SHELBY — Six months ago, Victor Uyoa, Sr., of Shelby, was about to go into surgery for a liver transplant when his wife told him that some people wanted to help the family and were going to “do some work” on their house.
“That’s what I remember,” Uyoa said, sitting on the sofa in his living room – a sofa that spent almost two years covered in plastic on his front porch. “I didn’t understand what she meant, but after I came home from the hospital, that’s when I was told about the work people wanted to do on our house to help us.”
My name is Demrie Alonzo, and I’m the school counselor at St. Mary’s Catholic School in Shelby. The youngest two Uyoa children go to my school and at the beginning of this past school year, the older of the two wasn’t at school for a couple of weeks because he was at the hospital translating for his mother who doesn’t speak English.
I’ve known these children for nearly three years now, so when he came back to school, I pulled him into my office to see how things were going.
It was during my conversation with him that I got an idea that something wasn’t quite right. Both children were always happy and well-dressed and clean and never a behavior problem at the school. They were typical kids.
But the emotional stress of being the translator for a string of doctors with lots of bad news and confusing jargon took its toll on this 12-year-old boy. He shared that not only did they worry about losing their dad, who had been very sick for years with Hepatitis B, but things were difficult at home.
Not one to complain, it was hard to get much information out of him, but I did find out that they only had electric heaters instead of a furnace in their house. That got me wondering what else they might be doing without.
I got his permission to speak with his older sister, Maria, who I knew because she substitute-taught a few times at St. Mary’s, and my son knew her at the high school as an aid.
It took a while to piece things together, but I eventually found out they were living in a house without a furnace, unfinished walls and floors, no water except in the basement where they had to shower and use the toilet, and all of their living room furniture was on the porch because work had been started on the living room, but Victor Sr. had gotten too sick to finish it.
I visited the home and wanted to cry. They have this huge house but only lived in the upstairs bedrooms. Veronica Uyoa, the mother, had no counters or sink or running water in the kitchen. She had to constantly go to the basement for water and to do dishes.
There were holes in the floors that looked down to the basement. Duct work had been put in for an eventual furnace, but the furnace never happened. In the winter, the family huddled around space heaters.
There are three children under 18 and Maria, who will soon be 21, and the two parents living in the house, all crammed upstairs most of the time. They showed me a beautiful, showroom-like bathroom that an older half-brother installed upstairs, but there was no water going to this bathroom, so it sat unused.
I asked the family if I could reach out for help, and they gave me the go-ahead.
My first step was writing an article for Richland Source. That was published on Oct. 9, 2022.
The response from the Shelby community was overwhelmingly wonderful!
So many people knew the Uyoa children, either through St. Mary’s or the high school, or the places where Maria worked multiple jobs to support her family.
Immediately, donations started coming into their GoFundMe account that their older half-sister had set up for medical expenses. I also asked for help with the needs of the house.
A woman and her family, who knew the younger children and was shocked to hear of their situation, bought them not only a brand-new Carrier furnace, but paid for at least a year’s worth of their gas bill. One of the teachers at St. Mary’s has a daughter who is a master plumber, and she volunteered her time, and even bought parts out of her own pocket, to get their plumbing hooked up to the upstairs bathroom and to the kitchen for when they would eventually have a sink.
St. Mary’s church graciously contributed toward family expenses, and other individuals donated money toward the work that needed to be done on the house.
Then I heard from Blue Rose Mission, a Christian nonprofit organization out of Mansfield that does home improvement projects for homeowners in Richland County. They are an all-volunteer organization that brings their expertise and experience to projects such as the Uyoa’s. They asked if they could take on the project, and I was ecstatic.
There were a few glitches along the way, when we thought we had one project set up and then that one fell through, or a volunteer who ended up not being able to help. Our biggest hold-up was getting all the painting done before the flooring could go down.
Then out of nowhere a professional painter contacted us and she volunteered her time to do all the painting. We are incredibly grateful for the beautiful work that “K” did for us. She was a Godsend.
Sutters Home Decorating, Flooring, and More volunteered their time to lay down the flooring and did a fantastic job. We are incredibly thankful to them for donating their time and experience.
Garland “J.R.” Harvey and Jeff Shuler, both of Blue Rose Mission, stepped things up and were determined to get things done sooner than later.
Although Schuler has a full-time job, he was at the Uyoa house every extra moment and every weekend to get things moving.
Even though Harvey had major shoulder surgery, he was very involved in the project and made sure things were on task and on budget.
Thanks to some large donations, a new dishwasher, a state-of-the-art sink, kitchen counters, countertops, and other items were able to be purchased. A new oven is on order and should arrive soon.
On April 6, 2023, Shelby High School kindly sent over six strong guys to help bring the furniture back into the house and set it up. There were Uyoa children bouncing around excitedly. They couldn’t wait to watch movies in the living room for the first time in years.
On April 16, I paid a visit to the family to see how they were doing. A final check was written to the family with the remaining balance of the money donated. It was just a little over $200. It’s amazing that we had enough donations to get all the work done, with a little to spare.
As I sat with the family in their spacious living room, Victor Sr. was surrounded by three of his children and his wife as we talked about the transformation of his house.
“I never thought it was going to really happen,” Victor admitted of the project. “People say they are going to do things, but you never know.”
He waved his hands at the house around him. “But this…” Tears came to his eyes, and he choked up. “I never expected this.”
For Veronica, having a real kitchen is the best thing that happened.
“Eight years,” she said, her only English words to me. “Eight years.”
That’s how long she went without cabinets or counters or a sink or running water.
What the children remember most are the Christmas gifts they received, thanks to Whittney Allen-Winck, their neighbor and friend who also owns a booth at The Little Shops of Shelby where Maria Uyoa has one as well. She organized a gift drive and a gift-wrapping day to make it the best Christmas ever for the Uyoa family.
“You can’t help but want to help this family,” Allen-Winck said. “They didn’t deserve this hardship, but they do deserve some happiness.”
ah yea marcus uyoa is my husband