Pubdate: Mon, 01 Mar 2004
Source: Surrey Now (CN BC)
Copyright: 2004 Lower Mainland Publishing Group Inc., A Canwest Company
Contact:  http://www.thenownewspaper.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1462
Series: Other elements in this series may be found at: 
http://www.mapinc.org/source/Surrey+Now+%28CN+BC%29
Author: Carolyn Cooke
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/rehab.htm (Treatment)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)

FEW DETOX BEDS HERE FOR YOUTH

Second in a series.

Some nights are just a "gong show."

That's what Melanie Sheard, a Surrey Reconnect youth outreach worker, calls 
it when her outreach shift is eaten up trying to juggle multiple kids with 
crises.

One such evening in late January saw Sheard fielding countless calls from 
two young runaway girls in different parts of the city. Sheard was asked by 
one of the girls, who just had a "massive fight with her parents," to meet 
her and her boyfriend at a fast-food restaurant to talk about their options 
and choices. In the end, the girl decided to stay with her boyfriend and 
sleep in parks or building doorways.

"It's not that there are more girls who run away but we hear about more of 
them," said Sheard. "Generally females ask for help more than males do. 
Females talk more than males do."

The other runaway's situation couldn't be sorted out by the end of Sheard's 
shift.

"At 11 (o'clock), you just have to turn the phone off and try not to think 
about it," she said.

Sheard, whose caseload has been almost exclusively young girls in her 
year-and-a-half with Surrey Reconnect, said that there is a huge range of 
issues particular to dealing with girls, runaways or not. Because of this, 
girls will almost always ask to have a female youth worker.

Some males do have body image issues, she said, "but how many guys have had 
a fat day?" Sheard said body control issues are another major concern for 
young girls.

"If you can't control anything else in your life, you can control what you 
do to your body, what you put into your body, or not put into your body," 
she said. "That's when it gets really tough."

Also an issue is young girls - 13 or 14 years old - with much older 
boyfriends, Sheard says. Some of these girls have boyfriends who are 26 or 
30, said Sheard, and then you have to explain that their boyfriend isn't 
looking for a meaningful relationship, he's a pedophile.

Many girls, like boys, also have addictions they're grappling with, and the 
lack of youth detox beds in the city is a real problem in trying to get 
help for these kids. "They never get in," said Sheard. "There's always a 
waitlist. By the time there's a spot open they've already gone on another 
binge."

Shayne Williams, another youth outreach worker, agreed, saying he recently 
spent two weeks trying to get a spot for one of his clients but ultimately 
the teen didn't get into one of Maple Cottage's three youth detox beds 
before he slipped back into using. Maple Cottage has the only youth detox 
beds in the Fraser Health Authority.

In addition, there is a desperate need for safe houses for youth in Surrey.

As it stands, if a kid is kicked out of home, is already on the streets or 
has nowhere else to go and turns to a youth worker for help, the nearest 
safe house is in the Downtown Eastside.

Williams wonders if they're really doing the child a service sending them 
to Covenant House, which also takes street people in their 20s.

"We wouldn't refer someone there unless they're really street entrenched 
and can handle themselves. They don't even have friends to fall back on 
there," said Williams.

The next morning, the kids are stranded downtown at risk of getting into an 
even worse predicament.

Instead, Surrey's Reconnect workers try to get kids into a safe house in 
North Vancouver, their only other real option.

"For the most part, they won't go," said Sheard. If the kids are in a 
school work program, for example, she said they don't want to go because 
it's too far from Surrey.

And sometimes, that isn't even an option: the North Van safe house doesn't 
always have space to spare.

"Surrey should have its own safe house," said Williams. "Because of the 
number of kids we deal with, we could keep a house full."
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