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GIVE: Hey Mom, I’ve Got GREAT News!

Written by: Patty Camme, Mother of Tanzania & Nicaragua Volunteer

11/18/2014

We do the best we can for 18 years and then we send them into the real world to make good choices, take responsibility for their actions, show us they listened to all that we’ve said and that they now, finally, after all these years….get it!

It is every parents dream for their children to grow up to be a kind, giving, educated, happy human being. It is every child’s dream for their parents to love them trust them and most of all believe in them.

I can’t say I was excited when Anthony first called us up from his dorm at university with the “GREAT” news! He had filled out an application to travel abroad over the summer and volunteer in a third-world country. My first response after I picked my jaw up from the floor was… a volunteer what?? In a third world where?? After I hung up the phone, I knew this was it. This is the time when my husband and I get to prove to our son that we believed in him, that we trusted his judgment and support his choices.

This is the time when my husband and I get to prove to our son that we believed in him, that we trusted his judgment and support his choices.

I am so glad we did! The stories he came home with brought me to tears. The conditions in which [the locals] lived in were deplorable and the children we so desperate to learn. My son knew his life was forever changed and so did I.

Anthony continued on to take another trip with GIVE the following year to Africa. He even climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro. How many moms can say their 19-year-old climbed the highest freestanding mountain in the world!? Not many. The relationships he formed, the memories he made and the education he received stretched way beyond the confines of any classroom wall. Anthony has transformed into a mature, responsible, caring, loving, giving, educated, well-traveled, happy human being and that’s not just MY OPINION! Our local newspaper is getting ready to do their third follow up story on his journeys.

I am so grateful for GIVE and the doorways they have opened for my son, they truly are the roots of change.

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