Sister Linda Dube, founder of Our Lady of Guadalupe Home where they work to assist pregnant women and their babies. 
​PHOTO BY NICK BRANCACCIO /Windsor Star
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Claudia Nizigiyimana arrived in Windsor last February from Burundi, pregnant and alone, her husband unable to make the journey with her.
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With her one friend in Canada living in Windsor, she chose to settle here.
But feeling overwhelmed and unable to find an affordable place to live, Nizigiyimana said her life changed for the better when she discovered Our Lady of Guadalupe Home of Windsor.
The 36-yer-old refugee claimant began living at the home, which provides crisis support to pregnant women and women with babies, in June.

In August, her son Penuel was born.
“I don’t know where I would be with my baby, oh my god, I don’t see how the life would be without (Our Lady of Guadalupe Home),” Nizigiyimana said. “I just have one friend here and she’s not able to take me to keep me in safe place with my baby.

“I can’t go on the street with my baby and the COVID. I don’t know how life would be. It would be rough.”
Nizigiyimana is one of 68 women who have stayed at the residential home since it opened four years ago.

Mother Claudia Niziyigimana and son, Penuel, 3 months old are seen at Our Lady of Guadalupe Home, where pregnant moms and their babies are assisted. 
​PHOTO BY NICK BRANCACCIO /Windsor Star

Co-founded by Sr. Linda Dube, the home offers a safe place to live and to learn and develop mothering skills.
Women sign a lease agreement and are required to keep their own space, as well as the common household areas, clean. Students are also required to attend school.

Dube said some of the women who use the residential support program have fled an abusive situation or have addiction or mental health issues. Some were in foster care or had long-term contacts with community services or are new immigrants.

“Many women in our facility have issues with addiction or abuse,” Dube said. “In that case, what we’ve learned very early on, it’s useless, pointless to accept a woman who hasn’t received treatment for her addiction.”
She said staff work closely with the House of Sophrosyne, which offers help to women battling substance misuse or abuse and women must continue with treatment to be allowed to stay at the Our Lady of Guadalupe home.
The same goes for women who have mental health issues.
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“Generally speaking they have a very difficult time in a residence situation where there are other people involved,” Dube said. “However, once again, it’s contingent on them that they receive some sort of treatment for their condition and that they continue with the medication that has been prescribed for them.”
For women who have suffered abuse, they are “very strongly encouraged to get whatever helps are available to her within the community.”

Sister Linda Dube, left, and Marina Kowalsky, both with Our Lady of Guadalupe Home where they work to assist pregnant women and their babies. 
PHOTO BY NICK BRANCACCIO /Windsor Star

Program manager Marina Kowalsky, a social worker by occupation, helps residents with finding employment, child care, housing, educational opportunities and importantly, hands-on help caring for an infant.
Parenting skills, life skills, cooking, hygiene and emotional skills are all taught at the home.
“Some of them don’t know how to love. They’ve never been loved. They need to be taught to love,” Kowalsky said. “And that’s probably the hardest one because you can teach them how to do things. How do you teach somebody how to feel?

“It’s not always successful but we don’t stop trying because it’s so very important. And if they got that one then there’s a chance (for successful parenting) too.”
Kowalsky, who has worked at the homes since 2017, said initially it was established to give women a choice to have their baby without sacrificing work or education but it has evolved from there.
“Children’s Aid families come to us for women who are at risk of losing their children,” she said. “The judges look at that. (The women) are in a stable scenario in residence that will help them learn how to parent (and) many will allow them to keep their baby and assess how they do.”
The non-profit home is staffed 24-hours-a day, seven-days a week and runs completely on donations and divine intervention, said Dube.

