OUR TEN YEAR STORY
2012-2022
2012 is when The Children's Home Project became official, legit, legally recognized by the US government. But TCHP started before then. It started with a little boy named Richar. Richar lived in a government run children’s home that was no place a child should ever live.
It was overcrowded, underfunded and instead of the kids living like siblings, it was survival of the fittest and fit, Richar was not.
One day, Richar got into a series of fights. He was the favorite to rile up by the bullies. After an employee rallied four of the kids to break up a fight and then carry Richar up to the boys’ dorm where the kids continued to punch and wrestle him as he sobbed, Sean and I (Jenny) were left alone with him as over and over again he said:
I don’t want to be here.
I want my mommy.
God please help me.
That’s when this started. There was no mission statement. No five-year plan. Just a desperation to get him OUT.
Proniño answered the dozen or so emails I sent to privately run children’s homes with “We know Richar. He was with us before and we’d love to have him back.”
His transfer happened. We began visiting him in Proniño with zero idea that this children’s home would one day be our own.
At that moment, all that mattered was that Richar was safe. But it was quickly clear that there was oh so much more to do.
Richar was safe, sure, but there was still so much that he lacked. That all the kids in Proniño lacked. We couldn’t fix everything, but we could shore up what already existed. Children’s homes were barely staying afloat and after paying salaries and buying food there wasn’t too much left for the ‘extras’ like a quality education, intense therapy to deal with past trauma, love.
The idea was that that’s where we would come in. We couldn’t run a home (bwahaha!), but we could make it better.
In 2011 and most of 2012, that’s what we did under the umbrella of Heart to Honduras. I (Jenny) am eternally grateful to them for giving us the administrative stability from which to do our work.
We started doing small fundraisers to help with education and therapy and we planned teams with the hope that they would bring a whole lot of love.
But it was confusing. We were an umbrella organization that worked under another umbrella. People’s eyes would glaze over as I attempted to explain our structure. I started to dream about going out on our own but I was SCARED.
Then, enter Rod Badgley. Stage left. (Because he's on the left said of the first picture. Yes, I'm also mad that I can't find a picture better than this.) Pastor Greg Battle from Mountain Park connected us to plan a golf fundraiser. Rod asked for our 501(c)3 number. I sheepishly said that we weren’t a registered non-profit. Without missing a beat, Rod said “Bring your budget and strategic plan and we’ll get that started.” Who puts so much faith in a near stranger? Rod Badgley. That’s who.
October of 2012 the papers were filed. Let the officially registered adventures begin!!
The beginning days were full of energy. I (Jenny) would tell people to bring granola bars because I couldn’t guarantee regular meals. There was SO MUCH to do and we had to remain flexible. (Please know that I’m not proud of that. Also, please know that if you come on a team from now on you can leave those granola bars behind. We will feed you.)
2011 brought us Haley. Being 17 and having zero idea what she was like, I made sure that I roomed with her for the first week. (5 of us packed into a room for 2.) She laid awake after our first day visiting Proniño. It had done something to her. A seed had been planted and we had no idea that that seed would grow into a sequoia in her heart.
Jilli came in 2012. She emailed me one day to ask if I knew a boy she was looking for, then committed to join our upcoming team that I randomly plugged. While on that team, she committed to STAYING in Honduras for a year to teach at a bilingual school. During that year she spent almost as much time with the kids on the streets of San Pedro as she did teaching. So I asked if she would consider jumping ship and joining TCHP when her year was up. The agreement was almost immediate. This girl does nothing by halves.
2013 and 2014 were years of finding our stride. Rather than deep, our roots were spreading out wide. Primarily, we were working with kids who either lived on or had a strong connection to the street. Ergo, the homes we worked with also had a connection to the street.
Our focus and commitments were to the kids we knew. When a child went to a children’s home, we would attempt a relationship with that home in order to bring education, therapy and, of course, love. Our goal was also to get kids off of the street so relationships with various homes meant more directors we could call when a child decided he wanted to leave the streets.
These were the years that we were more or less working under the radar. We would form relationships, call children’s homes, show up with a new child. I shake my head every time I think of the freedom we were given back then. Our intentions were good and our hearts were in the right place but this also meant that people with more nefarious motives also had the same amount of freedom. Shudder.
As we were finding our place, at the end of 2014, we also started our first specific program. Sponsorship. Haley and Kyree spearheaded this chance for volunteers to stay in contact with kids they had met and people who hadn’t visited could help from afar.
Jilli was a Jill of all trades. (Did you see what I did there?) She led teams. She spent a considerable amount of time in Proniño. And then there was the street. Technically, her title was Street Outreach Coordinator. She built relationships with the kids and helped them get into a children’s home when they made the decision to leave the street. And then maintained that relationship in the home, giving hours and hours of advice to please, please, please not return to the street.
But then she realized that a good chunk of the kids she was spending time with had family. Had a home to return to. Had people who loved them. But they were also spending a loooooot of time with kids a little bit older who were completely controlled by addiction and living full time on the street. And were receiving no education. To facilitate entrance into a children’s home would be detrimental to the attachments they had with their families. But the path they were on was leading straight to full time on the street.
That’s when Crecer was born.
It began as an after school (that they weren’t attending) program of sorts. A few hours every day off the street. A solid meal. Some tutoring. Lots of advice and love.
Then it grew to a program that provides access to education at a nearby school AND an afterschool program.
Today it’s a full day program where the kids have access to a variety of educational tracks, two meals a day and a job training program!
2016 and 2017 were big, big years for our current team.
