Reintegration is the process through which children that have been successfully rehabilitate from the streets are introduced back to their families. The reintegration process focusses on three key points; retention of a child in the family setting, safety and wellbeing of the child.
Families to Families is a Koinonia Community project mandated to help both parents and children through the process of reintegration. A family setting is the best place for a child to grow in thus the need for reintegration as a human being is incomplete without a family.
The 1st Saturday saw the first parents reintegration seminar held at Shalom House, the key aim being to help prepare them on the coming home of their children. Kenneth Kariuki, a family counselor talked of some of the influences that affect children that may lead them in having deviant behavior. The influences include media, social media, peer pressure, religion, gambling, music, fashion, community and most importantly parents. Many at times various children run to the streets to seek refuge due to these influences as well as improper parenting where a child may feel unloved and unwanted. It is therefore important that parents have a convincing power towards decisions their children make in their lives. This is important as failure to which they may end up being misguided.
For a child to be comfortable in being reintegrated back to the home it is important for the environment to be conducive a home where the child feels loved, where the child can freely express their opinions, the parent to always be available for the child and being a good role model. As a result children can talk freely to their parents about various challenges and changes in their lives and in turn parents are able to note the various changes in their children.
Parents were urged to always offer good parenting to their children through loving them and being supportive to their children. This process of reintegration is set to continue until their children are successfully reintegrated back home in November, a journey that parents, children and Koinonia Community will happily travel together.