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Changing the Woman, Saving the Child

Changing the Woman, Saving the Child
Barbara Thomas

Barbara Thomas is Executive Director and Founder of the North Baton Rouge Women's Help Center (NBRWHC)

In 1992, my husband and I started a crisis pregnancy center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana to provide services to teenage girls and women in crisis due to unplanned pregnancy, and to address other related crises such as lack of food, shelter, clothes, etc. Among the many programs offered at the center are:

  • A Shepherding Parent(s) Program, which provides temporary or long term housing for displaced mothers. It also allows mature individuals to volunteer their homes to temporarily house a pregnant client who has no place to live.

  • A GED Program which allows pregnant teens, young mothers with children to continue their education as oppose to dropping out of school. Clients who take part in this program can receive their high school equivalency diploma or improve their basic skills in reading, math or language.

  • Extended Discipleship Programs provide young women with the nurture and encouragement needed to mature in all aspects of her life. Our Share Support Group, which uses the Free Me To LiveBibie Study , Let's Get You Equipped, Heart to Heart, and the Young Married Support Group provides a group atmosphere suitable for women in distress as a result of life's dominating problems.

  • A Baby Basket Program, which provides maternity clothes, baby clothes , and food to expectant mothers.

    These programs provide total support to the woman so she can cope with her responsibilities in positive ways. They literally equip the client with what she needs to feel good about herself and have her baby. NBRWHC's goal is to offer alternatives which will assist her in a decision to have her baby.

    We have adopted a slogan around our center that says, "We Are Changing Women From the Inside Out." In order to save the child, we must save the woman. We must try to meet her at her point of need. If we say that we are pro-life, let us show it in our actions.