Back in SA!

Hello folks!! :)

Well it’s been a while since I’ve last updated things. To bring you up to date…I travelled back to Northern VA to spend Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years with my friends and family…we had a phenomenal time! And New Years was an extra. I was supposed to leave the States right after Christmas but I came down with bronchitis the day I was supposed to fly out which delayed me 2 weeks. It was ok though, I returned the rental car I had and got to spend some real good quality time at home with my parents :).

During my first two weeks home my South African roommate Marion joined me. She’d never been to the States before so it was really cool to see my familiar world through her eyes. We toured Washington DC with my Mom-we even got to see an IMAX 3D movie on the beauty of SA :), went hiking, visited some of my favourite coffee shops and restaurants, spent a lot of time just chilling and hanging out with my fam and travelled down to Charlottesville to visit my sister and her husband…

While I was home I also spent lots of time with my friends and supporters. We shared meals together….most of all, I enjoyed hearing about what’s been going on in their lives over the past year. Katie and I had a chance to travel out to the mountains for some really special catching up time and I had a fun time of sharing and encouraging during a brunch with my small group girls. I am so thankful for everyone’s help and support…I was really taken care of while I was home!So now I’m back in South Africa :)…and I’m noticing that things are pretty different from last year around this time! I had quite a transition to get through last year…moving to SA not knowing exactly what to expect, living with a family for three months who I hadn’t met before, buying a car, learning how to drive manual transmission, learning how to drive on the left (not right i.e. correct ;) ) side of the road, finding and renting a flat, finding a roommate, managing my finances from overseas-thanks Dad for all your help, finding a church and getting settled in to friend group (that should be at the top of the list). Looking back I think…dang, that was intense!

Anywho, I got through it….by God’s grace alone-for sure…

You know the chorus to the old hymn… “On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand”…

Yup, I GET IT!...I get it. Many times last year I felt like I was sinking fast with all the changes going on around me, a new culture, a new ministry, trying to get settled…this was not the semi-conductor engineering work I was used to! One of the biggest challenges was finding my identity in SA. No one knew me from Eve…so I had to pretty much re-establish myself. What I learned is that regardless of our circumstances and where we are in life, our identity is found in Christ. He knows our hearts…even when others don’t understand. Praise the Lord. What a relief it was to come back for year two knowing that this set of challenges were behind me.

So, this year I’m beginning to understand what it’s like to fully concentrate on the ministries that God’s called me to here. I’m working Mondays and Tuesdays at Options Care Centre focusing on teenage pregnancy testing and counselling and then Wednesdays and Thursdays at York High School both counselling and working with the Peer Education Program (same as last year). So far, so good!

I first trained and shadowed pregnancy counsellors at Options and last week I had my first client. This week I saw another two clients wanting pregnancy tests and struggling to know what to do if the test comes back positive. It’s important to talk to the client about the options she has if she’s pregnant (parenting, foster care, adoption, and abortion). At Options we don’t try to persuade or tell the clients what decision to make but we ask questions starting with…do you know what options you have if you find out you are pregnant?...Can you tell me what you know about these options? I usually end up going through a booklet called “Undecided.” The booklet goes through each option in detail so the client can make an informed decision. We talk about setting boundaries in dating relationships emphasizing that if your boyfriend really loves you-he will respect the boundaries you set, and when the client believes in God we talk about true love-what God says about sex…why He says it…and does she buy it? Regardless of the decision the client makes, Options offers support moving forward and we will make contact with the client to follow-up and see how she’s doing and how else we can help.

Options also does an outreach called Mom-To-Mom. Every week a team of 3-4 counsellors travel to the George Hospital to help and train new Moms who are struggling with breastfeeding. I’m learning a lot…breastfeeding is not as easy as one may think. I look forward to carrying on with this outreach throughout this year.

At York High School, Ozzy and I are continuing our journey with the Peer Educators. Our first series of sessions were based on alcohol, dating and boundaries. This is important stuff to talk about with Valentines Day. As always, it’s awesome to have the opportunity to equip students to make good decisions and their enthusiasm makes facilitating sessions very fun :). Moving forward the Peer Educators are in the process of creating community projects so they can use the knowledge they’ve gained through Peer Education in a practical way. More on that in my next post :).

Hope you all are keeping well! :) And keep your eyes peeled for the next post

PS: If you are interested in getting even more info on the cool things going on here in SA please email your snail mail address to caitlin.vida@gmail.com. The snail mail updates come more frequently and have more detailed information and prayer requests :)