Seeing The Possibilities - Releasing The Potential

What’s normal?

For Ryan, normal is his mum and her partner yelling at each other because they don’t know how to communicate their frustrations.

For Ryan, normal is not knowing if he’ll have dinner when he gets home from school – his mum’s addiction robs food from all of them.

For Ryan, normal is being woken in the middle of the night. His mum remembers the fear of waking up to find herself all alone. She doesn’t want that for her son, so when she needs her next fix she takes him with her.

For Ryan, normal is having moved home almost every year of his young life (he is 9 years old).

...and Ryan’s list of heart wrenching ‘normal’ goes on and on.

Ryan is representative of the many boys and girls in Scotland whose parent/s have an alcohol or drug dependency (a number too vast to count). On the surface, some of these children seem to fit in well at school and in places where they feel safe. Some of them display signs of being completely disconnected from the environments they find themselves in. Others find themselves somewhere between these two extremes.

When we met Ryan he was just 6 years old. He didn’t know how to connect with us or with other children. At that time, he was the older half-brother to a 6 month old baby and by then he’d moved house 4 times. Ryan was confused; he didn’t trust us and he couldn’t express what he felt, needed or wanted. This new and different environment felt threatening to him. Later on, we found out he was worried we’d take him away from his mum. He loves his mum.

Since our first meeting, the journey for young Ryan has been far from smooth, yet in the middle of the turbulence of the ‘normal’ he has experienced, we have been in the privileged position of supporting him to experience an new ‘normal.

• A ‘normal’ where he has learned to identify, express and talk about his feelings
• A ‘normal’ where he has learned why human bodies become ‘drunk’ and ‘high’ in a simple and straight forward way
• A ‘normal’ where he has started to build relationships with other children and with adults
• A ‘normal’ that doesn’t involve drinking to excess and taking ‘recreational’ drugs

It is likely Ryan will need support into his teenage years. If his mum had been given similar opportunities when she was a little girl, Ryan may never have needed our support. Unlike Ryan, his mum had to try and figure things out for herself and has done the best she can. She has asked for support and is taking positive steps in working through her own recovery from the menacing grip of addiction.

At CrossReach, we support children from all kinds of backgrounds and with a diversity of needs. During CrossReach Week in 2014, the then moderator Very Rev John Chalmers met some of the children we support and some of the people who provide that support. Seeing first-hand the release of potential made possible by our services, he was moved and inspired to organise the inaugural Moderator’s Golf Challenge.

The Challenge has the promise of brilliance. In addition, it affords participants the opportunity to support us as we support the children using our services – an opportunity which is beyond price.

Join with The Moderator on September 22nd, 2016 and make the potential of this event’s legacy live on for years to come.

Be Part Of It – Book Now!