Grandma raising 5 kids alone: ‘I just want to live a while longer to see them grow up’
Joan Pratt is living a real-life “Full House.”
And though there is a lot of love to go around between Pratt and the five grandchildren she’s raising alone in her Liberty City home, this is no TV sitcom.
It’s true that a conversation with Pratt, 62, will be punctuated by easy laughter. But that’s owing to her pluck and spirit, and it’s in contrast to the difficult challenge she’s meeting head on.
Pratt, retired from her job as a school bus driver, is raising the kids — two boys, three girls, ages 3 to 13 — because her daughter cannot, she explains.
Seems there was a party their mother, Pratt’s daughter, went to and brought the youngest babies along. Told her mom it was a kid’s party. It wasn’t.
“It was an adult party. They had a lot of drugs there. The police got involved. That’s how I found out,” Pratt said. “The detective asked me, ‘Before I take the kids away from her and put them in some home,’ he asked if I’d be willing to raise them.
“And I said, ‘Yes.’ ”
So about three years ago when the littlest, Abigail, was just a baby, Pratt’s small three-bedroom home on the corner of a Miami-Dade city block became a full house.
On Thursday, Give Miami Day, the Miami Herald launches Wish Book 2020, a nonprofit effort that has been a mission of the media company for almost 40 years. The goal, as always: to help some of South Florida’s neediest people by calling on the generous support of readers.
“Our annual Wish Book has always played an important role in addressing unmet needs in South Florida, a region with huge contrasts between the haves and the have-nots. The COVID-19 pandemic has made those needs greater, and those contrasts more stark,” said Rick Hirsch, the Miami Herald’s interim executive editor.
Pratt is humble, said Vanessa Griffin, the director of community services at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Miami, the agency that sponsored Pratt for Wish Book consideration.
“She’s just this awesome woman and not looking for a handout,” Griffin said. But that doesn’t mean she can’t use a helping hand.
Grandma raising five grandkids alone
“She’s such a hard-working, committed grandmother,” Griffin said. “Her daughter, the kids’ mother, has some issues with substance abuse and she keeps having babies and dropping them off to the grandmother.”
Griffin and Pratt both say the children’s mother really isn’t involved with them now.
“She might pop up once in a blue moon if I, say, remind her the kids have a birthday. She may or may not. She’s not really in their lives. The dads are definitely not in their lives,” Pratt said.
Griffin admires how Pratt, who drove buses for Miami-Dade Public Schools, has stepped up. But she needs a break.
“The grandmother is not willing to let her grandchildren just be out there,” Griffin said. “I’ve asked her, ‘What would you like?’ She said she would like a two-week vacation but, ‘Of course, I can’t do that because I have the kids.’ No one could take care of her grandchildren.”
What would really help
Griffin says the family could use some new living and dining room furniture. “Especially beds.”
Maybe some Christmas goodies like bikes for the oldest boy and girl, a laptop for the 6-year-old for school. Big Wheels for the 5-year-old and 3-year-old. Gift cards, perhaps.
And, oh, how lovely it would be to have the means to move into a four-bedroom, two-bath home. That would take money she does not have for a deposit.
Pratt acknowledges a larger home would be a godsend. Right now, she’s renting the home she’s had for 20 years — a three-bedroom, one-bath.
“There’s a lot of sharing. A whole lot,” Pratt said, laughing.
The home is, as you say, lived in. The kids are well-behaved. But they are, if anyone with children needs reminding, still kids. And that means a handful.
Dealing with different personalities
“They are real talkative. I’m dealing with a bunch of different personalities,” Pratt said. “That’s how I look at it. They have their own style.”
Pratt chuckles again. Laughter is life-affirming.
But life has become a bit harder with the COVID-19 pandemic and how it altered carefully constructed routines.
“Everybody was confined to the house but the kids went back to school because at first, at home, they weren’t doing so well. They wanted to go back,” Pratt said.
