By Namrata Ranjan | Project Development Officer
Oviya loves dancing. Ever-smiling, the three-year-old is among the youngest residents at the Arias Home of HOPE. The other children fondly call her 'thangai' ('little sister' in Tamil).
Oviya came to live with us in August 2013, from the tuberculosis sanatorium in Tambaram, where she and her mother were being treated. Oviya’s mother had been tested positive for HIV. She died a few months before Oviya came to our Home.
Oviya was severely malnourished and suffering from multiple ailments. At age three, she was only as big as an 8-month-old baby and weighed just 14 pounds! We admitted her into the ICU, where Oviya fought her way back to health over the next fifteen days.
At the Home, everyone, even the little children, made an extra effort to help Oviya recover and settle in. Today, she stands on her own, and is learning to walk. She has started speaking a few words, but responds mainly by smiling. The tuberculosis tumors around her neck and under her arms have begun to heal, and she has gained six pounds.
Oviya’s favorite thing to do is to shake her hip slowly and dance as her face breaks into a bright smile, winning over every heart around her.
Arias Home of HOPE, located in the temple town of Acharapakkam near Chennai in Tamil Nadu, has cared for 331 abandoned women and children living with HIV and AIDS since July 2001.
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