This Christmas, and during the coronavirus pandemic, the main focus of these parents is to be with their child in the hospital where they have to stay for weeks, and months for treatment, or to stay in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) for premature babies.
Many of these families live more than 50 miles away from the hospital, and so the toll of commuting every day to be with their child, or the expense of staying in a hotel near the hospital adds to the load of the cross they have to carry for the love of their children.
This is where the Ronald McDonald House becomes a blessing to these families.
I first heard about this charity from my daughter Christine, when she gave birth to our first grandchild Azshara prematurely at 24 weeks and five days, instead of around 40 weeks in the womb. She and her husband Dave live in Missouri with no other family with them as a support system. Azshara stayed in the NICU of the hospital for 120 days.
Thankfully, there is a Ronald McDonald House within walking distance to the hospital where parents like them can stay so that they can always be there for their children during these most critical moments of their lives.
I got to talk to a family who is staying at Ronald McDonald’s House (RMDH) – Stanford in Palo Alto, California. Dad Trevor and Mom Auburn Vanrooyen recalled how RMDH has been blessing their life through all these challenges.
They found out about the Ronald McDonald House 15 years ago when their son Thayde was also born prematurely in Alaska. Their son Thayde had a heart problem when he was born prematurely and so they were sent to Portland, Oregon at Emmanuel Hospital. There they had a Ronald McDonald House and that was the first time that they had the experience of staying in what has become their home away from home.
Mom Auburn remembers their experience when they arrived in Portland. “It was an emergency situation. It was completely unexpected and I was actually out of state when he was brought here. I got here the very next day, and we were in the hospital for just a couple of days and we were just trying to make the best of it, but they were able to get us a room within three days of us getting here.”
“And it just makes you feel like I have, we have a place to go, we can both be here we can take to being with him so he’s never alone but then we have a place to go where we can just take a breath unwind let out our emotions, whatever we needed to do. And it was close and it was safe. It’s huge, really.”
“We knew if there was going to be an issue, either one of us or both of us would only be a moment or two away,” Dad Trevor said, reliving those difficult times. “We don’t have to worry about a one four hours away, five hours away at home. If something happens, that’s way too long that’s way too far, the peace of mind that being here is really, really indescribable.”
The Vanrooyen family now lives in Gridley, Northern California — a five-hour drive to Stanford where Thayde will be having open-heart surgery.
Mom said Thayde is homeschooled, and their 14-year old daughter attends online classes.
“And now that Thayde is on the mend, he can start doing a little bit more school as needed, but his teachers have assured me not to stress about it so having a room and quiet with no interruptions for, like, at the hospital. It’s been really good for them.”
I asked Trevor how a day is like for the family to stay at the RMDH. “With COVID it’s been different, working very hard to keep everyone safe. So they open specific times for us to come down and have meals majority of the time we’re in the room where it’s safe and then we’re comfortable.”
“But the pre-COVID, we had, we had open kitchens we had playrooms the kids were able to interact with each other family members could have gatherings, they’re really fabulous.
I can’t stress that enough we, as as the head in the family, taking care of everybody worrying about logistics, not having to stress about that.”
The RMDH also helps the Vanrooyen family get the moral support they need from families who come and visit. “We don’t have to worry about where to do that, how to do that, when to do that we just tell them to come and, or they just come and we’re able to host them have them have, feel the support and the love and it’s really, really a blessing. “
Thyde himself agrees. He says staying at the Ronald McDonald House is more comfortable than staying in the hospital because it feels like home. He just walks to the hospital for treatment.
The Ronald McDonald House Charity facts and figures:
• Currently, the Stanford House serves 48 families (133 individuals)
• From Jan 1-Dec 8, we have housed 827 families at Stanford (1,400 individuals), providing 18,200 nights of accommodations, which totals nearly $8.5M worth of housing, meal, and family services
• Thousands of families are being fed meals each day at Stanford, San Francisco and Oakland, prepared without the help of volunteers due to COVID visitor restrictions
• All non-critical procedures have been delayed due to the pandemic, so the families that we are serving now are the sickest of the sick in the Bay Area
Roger Cordoba oversees the operation at the Stanford House. “We’ve done everything within our power to maintain that extra support because even during this Covid time, you know, crazy times, we’re still having sick kids right, they still need to receive treatments.
So being able to support that ongoing with the challenges we have is our biggest mission right now,” he said.
Ronald McDonald House is a charity that depends on the help of people in the community. McDonald’s is one of the core sponsors of the RMDH, and it also serves free meals to the families every Friday. They also have jars in the restaurants where people can give donations to the Ronald McDonald House Charity.
How can we help? Cordoba said: “Donations go a long way with everything we’re trying to do in the operations. We have three different major services accommodations, the meal service which seems to be one of the biggest ones right now.”
“Obviously, we normally don’t have the funds to be feeding families three meals a day. So anything that comes our way helps us in every aspect of it, including the holiday, giving comfort and joy that we are currently running to make sure the families can have as much as normal Christmas as possible.”
If we have healthy children, we are far more blessed than these families. I hope we can join McDonalds and other donors in helping these families to be there for their sick children and premature babies as our act of gratitude for the cross we did not have to carry.
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
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The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Asian Journal, its management, editorial board and staff.
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Gel Santos Relos has been in news, talk, public service and educational broadcasting since 1989 with ABS-CBN and is now serving the Filipino audience using different platforms, including digital broadcasting, and print, and is working on a new public service program for the community. You may contact her through email at [email protected], or send her a message via Facebook at Facebook.com/Gel.Santos.Relos.
