Testimonials

You would think that something that means a lot to you, something that you think about all the time, that you are grateful and happy to be a part of, that affects your family each and every day, would be easy to talk about. But it’s a funny thing how words fail us sometimes when we need them the most. Explaining the importance and value of the Bellcate school is like that for me.

As a family we have been associated with the school for seven years because two of our children have attended (Jesse graduated in 2015 and Aiden is now in 9th grade). But seven years worth of adventures with two very unique and special children just can’t be summed up in a few words.

Our family is formed through adoption and all four of our children experienced significant trauma before they came into our care. Trauma that not only exacerbates their disabilities but has changed their brain function and will stay with them forever. To help them cope with this, we teach our kids to think of their lives like a tapestry and that each and every thing that happens to them – the good and the bad, the happy and the sad – gets woven in to that cloth that ultimately represents who they are. Everyone’s tapestry is different; all manner of shapes, sizes, colors, and patterns mixing together into a beautiful and completely unique mosaic. It’s nothing that anyone can see, but you carry it with you in your mind and heart and can visualize it in times of stress or worry, thinking back on not only what has been but ahead to what is yet to come. You weave it as you go and it grows with every person that you meet and every experience that you have.

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor said, “We don’t accomplish anything in this world alone…and whatever happens is the result of the whole tapestry of one’s life and all the weavings of individual threads from one to another that creates something.”

Well, I will be forever grateful for the maroon and gold threads that connect my family to the Bellcate school and their remarkable teachers. It is a joy to watch my children change and grow into the happy, healthy adults that I know they can be.