense of hope, tempered only by the
realization that her poor choices might be irreversible. A
pastor at her mother's church detected this spark of hope and
offered to bring Lynn to a detoxification program. After 12
years of addiction and six months of the