Starcross Monastic Community, Sonoma County, California - Caring for Children around the World

THE STORY OF CHILDREN AT STARCROSS: AIDS

For what happened before this go to BEFORE 1986.

A young relative, unmarried and pregnant came to stay with us until she delivered and allowed us to adopt her baby. This was something we had never planned but joyfully accepted. Sister Marti became a Lamaze labor coach. We all were present for the 1986 birth of our healthy baby David.

In all the difficult years of caring for children with problems before 1986 nothing had prepared us for the sheer joy of a tiny baby. Even though we were a little old to be parents of an infant, we took to it eagerly. Those gentle first months with David had a profound effect. Around that time we happened to see a TV report about the growing new phenomenon of babies with AIDS being abandoned in hospitals. One image in particular stuck with us. It was a sober baby, his walker tethered to a doorknob in an empty, sterile hospital hall. There was no one to look at him or respond to him. We watched our own child so surrounded with love and realized we had to do something. We all had tears in our eyes. These babies needed love. We had room in our home and in our lives to take a few of them.

Ours was a simple response to AIDS. We are not medically trained people, at least not formally although by now we have lots of experience. In 1986 not much was known about AIDS transmission. We had to first educate ourselves and make certain we were not putting our healthy baby in danger of infection. We were soon reassured that would not be a problem. Our next task was to determine if we were qualified to care for such fragile infants. The local AIDS specialist convinced us we were. He said that medicine at that time did not have much to offer the babies. What they most needed was a home and love.

Within a few months we had our first baby, a frail 5-month old the size of a newborn. She was very sick and given perhaps a year to live. She is now almost 18. Her pending arrival was noticed by a reporter and before long we had a media circus. We were featured on all the Bay Area TV stations as well as CNN and ABC. Media helicopters landed in our cow pasture. We were mentioned in Newsweek magazine. Some of our neighbors were in an uproar. There were angry meetings. All of this over a tiny little girl sleeping peacefully in her crib. Brother Toby has detailed the events of this first year in MORNING GLORY BABIES, (St. Martin's Press, 1988).

Two more babies soon arrived. Josh lived only a few months. Nicole had been raised in a steel crib. She had tremendous other special needs - diabetes, epilepsy, serious developmental delay, heart problems. Amazingly she lived 17 happy years.

A young woman in Hawaii who had heard of us asked us to provide a home for her baby. Sister Julie traveled there for the birth and brought home her adopted daughter Tina. Later another pregnant woman came to live with us during the months before Holly was born.

Life got suddenly very busy with a house full of infants and toddlers. There were happy days filled with toys, stories and bottles which alternated with jarring hospital visits and sleepless nights.

We became deeply involved in the world of AIDS. It was not possible to escape the politics and agencies. We befriended many people with AIDS, mostly gay men and pregnant women. It became necessary to get help with the increasing activities. Volunteers appeared and helped tremendously. We were too busy to notice we were losing our center. There was so much urgent work to be done.

In the midst of all this came Romania. We rarely watched TV in those days but once again we happened to catch the first shocking images of emaciated little children, heads shaved, nearly naked in filthy institutions. They lived in row after row of metal cribs like cages in a concentration camp. What could we possibly do? Brother Toby decided to go over and find out. We knew that shining a light on the situation would be bound to help. These children had no one to speak for them. ABC News sent a camera crew along to document Toby's trip. Eventually 4 segments about it were featured on the TV news show "Primetime Live".

The plight of the institutionalized Romanian children was even worse in person than it had appeared. The children were not seen as human. Many were considered "irrecuperable" and left to die of starvation and neglect. Thousands of them did.

CASA SPERANTA, the "House of Hope" we established there, became a model of humane care for the country. Staffed by American volunteers the first few years, it has recently been turned over to a Romanian director. And the first family of children we rescued from an institution are alive and well and living in New Jersey. Brother Toby has recounted this incredible story in CHILDSONG/MONKSONG, (St. Martin's Press, 1994). Later we were to have another project for children orphaned by AIDS in Africa called STARCROSS KIN WORLWIDE.

Meanwhile back at home little Tina was getting very sick. There was one crisis after another as her immune system valiantly fought a losing battle. Although she was unable to eat and very weak she never lost her courageous, loving spirit. All through Holy Week she hovered on the brink of death. She revived a bit for Easter. About a week later on April 9 as she was rocking with her mother Julie in their room on a sunny afternoon, Tina's spirit went home to God.

Tina's life and death touched many people. The following is an editorial from the Santa Rosa PRESS DEMOCRAT published on Saturday, April 13, 1991

TINA DEROSSI'S LEGACY OF LOVE

Christina "Tina" DeRossi died this week, after a too-short life that was filled with too much pain. Yet despite dying a month shy of her third birthday, despite suffering from AIDS, Tina was a very lucky little girl.

Tina died at home - the Starcross Community near Annapolis - surrounded by a loving family. Had Tina been born three years before she was, she would not have had such a home. At that point in the AIDS epidemic, few saw the point in trying to place children like Tina in an adoptive home. AIDS kills, and these children had AIDS. Who would want to adopt a child who was dying?

Children like Tina helped to change those attitudes. Tina showed that children live with AIDS, not just die from it. Like all children, they laugh and sing and romp and cuddle. They get sick, they can get terribly sick, but like all children they bounce back fast.

As knowledge of AIDS has grown, so has awareness. More women who have AIDS, as Tina's birthmother did, make provisions for their children's care. Just two days after she was born, Tina came home to Starcross with her adoptive mother, Sister Julie.

Children like Tina have changed the adoption bureaucracy. A process that is by necessity slow and cautious now focuses more clearly on the need of the children who don't have time to squander.

And Tina helped make people realize that children with AIDS are, like all children, treasures. Just this week, two people called the Starcross Ministry wanting to know how to go about adopting a child with AIDS.

Despite the positive strides, too many children still die in institutions. This week, as the Starcross Community mourned Tina, Brother Tolbert McCarroll remembered being in an AIDS ward in Romania several months ago. He saw a cleaning crew, carting out the refuse of the day, carrying a bag that contained the body of a child.

"Tina died in this old farmhouse that was her home," Brother Toby said.

Other children should be so lucky. Because of Tina they will be.

There was a long process of healing for the family. Tina had been at the center of things all her radiant life. But children move on. As the adults grieved, the kids grew and thrived. Amazingly, since that time there has not been much serious illness among the children.

Julie wondered how she would survive the first Christmas season without Tina when an urgent telephone call came. A woman with AIDS was desperately seeking a home for the baby she was about to deliver. Julie's heart told her to say "Yes!" Little Andrew arrived on December 12. He almost seemed like a special delivery gift arranged by Tina.

For what happened next go to THE PRESENT.

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