Visually-impaired mother faces hard times this Mother’s Day

Mother’s Day is a time when emphasis is on flowers and gifts, along with praising mothers for the hard work they have been doing. We sometimes overlook the struggling mothers: those who are trying and still can’t make ends meet.
Like forty-eight-year-old Celesa Moore, of Manchester Village, Corentyne, Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne), who is visually impaired and who lost her husband a few months ago, but still has to send two children to school and run her home on the $22,000 public assistance she receives monthly, even as the water company has disconnected the water supply, and the electricity company has threatened to remove the meter from her home for non-payment of bills.

“I was born blind on one eye and at the age of 19, I got completely blind. I’ve been blind for like 30 years now and I cannot work. So I get public assistance.”
Moore says from that she has to put food on the table and pay bills. “I have like internet bill to pay, light bills to pay. I have my kids to go to school, you know…and it’s been a terrible challenge since my husband died,” she relayed.
One of Ms Moore’s daughters, who is currently sitting the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) assessments, has reportedly faced repeated embarrassment at school due to her mother’s inability to afford a computer.
Ms Moore, who became a widow in February of this year, is a mother of four. Three of her children currently live with her—two are in school, while the third is battling a chronic illness.
“And my eldest daughter, she’s a sickler, [children and adults with a diagnosis of sickle cell disease (SCD)]. So there’s a lot she’s not supposed to be dealing with, especially not sleeping well in the night. But there’s nothing that can be done at this moment because I don’t work anyway.”
Her daughter also is unemployed. In fact, she has been considered for Government’s public assistance because of her condition.
“Both of us get public assistance and that’s what I depend on because I don’t have a husband,” Moore explained.
According to the single mother, financially, it is challenging for her, and she describes her situation as ‘tough’.
“I am struggling to put food on the table. To send my daughter to school is very expensive right now. She is writing CXC without a computer, which is something she had really need. I try hard to save the money but was unable to do that. She was embarrassed a few times at school because of not getting a computer. And yeah, that’s the situation right now… It is tough, real tough,” she said with a slight nod of the head.
“We don’t even have water because our water disconnect… so what I do, I pay the neighbours for water. I pay them monthly and they give me water. I pay them $1,500 every month for water.”
While the connection still remains to her yard, Moore said the Guyana Water Inc (GWI) might remove the service from her property.
“I think about three weeks now they were threatening to remove my service completely because I cannot come up with the money to pay the water.”
According to Moore, her bill is $127,000.
“I managed to pay a little. I can’t remember exactly the amount I paid before my husband died. But it’s still there to be paid,” she said.”
The mother of three is not only struggling to make ends meet, her house is now falling apart.
A few days ago, when a carpenter visited to see what assistance he can render, he advised her to get out of the house before it falls, but she has nowhere to go with the three children.
Inside the two-bedroom house, the kitchen is just about two feet wide.
“There’s nothing else I could do,” Moore said when asked how she is able to manage in the small kitchen. The floor is also in a bad shape and shaky.
“The issue is our house has been falling apart. The step, the landing, the kitchen is sinking, all the flooring are losing, we don’t have a few windows, I would say like four or three windows, something like that we don’t have. Some of them are broken, some doesn’t have any at all. Added to that, the roof, when the rain falls, we cannot sleep. It’s every bed soaking and if the rain falls… and every breeze… it will like lash and make a lot of noises with the sink.”
“I don’t have anywhere to go or anybody I could stay with at this moment. So I have to dwell there until better comes.”
“If I can get the help from the Government – it’s my house to rebuild. And that will make me comfortable with my kids. My yard, as you look at it, you would see the fence, they’re all falling apart. And there’s nothing I can do at this moment because we don’t have any saving or anything,” Moore explained.
Persons wishing to contact Moore can do so via telephone number 665-8668.