We Are Family: RMHC’s Mission Continues, Chocolate Fantasy Ball Still On
If the first eight months are any indication, Sophie Laura Brown is going to be a handful for her parents, Brittany and Kagen Brown of Jonesboro. Just an infant, the little girl has already shown a stubborn, unyielding streak that is likely to be the cause of many long nights in the years to come.
It’s a trait the little tyke comes by naturally, passed down by parents who have shown similar mettle during these difficult first months of life. Over the past two-thirds of a year that the family has been away from home while Sophie receives treatment at Arkansas Children’s, strength and faith are all that hold the little family together some days.
Photos of the Brown family during their hospital and RMHC journey. (Courtesy)
“I hate to say it’s the worst time to have a child, during COVID, but it is literally the worst time to have a child,” Brittany Brown says. “It is so stressful; you have to pick and choose who comes and sees her, who doesn’t come and see her. Then you have to face, ‘Is it worth risking her health for somebody to come see her for an hour or two hours? Is it worth my daughter getting sick and potentially catching COVID, and honestly not making it if she does catch COVID?’”
Brown takes a long breath, and you hear the air squeeze past the hundredweight of having a seriously ill child. Talking about the challenges the couple has faced to meet work requirements and assuage the unrelenting worry over Sophie’s condition, Brown’s tone is soddened with exhaustion.
“I don’t wish it upon anybody,” she says.
Photos of the Brown family during their hospital and RMHC journey. (Courtesy)
Yet for as much as the family has been stretched and torn during their ordeal, Brown is quick to point out how much worse things could have been, had it not been for Ronald McDonald House Charities of Arkansas. The Little Rock nonprofit operates the Ronald McDonald House located right across the street from Arkansas Children’s and Ronald McDonald Family Room at UAMS, providing lodging and meals to families with sick children, as well as a Care Mobile bringing free pediatric dental service to communities statewide.
Brown doesn’t like to consider what her family’s life would be like if they didn’t have Ronald McDonald House to call home during Sophie’s treatments, but she’s not shy in saying it would be a much different reality.
Photos of the Brown family during their hospital and RMHC journey. (Courtesy)
“Honestly, if we couldn’t stay here at Ronald McDonald House, we wouldn’t be in Little Rock,” she says. “We both work; we are not upper class by any means, and we’re not poor by any means. But the fact that I don’t have to worry about paying rent or paying for a hotel every night or every week or every month makes it so much more comfortable and so much at ease.
“It’s a humbling experience to stay here; just from our experience it’s taken me aback to understand fully how generous people can be and how much people honestly struggle in the world today.”
Brown’s sentiments are echoed throughout the comfortable sleeping rooms and open, cheery dining areas of the Ronald McDonald House and Family Room by every family that stays here. And there are many — in 2020 alone, nearly 3,300 families spent more than 6,500 nights, fortified by more than 20,000 meals prepared and delivered to parents at their child’s hospital bedside. And that’s just a fraction of the services delivered in years uninterrupted by the pandemic.
All told, Ronald McDonald House saved 2020’s families more than three-quarters of $1 million dollars in lodging, toiletries, meals and laundry services, to say nothing of the inestimable value of moral and mental support.
Photo courtesy the Kennedy family.
Samantha Kennedy has been a resident at Ronald McDonald House since late summer, following a trip she and her boyfriend took from Florida to Northwest Arkansas to see his family. During the visit, she contracted such a severe case of COVID-19 she was intubated for a month and on a ventilator for 36 days, all while expecting baby Charlotte. Again, toughness runs in families.
“I was given a 10 percent chance of survival. She was given a zero percent chance of survival when I was intubated at 21 weeks,” Kennedy says. “She was born at 26 weeks, and she’s honestly a little miracle, 100 percent. All I hear is how feisty she is. ‘She’s a little diva, and she’s feisty.’ I said, ‘She needed that fight.’”
Photo courtesy the Kennedy family.
Ronald McDonald House has been invaluable in supporting the family’s journey, not only for the cost savings but for the moral support Kennedy has experienced from other families and the organization’s staff.
