Stella’s Story
Stella is a 4–5-year-old girl who has experienced significant health and family challenges at a very young age. She is an only child and she has got complicated health issues, her mother was living with HIV.
 
Stella lived with both her parents, however her father is reported to have struggled with alcohol misuse and abandoned the family. Although he is still alive and living within the community, he does not provide any support or take responsibility for Stella or her mother.
 
Stella’s grandmother, who had previously been one of her caregivers, has also passed away. She was living with HIV.
In November, Stella became very unwell and lost a significant amount of weight. She was diagnosed with tuberculosis (TB) in December. Around this time, her health was already very fragile.
In January, Stella’s mother became seriously ill. During this period, there were interruptions in Stella’s follow-up care, and she missed hospital appointments for about a month. Sadly, her mother passed away in February.
 
At the time of assessment, Stella had recently buried her mother (approximately one week prior) and was temporarily staying with a neighbour who had been a close friend of her mother. At present, there is no confirmed long-term caregiver identified for Stella.
 
Stella is now staying at Manna Rescue Home and she’s having the most amazing time being able to be a child. You would never notice that she’s had so much trauma in her past with the big grin that she has on her face every day.