On what would have been Sadie’s sixth birthday, Sadie’s Race raised $20,000 for Smile Train, a nonprofit organization that provides surgery for children born with facial abnormalities. Photo by Reza Marvashti.
Sara loved Mary Washington the second she saw it in Peterson’s Complete Guide to Colleges. When her parents took her to visit another school, she refused to get out of the car.
At Mary Washington, “everybody was supportive and wanted you to do great things,” Sara said.
She learned writing skills from Jack Kramer, professor of political science and international affairs, and remembers the encouragement of Joe DiBella, professor of art and art history.
Sara studied political science and studio art. But roommate Heather Paige ’92 was a psychology major with a therapist mother, and that planted a seed. Sara earned a master’s degree in counseling psychology from Marymount University and a post-master’s certificate in marriage and family therapy from Virginia Tech. She now counsels couples and families in her Middleburg practice.
When she lost Sadie, Sara knew she’d be crushed by the weight of her grief if she didn’t take on something big – something life-affirming.
“Brain injuries are awful,” Sara said, “but it’s not the direction I wanted to take.”
She thought of the children Sadie wanted to help and of Smile Train, which makes surgery for a cleft lip or palate possible with a donation as low as $250. To reach her target, Sara must raise $478,250.
“It’s a bold goal,” she wrote on the Sadie’s Smile Foundation website, but “Sadie lived with a bold heart.”
Sara raised nearly $60,000 in eight months – a third from Sadie’s Race, the May 5K she held in Purcellville. She plans to hold the race, along with a golf tournament, annually.
She’s also training for a triathlon, building a butterfly garden in memory of Sadie, and “trying to figure out what the heck I’m doing here.”
“Her training is about strategizing and coping,” said Paige, Sara’s Mary Washington roommate, who’s now a psychologist. “Sara’s choosing a path that works for her.”
What she isn’t choosing is to give up.
“I won’t say goodbye…” she wrote in a letter to Sadie. “I’ll just wait and work longingly until the day I get to see you again…nose kiss, butterfly kiss, lizard kiss.
“Mommy.”