Lowell and Eileen Vaught drove their grandson, Jonathan, to Farmville on Tuesday, July 11. They had made the trip from Troy before, but this day held a special excitement.
Jonathan would not be returning with his grandparents.
He would remain in Farmville to settle into his new home. On this day, Jonathan became the first resident of a new group home for adults with developmental disabilities recently constructed thanks to a partnership between the Southside Baptist Association and Virginia Baptist Children's Home & Family Services.
Carrying his bags into the home, Jonathan, 20, flashed a quick smile to the staff awaiting his arrival, then strode quickly to his room where his furniture had already been placed. A neat room complete with bed, dresser, desk, easy chair and television, the room offers all the comforts of home. The Southside Home, as the facility is called, will be his permanent residence for the foreseeable future.
“We were looking to get Jonathan into a situation where he would become self-reliant and independent and have some kind of future that he could be secure in. We are getting old. Mom and dad are not always going to be there. We are not always going to be there, so this is the kind of place we were looking for,” said Lowell, Jonathan's grandfather.
Jonathan, a lanky, athletic young man with a charming smile and razor sharp sense of humor, is originally from the Chicago suburb of Algonquin. In recent years, his mother developed health problems that led to her being bedridden for long periods of time. During these episodes with no one to supervise him, Jonathan would leave the house and explore the neighborhood. Youthful and gregarious, his adventures often took him far from home. Realizing that such a hazardous situation should not continue, Jonathan's mother turned to her parents, who welcomed Jonathan into their home in Troy, Va. Lowell retired from his pastorate at Bybee's Road Baptist Church and he and Eileen began the arduous task of caring for their grandson.
“He has a lot of interests that need nurturing. I've been the basketball coach, the music teacher, the social instructor. We want him to learn to deal with his money and manage that. We want him to learn some more about socialization; what is appropriate and what is not appropriate. Grandpas and grandmas and parents can't carry out and facilitate what he needs for long-term growth and maturity. I can't stay after him all the time about the things he needs to learn,” explained Lowell.
Added to the physical and mental struggle of providing the care Jonathan needed, the Vaught's own health began to deteriorate. With their energies and abilities flagging, the chance opening of a single letter threw open a new door of opportunity for the Vaughts. Eileen's eyes sparkle as she recalls the moment.
“I'm going through the mail and here's a letter from Virginia Baptist Children's Home. I said ‘I wonder what they're up to? Oh, I just think I'll see what they are doing.' So, I opened it up and there it was! It was about doing ministries for people like Jonathan and I thought ‘Oh, my goodness!' ”
Ironically, during the same time period the Vaughts were learning about the DDM program, hundreds of volunteers and dozens of churches and businesses in the Farmville area were working to construct the Southside Home were Jonathan now lives. Lowell and Eileen say the coincidental timing is too convenient not to have been orchestrated. Having spent their lives in the ministry, the Vaughts see God's hand at work in their situation and are grateful for the opportunity the Southside Home provides them and their grandson. “He's going into a setting that fits him philosophically and theologically because he is a Baptist. He's been raised as a Baptist and living in a Baptist setting. I can be his grandpa but I can't be his teacher and coach and all that because that creates some problems of its own. Getting him into a place like this was ideal for us. Right in the beginning we knew these were important changes. We get to be his grandparents again! Besides that, he's a sweet, good kid with a whole lot more potential than we can help him achieve,” said Lowell.
As Jonathan settles in to his new surroundings and routines, he will have plenty of company. Two more residents arrived during the week, with more to come. The Southside Home will house a total of six men with a wide age range. Jonathan, 20, is the youngest resident in the entire DDM program, which consists of 11 other single-sex group homes spread across Virginia from Richmond to Martinsville and Fredericksburg to Abingdon. Another group home is currently under construction in Bedford with others in various stages of planning in other localities.
As Jonathan settles into his new home, his grandparents look on with delight. For them, this is not a separation or an ending of their relationship. This is the kind of transition that all parents and grandparents desire for their children.
“Jonathan needs to go on from the nest that we have provided and his parents have provided into another schooling system that helps him advance. And he's moving into, as far as we're concerned, a college setting that helps him grow and mature and become independent. We are just fostering his independence and his ability to take care of himself, apart from the tutoring from the family, so that we become again a family. He is moving on, just like any kid. I want him to have his own life,” said Lowell.