A young mom in West Virginia had no one to turn to… except the parent educator who answered her call.
“My baby is starving to death.”
That’s what Karen Vaughan heard one evening early in her career when she answered a phone call from a mother she’d been serving.
The 14-year-old mom on the line had no one else to call. Her parents had disowned her, as had the parents of her baby’s father, who was just 15.
“They were totally on their own,” Vaughan said of the teenagers, “raising a newborn baby.”
Distraught, the mother explained the situation. She’d been trying to introduce baby food to her infant, and it wasn’t working; the baby spit it all out.
“She was so scared that her baby was going to starve to death because she wouldn’t eat,” Vaughn said.
Familiar with this stage of development, Vaughan reassured her that all would be well. The baby was experiencing something new, she explained, and she’s learning; she’ll catch on.
And she was right. By the next visit, the mother was thrilled to report that her daughter had eaten a whole jar of baby food.
“She was extremely grateful to have that support,” Vaughan said, “to let her know that her baby was going to be okay.”
This year, Karen Vaughan celebrates thirty years supporting families through Parents as Teachers. She currently serves as a program supervisor with the Lewis County Family Resource Network in rural West Virginia.
What inspires her in her work now is exactly what she did for the young couple years ago: “I enjoy seeing parents feeling empowered.”