January of 2016, everyone’s life got a little better when Marie came on the scene. At all times she is ready to help, love, comfort or create a color-coded spreadsheet. (You should see the beauty that is a Marie spreadsheet.) At first, she was just a visitor. Then she was a visitor that came for a month. Then she took over sponsorship. Today she is the Director of Sponsorship and Program Management.
October of 2016, Haley moved to Honduras and was in charge of everything we did in Proniño. (Don’t worry, her title gets significantly larger and more defined in the coming years.) This was such a game changer since I (Jenny) could only be in Honduras a handful of times per year. Because she lived there full time and because I don’t know anyone who has more follow through than Haley Janssen, we were able to gain traction to see significant change in our programs!
February of 2017 brought us Wyn Wiley and Abbey Moore. You’ll notice that the pictures on our site make our first years of pictures pale in comparison. Wyn and Abbey have brought their incredible talent to TCHP and revolutionized our photos and videos. They have also tirelessly trained us on all things social media because, let’s be honest, we’re better at other things…
Until 2018, TCHP was always part of the backstage crew. We were there, we had an important role, but we were in the background. We helped children’s homes. We didn’t fund or run them. But there were holes in Proniño’s ship and continuous bailing wasn’t going to be enough. If no organization stepped up, Proniño would close.
We brainstormed what in the world we could do. Haley provided the definition we needed. We would stop waiting for an organization to step up and instead, we would take on the financial and leadership responsibility of Proniño with Haley as the Director. (I told you her title would get much bigger!)
The rest of 2018 became a bit of a trial. We would need to go from raising about $2500 per month for Proniño to about $20,000 per month. No small feat. If we couldn’t do it, we would work our hardest to transition the kids to the best homes we knew of.
But guys. It happened. You all showed up in a way that blew our socks off. In Spring of 2019, the kids went to camp with Tabitha and Simon, the staff spent days in intensive Trust Based Relational Intervention with Haley and a team of y’all joined me (Jenny) and descended on the Proniño property for some major renovations (and lots of paint) in order to have a visual reminder for the kids that things have changed.
(Does it kill me a little inside to see these pictures, now knowing that a year and a half later it would all be washed away by the hurricane? Yes, yes it does. )
Now we have arrived at the most trying years to date. No one has lived through these years unscathed so I know we are not alone in this. Sometimes I (Jenny) feel silly talking about how hard these years were. It feels like an appropriate response as you read this would be “Yeah, no _____ Sherlock.” And yet, here I go.
March of 2020, COVID caused Honduras, and most of the world, to shut down. In the US, this meant the cancellation of important fundraisers. In Honduras, this meant strict curfews and only a few days a week that people could circulate. Haley and Jilli were figuring out how to take care of our kids during a global pandemic while also facing the risk of harassment from police if they needed to buy food or access medical care or to transport staff. But the whole country was suffering. So, they also began feeding hundreds of people in neighboring communities. (Guys, it was too much.)
In November of 2020, two hurricanes decimated the country. Our Crecer kids were moving entire houses away from the swelling river. Roofs were ripped off. There was death without the space to mourn loved ones with dignity. In Proniño, our kids lost everything when the levee outside the property broke and they spent the next few months scattered around town, living with staff members. (Haley had nearly a dozen teenage boys in her 3 bedroom house. Bless.)
Jilli, Haley and our staff shouldered too much in 2020 and into 2021 but what continuously blows my mind is that the kids did so good. They stepped up and took on extra responsibility. They became closer as they supported one another through these years. I picture our team in Honduras bending over our kids for two straight years, receiving the harsh brunt of all that was hard on their backs as they sheltered our kids and allowed them, through all of this, to remain kids. They are freaking heroes.
To say they have gone the extra mile would be an understatement. To say that the effects of these years still linger would also be an understatement. The Body (truly) Keeps the Score. (Great book if you’re interested.)
Things are so much more normal, but unfortunately, bone deep weariness doesn’t go away after a few nights of good sleep. As we continue this work and watch our kids heal and grow and thrive, we know that we need to heal as well.
Want to know even more? Visit our Hurricanes of 2020 page
In 2022, we celebrated our 10 year anniversary. One solid decade of growth and so much learning under our belts. As I (Jenny) spent weeks pouring over thousands of pictures, there were moments that were very hard. Not all of the kids we’ve loved are doing well. Too many of them are no longer with us on earth. But these moments of sadness are buoyed by bigger moments of awe.
The Crecer kids who have been with us from the beginning. Cristian, who graduated from high school in 2022. Emer who has found true belonging within the walls of Crecer. Erik, who has stopped and started so many times, is now breaking through the anxiety that has held him back for so long.
The kids in Proniño who, in 2012, would talk about which gang they wanted to be affiliated with who are now talking about which university they will choose. Our 9 university students who have absolutely changed their destiny.
Please, oh please, enjoy these then and now pictures of only some of our kids. I didn't want to break the internet by posting them allllllll.
Our kids are recovering from their early experiences of trauma. They are recovering from these last few years.
As we celebrate this ten year anniversary, we are also looking at recovery. After two years of not being able to have in person fundraisers, teams or spend time with people outside our individual COVID bubbles. After two years of Haley and Jilli working every day to keep their heads above water, we have lost funding that facilitates the work that we do.
We remain committed. Our kids are taking every opportunity and running with it. But if we don’t hit our next few fundraising goals, these opportunities will have to roll back. And paring down the good things we have going is the very last thing that I want to do!
We are so proud of our kids for overcoming so much. We are proud of our staff for providing a safe place for our kids that's so full of love. We are so thankful for all that we have become.
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