She Came Back

Corina came back today. I met Corina (not her real name) the first day we worked for the home. She had been in the older girls’ program (Intensive Life Skills), but had gone AWOL from that program and spent the night with “friends”. This wasn’t her first brush with the rules, and wouldn’t be her last.
She was bucked down (so to speak) to the Christian Family Program and placed on the lowest possible privilege level (level 0). She would remain there for two weeks or more, and only gradually over the next several months work her way back up to a level with good privileges. She would go up a level or two, then back down. She’d stumble, get up again, only to fall again. She was the great manipulator.
I visited with her the first day on the job. I hadn’t a clue what I was doing, and probably wasn’t doing anything right those first few months. But together we worked, and she finally made it back to the ILS program, graduated high school, made a commitment to God, and enlisted in the Air Force.
She’s back on campus for several days and will work in the recruiting office that saw her off some months ago. She’ll celebrate her 18th birthday this coming Saturday on the same campus that she almost swore she would never come back to once she left.
Corina had a reality check this past year or so, and seems to have come out on the bright side of things. She seems to be on her way to being the young woman she was intended to be. She seems happy and fulfilled.
I’d like to think we had a part in that transformation.