Karl Lunt was born at Mt. Graham Regional Medical Center in Safford, and his mom, Katrina Lunt was worried.
Although the labor and delivery were smooth, Lunt is a veteran who suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and general anxiety and depression. She also had a 17-month-old daughter Klaura at home, and was unsure of her ability to care for two young children.
While still in the hospital, Lunt received a visitor from Child & Family Resources, who shared services available to families of newborns. The new mom’s attention was drawn to a home visitation program called Healthy Families Arizona. Healthy Families provides a parent coach who visits the family in their home to provide parenting information, teaching strategies and connections to community resources.
Many families struggle with situations that can cause stress for parents and may compromise children’s healthy development, so the First Things First Graham/Greenlee Regional Partnership Council funds the voluntary Healthy Families program as a way to offer parents of young children individualized support.
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Lunt, who lives in Duncan, was thrilled to find out that help was available to her at no cost. As she began receiving visits from her home visitor Melissa, Lunt’s confidence as a mother began to grow.
“Melissa helped me to redirect my emotions and learn how to handle myself better, so I can be a better mom,” Lunt said. Now, she is able to pass those self-regulation skills on to her children to help them be more successful.
After developmental screenings showed that Karl and Klaura were not meeting appropriate developmental milestones, Melissa would bring fun activities for the children to help them develop specific skills. For example, she would introduce an activity such as stacking, sorting or creating a toy from everyday objects in the home, and then let Lunt take the lead.
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As the children learned and developed new skills, Lunt was busy learning too. In addition to gaining parenting skills, she was working on a bachelor’s degree online. During the hard days when she wanted to quit, Lunt said Melissa would give her the courage to keep going by telling her to take it one day at a time and helping her focus on the end goal.
Lunt recently received her bachelor’s degree and attributed a lot of their success as a family to Melissa and the Healthy Families program. Today, Klaura is excited to start kindergarten in the fall, and Karl is right on track with all of his developmental milestones.
