It was the only home I had known and we had to leave. My friends were there and one set of grandparents lived at the end of the block. An aunt was two blocks away. My church was there. The minister lived across the street. The neighbors knew all the kids and looked out for us and scolded us when we needed it. I didn't want to move. I wouldn't know anyone. I was in junior high, an age of uncertainty for children. I left a medium sized school to attend a very small country school where everyone knew one other and their families. I hated it. I was different; I was a city kid in the country. The kids who took notice of me were the ones who skipped school and shoplifted. It seemed okay; I had to have some friends and the new kid couldn't be choosy. An A student, my grades fell to barely passing in some classes.
The world around us may have changed drastically, but emotions stay the same. Children who have known a consistency in their lives have new emotions to deal with when their lives are suddenly in turmoil. Home is our place of comfort and refuge. It's where we know that everything stays the same. Suddenly, when foreclosure strikes, nothing is the same.
Nearly two million children are expected to be affected by the current mortgage crisis. They will be uprooted and their lives changed by forces they have no control over. Changing interest rates, loss of jobs, health issues, and divorce have contributed to the rash of foreclosures in this county. While adults strive to figure out how to keep a roof over the heads of their families, children wonder how this could happen. Aren't adults supposed to keep jobs and pay the bills? How can they move their family from a well kept, upscale home to a rented house on the edge of town? Where did the money go? How could they let this happen? What will my friends think?
According to a report by First Focus, children who are moved from school to school fall behind their peers in reading and math and have a greater risk of being held back or dropping out of school. Changing schools and homes increases the risk of dropping out of school by 50 per cent. Children who change schools often may find the new classes to be far ahead or even way behind the school they just left, setting the scene for new challenges or classroom boredom.
Children who move frequently often exhibit behavior problems. Uncertain of how long they will be at the current school, children may refuse to make friends or join clubs and organizations, taking the attitude of “why bother; we'll just move again”. When foreclosure hits a family, the next house is certain to be in a less affluent area than the one they just left. Kids in new settings are often standoffish and defensive, sometimes getting into fights when they think someone has said something offensive. The First Focus report states that when elementary aged children change schools frequently, the probability of violence in high school increases by 20 per cent.
The emotional impact of stress and uncertainty can lead to health problems in children, as well as adults. Children pick up on their parent's fear and worry and may develop headaches, stomach aches, or behavior problems. Anger is certainly to be present in children who no longer attend the school where they played football or soccer or held the office of class president.
Many children whose families have faced foreclosure don't move to another house. The house of grandparents or other relatives is now the place they call home. Too many live in homeless shelters across the country. The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority had requests for shelter from 620 families of foreclosed homes in the winter of 2008, almost twice as many as a year before.
Family meetings can help children to understand what's going on. They don't need too many details, they don't need to hear the anger and arguments that are certain to be going on between parents. Children need only as much information as they can handle but even a little can help reduce the fear that they feel. What they do need to know is that no matter what happens, the family stays together.
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