COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KKTV) – ENT Credit Union will be matching donations made of $200,000, for their campaign ‘Catalyst for Children’, to raise money the month of May for mental health care and services for children in Colorado. The funds and donations people make will support the nonprofit, Children’s Hospital Colorado.
“Without that support, like we have to drive to Denver, or we’re like waiting months for care,” Ashley Reppart, whose son is a patient ambassador at the hospital, said. “And having those donations come in, really does support like our future with our kids.”
Ashley said her son, Parker, who’s in fourth grade, was dealing with frustrations and different anxious behaviors and she didn’t know where to turn to for help.
“It’s been a long journey like it took us three years to just be able to get some help for him,” Ashley Reppart said. “But then once we were able to get help, we were able to understand like his frustrations and like why he was behaving that way.”
Reppart said within Parker’s time there, parents were just as involved in the solution as Parker and the rest of the providers were.
“They really reassured us, ‘you’re doing all the right things, you’re just not speaking his language, right’?” Ashley Reppart said. “And so, we learned how to speak his ‘language’, and that helped just to have a better family because we weren’t concerned as much anymore. Like he was so happy.”
Parker also felt comfortable and in a safe place to talk to providers, who he said, gave him strategies on ‘how to not be so frustrated with things’.
“They really helped me get through some troubling times,” Parker Reppart said. “And it was just really helpful for my parents and me to know what was going on.”
Parker’s mother talked about the importance of mental health and encouraged children to talk to their parents, and for parents, to never stop advocating for help with their kids.
“I think a lot of times we think like a disability is just physical,” Ashley Reppart said. “But like for him, it was this mental and emotional struggle that he was going through every day, and so like recognizing that helped us and helped like him and helped his classmates.”
Ashley said through their journey of getting guidance and care with Children’s Hospital Colorado’s services, there’s been a lot more ‘harmony’ and ‘home’ with Parker, as they’re able to understand him and have that better relationship.
Click here to donate to ‘Catalyst for Children’ through Children’s Hospital Colorado’s patient ambassadors’ pages. Parker Reppart has one too.
For more resources for kids and mental health from IMatter in Colorado, click here. You can also call 1-844-493-TALK.
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