“Words can’t even express how grateful we are for what they do,” she says. “Providing us a safe place to stay while our daughter is in Children’s Hospital, the staff and volunteers are always so kind, and they really try and make it feel like a home away from home.
“The families here are people who make you feel like you’re not as alone. You can only understand what we’re going through so much, unless you’re going through it yourself with your own child. When we hear the success of another baby we’re like, ‘Yeah, it can happen. We’re going to be fine. If they can do it, we can do it.’
“Or if they were doing well and now there’s a step back, we can encourage each other to remember that there’s going to be setbacks, but there’s going to be three steps forward.”
Such endorsements define the purpose and mission of Ronald McDonald House better than anything else can. And it’s what keeps staff, volunteers and donors alike motivated to continue to support the House That Love Built, despite today’s very challenging times.
“The support our families gain from each other and from our staff is just priceless,” says Janell Mason, executive director. “One of the moms told me recently, and we hear this all the time, she said, ‘I can call my mother and talk about this. I get to call my girlfriends and talk about it, or my sister, but no one understands the ups and downs on the daily basis like the staff here and the other families here.’
“I think about that component a lot. You walk in from a full day at the hospital, and here is Wilma [Foster, guest relations manager] at the desk saying, ‘How’d it go? How is your baby?’ And they respond. Sometimes everything’s great. Then sometimes they need a shoulder to cry on.”
Mason serves a lot of functions around here, equal parts ringmaster, sorority mother and Tinkerbell, flitting from family to family, imparting her own special brand of magic. But the fundraising element puts an uncharacteristically weary note into her voice. It costs in the neighborhood of $100 a day to operate a single-family suite at Ronald McDonald House, a cost no family is required to pay, although freewill donations are accepted.
The pandemic has complicated the organization’s usual fundraising activities. And while Mason’s buoyed by the continued generosity from the community, money is a constant concern, especially as community needs mount, and the organization plots its long-range plans to meet them.
Still, the sight of one young mother’s smile or one toddler released from the ICU or one family checking out to go home sustains her and her troops. It’s all worth it, she says, as underneath the masks and past the 75 percent allowable capacity and beyond the many pivots the team has had to make, there’s still much magic to be absorbed.
“I ran across this quote recently, by Katharine Graham. It says, ‘To love what you do and feel that it matters, how could anything be more fun?’” Mason says. “You know, our fun comes in different ways, and we have to create it sometimes, but I’m just so honored to get to do this and help families, and know that whatever action I made that day could potentially make a difference. It’s been inspiring at a time when we all need to be inspired.”
Chocolate Fantasy Ball Set for Spring
One of the most anticipated social events of the year is back on Little Rock’s calendar. Chocolate Fantasy Ball, benefiting Ronald McDonald Charities of Arkansas, is set for Saturday, April 9 at the Statehouse Convention Center in downtown Little Rock.
“Everyone has heard of Chocolate Fantasy,” says Susie Morgan, past board member, longtime volunteer and repeat chairperson for the 2022 gala. “It’s a very fun, very elegant, well-organized event, and I think that’s what people like about it. It doesn’t drag. We get our point across, but it’s fun, and it’s a very entertaining ball, set in this beautiful room with great food and chocolate. That is a fantasy.”
Morgan says the response to this year’s event, has been very strong, even as the gala has had to be pushed from February to April out of an abundance of caution related to the ongoing pandemic. She says besides the uniqueness of the ball itself, the mission is what attracts people year after year. And 2022, Chocolate Fantasy’s 40th iteration, is no different.
“The need for what we do is expanding,” Morgan says. “The house has become a place for everybody from all the hospitals to use. It’s a much-needed resource. People understand what a great service our house provides. It’s just like a family. I mean, it’s a home. It’s not just a place to go.
“Our dream is to continue building upon what we have here to serve more families. That was true when we built Ronald McDonald House; it was true when we opened the Ronald McDonald Family Room at UAMS; and it’s truer than ever as we look to the future.”
For tickets and information about the 40th Chocolate Fantasy Ball, click here.
READ MORE: Family Reunion
