Providing help to young mothers - Step By Step
Center offers parenting classes, anger management groups, encouragement
From, The Kentucky Citizen Digest, Novemer/December, 2001.

A group of women sat around a kitchen table, trying to think of a name for a new church outreach to help young women who had emerged from crisis pregnancies and were now struggling new mothers.  Just then, one woman’s 11-month-old daughter provided the inspiration they needed.  She took her first steps before an adoring audience, and Step by Step was officially christened.  That was in 1995.  Now Step by Step is an independent, nonprofit center providing opportunities to young mothers in the Lexington area.
    
The center’s first task is to provide help for the physical needs of its clients according to Margie Groves, the center’s executive director.  “A place to live, food, clothes for a job interview—these need to be taken care of,” Groves said. 
   
But Step by Step provides more than just practical essentials.  They also provide parenting classes, anger management groups, referrals, and just down-to-earth encouragement to help teens and young women build a framework for a hopeful life, free from destructive cycles.  “They’re keeping their jobs, apartments, phones,” Groves said.  “They’re going to school and they’re staying in school.  It’s consistency with everything.” 
   
Carrie McAfee is a 28-year-old single mother of two, an Engineering major at Lexington Community College, and a Step by Step client.  “They encourage us to study.  They worry about our education,” McAfee said. 
   
But Groves will be quick to tell you that she considers Step by Step more than a social service agency.  Quoting II Corinthians 4:6, Groves said the center seeks to “let light shine out of darkness” by providing Bible studies, discipleship groups and retreats on a voluntary basis.  “We’re a lot about encouragement, and no judgment,” Groves said.
   
McAfee agrees.  “I’ve been an abuser for most all my life, but they don’t judge you for what you have done.  They try to encourage you,” she said.
   
Terri Behrens is one of three women who were inspired to launch Step by Step over six years ago.  “We saw in our lives what a challenge it is to be good parents even with all the resources that we have,” Behrens said.  “The youth have been abandoned because the family has been broken.  We wanted to provide resources for mothers who were trying.” 
   
Behrens now serves on the center’s board of directors.  “We foresee having a short-term living space for girls, a place for three-to-six months to allow their spirits to heal without being constantly battered by the negative environment that has held them back,” she said.
     
Tiffany Davis was referred to Step by Step by a health department counselor six years ago. Step by Step provided biblically based prayer counseling which Davis said was very helpful. “I’m a victim of sexual abuse and rape.  Traditional counseling did not work for me,” she said.  “At first I was skeptical.  Nobody else has been able to help me.  Why should God?”
     
Although Davis said she stopped attending Step by Step functions for a time, the center’s staff didn’t forget her.  “They kept in contact with me, sending me little letters.  I knew they still cared.”
   
When Davis found herself in need, those letters gave her the confidence to contact Step by Step again.  “They’re really like my mom, my sister, my best friend in one.  Step by Step has been my family,” she said.
   
The center receives funding from a variety of sources, including area churches, but Groves is hopeful that new federal legislation may open doors for more funding.  Because participation in its Christian activities is not required, Groves said President Bush’s Faith-Based Initiative holds great promise for the ministry’s expansion.  But money isn’t the only obstacle.  “We cannot grow any more until we get more volunteers,” Groves said.
     
Whatever the case, overcoming obstacles is Step by Step’s specialty.  Carrie McAfee testifies to that.  “I got a long way to go, but I believe I’m gonna make it,” she said.  


 

Key Family Foundation Contacts: Kent Ostrander , Executive Director Martin Cothran , Senior Associate Policy Analyst