Ripple of Thanks (Meb)

Many of you know that my daughter, Elizabeth, was abused by a license-exempt provider (nanny) and blinded for life. The judge convicted the nanny of felony child abuse, but shockingly, amazingly and seemingly without regard for other families and children, allowed the person who tried to kill my daughter to be a nanny again, stating that it "was good to have a job while on probation." The nanny was given a $100 fine.

     This was too much for me to bear. Not only was my beautiful, 6-month old baby blind, unable to move the right side of her body and having seizures, the 'system' I thought would surely protect others had failed before my eyes and ears.

     I decided to change child care laws in CA, and the journey to what later became the California Child Care Trustline Registry began that day (www.Trustline.org). That journey, in and of itself, was a series of miracles that I partially chronicle in The Miracle Chase. But there is more, and this is the amazing miracle I want to share with you now.

          This year, early education and child care has been a focus for many who care about and work on behalf of young children. The reauthorization of the eighteen year old Child Care Development Block Grant (CCDBG) finally made it to the top of someone's list and a majority of our legislative folks in Washington were on board to pass legislation that would ensure that the funding could continue, but with many new, updated and important changes to make child care safer and better administered.

     Unfortunately, a couple of legislators wanted to hold up  the passing of this nearly unanimous legislation. After many advocates and the sponsors of the bill put pressure on them, there was only one man who was the hold out. (The way Federal legislation works is that you have to send the bill out for signature by the President before a certain date or the bill dies.) We needed his vote to send the bill on.

          Here comes the miracle. A mother was at a child care conference for parent advocates, because her son had suffocated by being placed in an unsafe crib; she was determined to make the death of her child mean something, to ensure that no other family would suffer what happened to her own family. She  Googled women who changed child care and came up with the story of the Trustline Registry. But the story of Trustline didn't launch her advocacy. It turns out that our book, The Miracle Chase, also came up on Google. So she bought the book, which tells the story of how Joan, Katie and I uncover what the miracles in our life have meant to us. She said that the wonder and nature of miracles soothed her soul and inspired her at a time she really needed it. She decided to come to the conference and through her voice and her family's terrible experience, she would try to make a difference.

     Here is the amazing part: her hometown legislator was the "Hold-Out-Legislator" who was blocking the passing of the CCDBG. Well, we all know that No Thing is more powerful than a woman who is defending her children and one who is inspired by miracles is unstoppable. She walked into her Legislator's office and passionately told him her story, explaining why what happened to her family must "never again" be any other family's experience. Where cajoling by other legislators had failed, her heartfelt sharing changed his vote.

     The rest is history, or maybe really, it is her story. God bless this mother and God bless the miracle of a change of heart.

     To recap the Ripple Effect of the Miracle:
My daughter survived (our miracle) and I started Trustline. This mother found Trustline, and she found the three of us who wrote about miracles in The Miracle Chase. And then, she made her very own miracle by saying "Yes" to the unfolding of miracles. She made miracles happen for countless families across this nation. Who knows how many children will be spared death or injury because of her courage and passion?

     As we say in The Miracle Chase, "Like the ripples in the Universal Lake, a Miracle is the perfect stone God casts in to the center of the still more perfect water. When we step back and look, we can see how the ripple cascades across time and space until God's miracle returns to another shore, like a wave unto itself."

    Go out and say "Yes" and make miracles happen. They never end.