Issue link: https://www.massageandbodyworkdigital.com/i/149404
S Vietnam's orphans Stories like these are repeated in orphanages all over the world. Infants and children are displaced, abandoned, and left to fend for themselves on some of the world's most dangerous streets. Dedicated caregivers struggle to provide help in overcrowded orphanages, drawing from their limited tools and basic knowledge of child care and development. As the number of orphans rises around the world, the demand for sensory stimulation, nurturing touch, and palliative care within these settings grows along with it. Sharing Nurturing Touch Recently, my nonprofit the Liddle Kidz Foundation, along with a group of 20 global ambassadors, spent just under three weeks in Vietnam, traveling from Ho Chi Minh City to Ha Long Bay and providing hands-on massage therapy and nurturing touch to hundreds of infants and children in orphanages along the way. We had visited this area roughly two years earlier, and the team was excited to see familiar faces, meet new friends, and experience the sustainable impact we had made from the previous trip. Our program is rooted in massaging children and infants, but also in leaving a lasting impact by teaching orphanage workers how to use nurturing touch. Education is an integral part of our mission. Our experience has shown that caregivers lack the funding and resources to provide much more than standard daily care. Through our work, we provide no-cost education in optimal nurturing and tactile stimulation, none of which requires the orphanage to obtain any special equipment or increase any budget. Through our education and support programs, we are able to give hope to children and caregivers, as well as shine a light on the devastating effects of the institutionalized care of children in developing nations. Welcomed with Open Arms Que Huong Charity Center (QHCC) in Ho Chi Minh City was the first stop on our trip. We had visited QHCC in 2010, and the memories of our struggle to convince some of the caregivers about the benefits of massage were still fresh. But this time was different. "What made the trip so rewarding was when a caregiver 68 massage & bodywork september/october 2013