Jennifer, one of our case managers, was sharing with us, her stories about delivering the angel tree gifts to her clients this year. Angel Tree is a program sponsored by Whirlpool. Each year around the holidays, Whirlpool asks CARES about the children of our HIV positive clients. We provide them with some basic information and the staff there buy toys, clothes and other gifts for these children. This is such a great program, because most of our clients are in poverty, or are experiencing additional complications with their lives. They do not have the money to meet even basic needs, so these children often go without. Through this program, our case managers deliver the gifts purchased by the Whirlpool “angels” around Chirstmas. It is an exciting time for CARES staff and we wanted to share a few stories about these deliveries:
One of my clients is now a single father to two teenage sons after losing his wife to cancer and HIV last December. He is a very proud man who would never have asked to be involved as a recipient of this program. I signed his children up for him. When I gave him the gifts, he struggled to keep his composure, but did. He repeated over and over “You didn’t need to do this”. We spent some time together that day remembering his wife, also a CARES client until her death, and I could tell this holiday surprise was greatly appreciated.
Another of my clients from Africa speaks very little English. She has a 12 year old boy. When I took her the gifts, she hugged me and thanked me over and over and began to cry. Often when I visit this client, she makes me a sweet African bread and this year, she wasn’t able to afford to get the ingredients. She felt so bad that this wasn’t part of our visit, but she was so glad that “Papa Noel” (her second language is French, English is third) had provided the only Christmas her son will have this year. “Papa Noel will come for Fred” was a phrase I heard a lot throughout our visit.
Thank you Jennifer for sharing these touching stories, illustrating the importance of the Angel Tree program. Our very special thanks go out to Whirlpool and the employees there who made such a difference in these childrens lives. These are just two of the stoies, there were many more. It took 6 large trucks to pick up and deliver all of the wonderful gifts this year!!
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