“It’s completely funded by divine providence. And that’s how it’s been for our home from the beginning,” Dube said. “We received absolutely no government funding, nor have we from the very beginning.”
Philanthropist and businessman Al Quesnel recently donated $100,000 but it wasn’t his first donation. He also donated $100,000 in 2015 and 2019.
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Dube said Quesnel committed to donating a total of $500,000 total within the next two years — all in honour of his grandmother Ernestine Paron.
“He has been a real supporter from the very beginning,” Dube said.
She said the home was “inspired through the (Catholic) church.”
“We don’t evangelize in our program. However, our values and our vision is formed by Catholic teaching and Catholic vision, for sure.”
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​The Board, Staff and Residents of Our Lady of Guadalupe Home would like to express our deep appreciation to Mr. Alan Quesnel for his wonderful support over the years.  Alan has been a faithful benefactor and promoter of the home and its program since it first opened its doors in 2016.
Mr. Quesnel’s most recent donation of $100,000 will help us to continue in our calling to support new mothers and their babies in time of need.  Thank you and may God bless you Alan for your great generosity!  
Last year Mr. Quesnel commissioned Mark Hopkins to create 3 bronze sculptures of the birth of a baby for Our Lady of Guadalupe Home.  And so, the artist created this work called “Heavenly Gift” for us (photograph by Paul Coleman).
The Lord has inspired many to contribute their time, their talents and their treasures to Our Lady of Guadalupe Home over the years.  We thank God for all of them and pray for each one daily.  Mr. Alan Quesnel has stepped up to share his wealth with many mothers and babies in need of support.  He has truly responded to Jesus’ words: “Whatever you do for the least, you do to me.”  So, I expect that someday he’ll hear the Lord say, “Well done, good and faithful servant!”
Please join us in the daily prayer of Our Lady of Guadalupe Home:
“Thy will be done, Lord!  Nothing more.  Nothing less.”“Our Lady of Guadalupe, Pray for Us”

Click on the link below to hear the interview.
​https://www.cbc.ca/listen/shows/windsor-morning/segment/15537972

        
Craig Pearson

May 01, 2014 - 5:49 PM EDT

Last Updated: May 01, 2014 - 7:54 PM EDT

Pregnant and in crisis?

Call Our Lady of Guadalupe Home for Mothers at 519-962-4861 or visit ologhome.com.

Thanks to prayers, they say — and a particularly generous donation of a new home — a group of Catholic volunteers have created Windsor’s first residential program for pregnant women and new mothers in crisis.

Our Lady of Guadalupe Home for Mothers, so new that its dirt lawns have yet to be landscaped, will welcome as many as seven women and their babies for up to a year at a time.

The spacious seven-bed, four-bath home characterized by a modern feel and dark hardwood floors, was built courtesy of an anonymous donor. It will offer counselling and help on everything from life skills to breast feeding.

Ironically, it partly started with a challenge from those opposed to pro-life initiatives.

“In prayer, the Lord asked me to do something for the right-to-life movement,” Sister Linda Dube, who started spearheading the maternal home project four years ago, said Thursday. “But I didn’t know what ‘something’ was. So I went on the streets and participated in many prayer vigils. This is all about pro-life.

“We try to raise awareness. But some people don’t like what we’re doing. The second call came through these people who posed the question, ‘What are you doing to help women who are pregnant and in crisis?’”

The answer: the non-profit Our Lady of Guadalupe Home, on Alexandrine Street in the Remington Park area. Though it’s Catholic-based, the home welcomes all religious affiliations.

“Every woman I have ever spoken to who has ever had an abortion — forgive me for using the A-word — has said, ‘I felt I had no choice,’” said the Ursuline sister. “For women who have no place to go, we thought: Alright, we’ll provide a place to go.”

At the opening ceremony Thursday, Fr. Nichola Mauro Iko from St. Alphonsus Church blessed the home with prayer and sprinkles of holy water. A collection of supporters sang church hymns to organ music before enjoying an impressive array of pot-luck baked goods laid out on a kitchen table.

The home, which will open within weeks once city licencing is complete, is already nicely appointed with single beds and a number of cribs.

“It’s an important place for the community because we’re meeting a need,” said Elaine Paul, a social worker in Windsor the last 21 years who will serve as the live-in program director. “I’ve worked a lot with families and children and one of the main things I’ve seen with wounded, vulnerable children is poor attachment in that first year of life.

“It’s very important for me that we help women have that nurturing time.”