Visitation House loves mothers

By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press

WORCESTER – “It’s Mother’s Day every day at Visitation House … because the moms … they’re learning about being a good parent, wanting to be a good parent.”
So says Laurie Cahill, the mother of 20-year-old twins, who learned about mothering from her mother. Mrs. Cahill is house manager/house mother at Visitation House, “a caring home providing women with unplanned pregnancies a path to cherish and sustain the life of their babies,” according to its website visitationhouse.org.
Since the home opened on the feast of the Visitation, May 31, 2005, it has welcomed hundreds of women and their children, the website says.
“We’re a life-saving ministry,” Mrs. Cahill said.
That’s exemplified by the story told by a current resident who called herself simply Lyne.
“I’m not ready to be a mother,” she told her case manager, who suggested she call Visitation House. Lyne didn’t; she’d planned to end her pregnancy.
But one day, alone and in need of help, she called. She said she was having pains related to her pregnancy. “Laurie … wanted to meet me.”  And, though not feeling well, “I wanted to meet her so bad,” Lyne said.
When she got to Visitation House, they thought she should be seen by a doctor. So, Grace Cheffers, executive director, who is a mother of 11 and a member of Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish in Winchendon, drove her to the emergency room.
Upon her release, Lyne returned to Visitation House and within weeks her baby was born via cesarean section.
After giving birth, “I still wasn’t ready to be a mother; I was still taking my depression medication,” she said.
“Grace, Jennifer, Laurie – they taught me how to be a mother,” she said. “They were always ready to listen to me.” (Jennifer de De Mora, the mother of two teenagers, from St. Mark Parish in Sutton, is Visitation House’s director of operations.)
Lyne smiled at her child, and continued her story, “Now I learned to love my baby and I love him so much.”
“He loves her so much,” interjected Mrs. Cahill.
“I’m much better now,” Lyne continued. “I can smile. I can laugh. I met new friends. … I’m trying so hard to be a good mother for my baby. … He’s my everything.”
She said she had been afraid to tell her family she was pregnant, because they might reject her. Now some know about her baby and are so happy, she said.

LIFE CHANGING

“Being a mom changed my life completely,” said former resident Janellys. “Ever since I was young and started babysitting, I wondered what it would be like to have that bond with a child.” With her baby, Alyna Faith, it’s “like having a little best friend that is always with you,” she said. “I’ve learned how to love unconditionally, that it’s like having my heart outside my body. She’s literally like my heart walking around.”
In Visitation House classes the mothers learned “how important it is to have that bond with your child,” she said. 
Being a mother is very hard, but beautiful, a former Visitation House resident called Camila said through a translator. You’re happy when your baby is happy, sad when she is hurt. You worry, knowing she can’t tell you if something bothers her.
Camila said she doesn’t have enough physical and emotional support, but she’s thankful to God and her daughter, Esther, who has kept her out of the depression women feel when they feel alone.
Asked if Visitation House has helped her, Camila said one class taught the mothers how to protect their emotions and their children’s emotions from people or things beyond their control. She spoke of protecting yourself from negative people and people who put you down because you’re a single mother.
“I like being a mom,” said a former resident who used the pseudonym, Vanessa. The baby “made me stronger than I thought I am.”
“I used to just give up a lot,” Vanessa explained. “I don’t get mad as much no more,” because her baby brought her peace.
A friend told her about Visitation House, she said.
“I learned how to be independent,” she said. “I made very good friends here.”
When the mothers understand that God has put them on earth for a purpose, that they were not created by chance, they can give that gift to their children, Mrs. de De Mora said. The children can learn that they too are here for a purpose.