Maine Families offers support in the home

By Joseph Cyr
Staff Writer
    HOULTON — Maine Families of Aroostook takes pride in providing local families with assistance when it comes to raising a new child.
    Danielle Langley, director for Maine Families of Aroostook, is trying to spread the word about services that many may not know exist. To that end, the group, formerly known as Healthy Families of Aroostook, is conducting a “home visiting week” Oct. 25-29 to raise awareness for their cause.
    “We’ve done community events in the past, but this year, we are trying to get more information about what home visiting is to the general public,” Langley said.
    Maine Families of Aroostook is a free, voluntary home visiting program that helps parents by providing them with information on prenatal and child development. The program offers activities to stimulate a child’s brain growth; ways to bond with a new baby; helping children form healthy attachments to their parents; and providing access to community resources parents may not be aware of.
    “We get the stigma a lot of times attached to us that we are coming into someone’s home looking to spy on them and it’s really just the opposite,” Langley said. “We are here to support the families. It’s completely voluntary.”
    Langley said the name change was needed to provide more uniform coverage throughout the state.
    “We have a lot of transient families that move from one end of the state to the other, so now they can know they are going to a Maine Families program,” Langley said.
    In the past year, Maine Families of Aroostook has formed a partnership with the Aroostook County Action Program
    The First Time Parents program, which offers new parents the opportunity to learn new ways to interact with their child, requires individuals to enroll before their baby turns three months old. An Early Head Start program is featured through the partnership with ACAP, features home visits for low-income families.
    “We go into homes with the intent of figuring out what is going on with the family,” Langley said. “We also try to help them with the transition of adding a newborn to their family. We try to make sure to do developmental screenings to make sure children are making their developmental milestones. We take activities that are parent-child based.”
    Langley said it was vitally important for parents to work with children at an early age.
    “Studies have shown, the greatest brain development happens from birth to 3 years,” she said. “The more things they do and the more appropriate stimulation a baby has, the easier time they will have when they get to school.”