“Overall, they are good kids doing what kids do,” Pratt said. “The little boy, he’s 6, has a little challenge because he was a drug baby. He is having a little difficulty in school. Right now he is trying to do a little better in school and I try to get him some help whenever I can with his homework. I have a family friend tutoring him in the evenings.”
The oldest boy, Isiah, 13, just joined Booker T. Washington’s high school band, Pratt said. “The next little girl,” Oliviea, 10, “She’s not into anything right now. She likes dancing. Maybe if I could get her enrolled in some kind of dance class.”
There’s also Loyal, 6. Terylin is 5. Abigail is 3.
“I manage. We are surviving,” Pratt said.
Driving elementary school-age and high school-age children for 35 years in Miami-Dade has given this grandmother a real perspective on the psyche of children. “I loved the job,” Pratt said.
“I just want to be able to live a while longer to see them grow up a bit, where they can fend for themselves, because their mom, she’s not into them. I just want the kids to grow up and be comfortable and be able to take care of themselves, look out for themselves and look out for each other, and I want them to be close.”
Wish Book could make this a better season. Pratt says she is grateful for whatever comes.
“We must be grateful.”
Wish Book during the COVID crisis
This year, the Wish Book challenge is bigger than usual.
“As one can imagine, needs are greater this year than ever before. Job losses, evictions, food insecurity due to COVID are all themes of the requests,” said Wish Book coordinator Roberta DiPietro. “Many of the nominations, submitted from social service agencies, also include medical equipment, service needs and some just some joy for the holidays.”
Wish Book readers’ generosity
Last year, Wish Book raised $325,00 in cash along with $30,000 of in-kind donations. More than 750 people were helped.
For Wish Book 2020, DiPietro remains optimistic. Giving to others would be one way to end a year on a highlight, a year that many would like to put behind them. It would be a way to bring joy to Pratt’s family and many others that the Herald will introduce over the coming weeks.
“We are hopeful our readers can be counted on once again to be as generous as in the past to support the neediest in our community and bring a little bright spot into a neighbor’s life,” she said.
Making a difference
Last year, Wish Book helped bring light to people like David Anaya, a 6-year-old who had already spent half his life battling neurofibromatosis, a genetic disorder that causes tumors that can be cancerous to grow on nerves.
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David had a cancerous tumor on his optic nerve and was also diagnosed with autism.
What topped his holiday wish list was a laptop so he could do his schoolwork after he had spent more than a year undergoing chemotherapy. On Christmas Eve at his grandmother’s house in Kendall, David excitedly opened his gifts, which included a laptop and a bicycle donated by readers.
Readers also met the Brown brothers, Marcelino and Jorge.
Marcelino Brown was diagnosed with post-traumatic epilepsy in 2012 after he was hit by a drunk driver while crossing a street. The seizures were debilitating and cost him his job as a highway maintenance worker for the state. He was turned down for disability and Medicaid. All he had was his older brother, Jorge.
They lost their Allapattah home to a rent increase. They lived in a car, which was later repossessed. They then rented a cramped Little River duplex studio. The brothers could barely afford that space, which led them to sell off their possessions — including Marcelino’s prized Canon camera.
After their story ran, readers’ donations assisted with the rent — and provided a new Canon EOS camera for Marcelino, DiPietro said.
We also introduced readers to Elizabeth Minguez. She has multiple sclerosis, an autoimmune disease that affects the brain and spinal cord. MS rendered her unable to walk and in need of assistance at her Southwest Miami-Dade home. She dreamed of a scooter to give her some mobility, but spiraling insurance costs, co-pays and other bills for her care strapped the family financially.
“Donations made it possible to provide her with a scooter that she needed,” DiPietro said.
How to help
Wish Book is trying to help hundreds of families in need this year. To donate, pay securely at MiamiHerald.com/wishbook. For information, call 305-376-2906 or email wishbook@miamiherald.com. (The most requested items are often laptops and tablets for school, furniture, and accessible vans.) Read more at MiamiHerald.com/wishbook.
This story was originally published November 18, 2020 at 7:00 AM.
