When we opened our doors on 17 August 2024, we made a single promise to every child who would walk through our gate: that here, they would be safe, they would be fed, and they would be loved without condition. Twelve months later, I can tell you that promise is no longer just words on a registration document. It has a heartbeat. It has a kitchen that smells of breakfast in the morning, a classroom with small chairs, and a full house of children who now know what it means to belong somewhere.
I will be honest with you, because honesty is the only currency a home like this can afford. The first months were the hardest of my life. We received children in conditions that still keep me awake at night. Some arrived malnourished. Some arrived having known nothing but the street. Two of the children we welcomed this year live with cerebral palsy, and caring for them properly has stretched us in every way a small foundation can be stretched. But not once did we turn a child away, and not once did I regret saying yes.
The orphanage has grown exactly as we hoped and prayed it would. We now care for babies, for older children, and for teenage mothers who themselves are still children. Each of them came to us carrying a story heavier than their years. What moves me most is watching those stories begin to change. A child who would not speak for weeks now laughs at the dinner table. A teenage mother who had dropped out of school is studying again because we promised her that motherhood would not be the end of her future.
We have also known grief. In September we lost two-year-old Ebenezer, who had been brought to us paralysed from the neck down. The severity of his condition was beyond what any of us could reverse, and his passing left a silence in the home that took a long time to lift. His teenage mother, Ruth, asked us to help her return to school after his death, and we agreed without hesitation. I share this not to sadden you, but because a home that only tells its happy stories is not telling the truth. We carry both.
None of this would exist without the people who chose to believe in these children. Every meal, every school uniform, every bed and every doctor visit this year came from the generosity of supporters who may never meet the children they have saved. You fed them. You clothed them. You gave them a place to sleep that no one could take away. On behalf of every child in this home, thank you.
As we begin our second year, my prayer is simple. I want every child here to grow up knowing they were wanted. I want the teenage mothers to finish their education and stand on their own feet. And I want this home to remain, for as long as there are children who need it, a place where hope is not a slogan but a roof, a meal and a family. There is still so much to do, and we cannot do it alone. But one year on, looking at these children, I am certain of one thing: this work is worth every single thing it costs.
