There are success stories and then there are stories about successes that lead up to more and more success stories. There's a business and a non-profit that are working together, with a team of some extraordinary people all focused on fixing some of the hardships and wrongs that are faced by the young people in our society.
It all has to do with Infinite Resources, the Plugged In Community Centre Organization and a special event called Beautiful Me.
The first, Infinite Resources, is a business for special needs children. Owned by Sheila Chisholm, it works to provide special programming and other services for kids who might not otherwise have access to them.
She describes it as a community-oriented business that "creates social inclusion and opportunities for families and children to experience themselves as whole and perfect, nothing broken or anything to be fixed."
People like Terrie Schock are effusive with praise for Chisholm and her business. Her six-year-old son has been diagnosed with Tourette's Syndrome and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, along with other issues, and so kindergarten has been a fair bit of a challenge, even though he has aides to help him through his days.
She explained that her son just couldn't get into art in school, a situation that prompted her to start taking him to Infinite Resources for a few different programs, including one to get him interested in expressing himself creatively.
Now he paints so much that he paints on her walls, something that was otherwise unheard of. She said that he also gets along better with other kids and is better able to describe and discuss his feelings.
"He loves it that much! She has changed him. She's got him to do fingerpainting with pudding. The kid would not touch things like that, and now he is," Schock exclaimed.
She noticed a positive difference in him even on the first day, and she's grateful for all of Chisholm and her team's good work.
"I don't have enough praise for that woman. It's unbelievable the things that have been accomplished in such a short time. I never thought that my child would fit in anywhere," she continued.
"It's unbelievable. I think everybody should know about what she does and the help that she gives. You've heard of the Dog Whisperer. She's the Baby Whisperer. This woman is fantastic! I want her to move in with us. She's awesome!"
Teen boosting
Infinite Resources doesn't just work to help children. It has programs like Quirky Teen for older kids who don't quite fit in.
But sometimes that's not enough. Low self-esteem can be a tricky monster to tame. Society's strange and unfair concepts of beauty can make being a teenaged girl pretty tough to take.
That's why Chisholm started Beautiful Me, a once-a-year chance for a select group of approximately 25 teens who could really use the boost. With the help of fashion experts and a professional photographer, these teens are showed the true meaning of how beauty is in the eye of the beholder: when the beholder's perception changes, beauty changes.
"Beautiful Me is all about not being comfortable in your own skin and really discovering it's not about what you have going on the outside, it's who you are inside that people are drawn to and attracted to," Chisholm said. "You could be the most beautiful person in the world but if you have an ugly heart then that's what shows up for everybody."
The team works to make an impact on the participants by focusing on improving how they feel about themselves. They don't ignore the realities of who the person is but do guide them to discovering the positive qualities that lie within each and every one of them.
This free event is now in its fourth outing this weekend but is seeing the Plugged In Community Centre Organization, or PICCO, involved for the first time.
Trisha Pasnak is the fashion co-ordinator for the event, now in its fourth year. She had it rough as a teen herself, but she had really good supports with her family at home. She's just trying to do the same thing for today's teens who might not have it so good.
"I've struggled with my weight my whole life. I was bullied and teased," she began.
"But I had a safe place to come home to and I don't know if everybody has got that. Sometimes your parents saying that you're beautiful doesn't feel the same as having other people in your life say 'you're beautiful and not just because of what you look like.' "
Chisholm admits that some people balk at the notion of preaching inner beauty and giving makeovers at the same time.
"If you're the kind of person who can't even look at yourself because everything you see is wrong, then you'll never get to what's inside. We wanted to give them a day where they could look at themselves and look at their flaws."
Pasnak agrees. She sees a lot of the professional advice and treatments simply as ways of caring for yourself.
"If you ask any woman, putting on the right dress can sometimes change your outlook on everything. Or getting a new haircut. It shouldn't be about an outward appearance but at the same time, it's what you look at every day. Improving your outside can sometimes make you feel better on the inside."
"I think it's very powerful for some of the girls, especially some of the ones who struggle with finding themselves. I personally changed my look a million times. I always felt like I was a kind of ugly duckling, that I was never able to find the swan in my teen years."
She said that it's a beautiful experience to help pick these girls up and see them become their own swans.
"I feel like it's a gift to be involved."
Space crunching
The cruel irony is that Infinite Resources doesn't actually have infinite resources. It's a business without its own building, operating out of Dynamyx Gymnastics Club in Campbell Park.
That's where PICCO comes in. Chisholm is the president of that organization too. Getting 'plugged in' means facilitating the meeting point between families like Schock's with organizations like Infinite Resources.
"It means getting plugged in to your community, finding out what's there for you," she said.
"The families that I work with sometimes don't feel like they can just go into the community or they don't have the same access. It means getting plugged in to the experts, getting plugged in to the events … just getting plugged in and not feeling like you're always on the outside."
But Infinite Resources has already reached its tipping point. Hundreds of families have accessed its programs within Dynamyx, and hundreds more are waiting in the wings. There's only so much that Chisholm can do, and it seems like increasing the costs is the only way she can ensure the quality of those increasingly over-extended programs.
Of course, it also means that some families will have to look elsewhere because of finances.
"That's absolutely a possibility," suggested Kristi Rouse, PICCO's treasurer.
PICCO is hoping to go where Chisholm's business can't: find affordable space to serve the community within the community. One of the non-profit's mandates is accessibility: opening the doors to everyone regardless of ability, of age, and especially of finances.
St. Albert is notorious as a city where pockets must be deep in order to scratch out a piece of land and put up any kind of structure. PICCO, as a non-profit, would own the place and Infinite Resources would rent space from it, potentially with other like-minded groups. Such a facility would encompass a gym, a studio for music and art, yoga and sensory spaces, classrooms, meeting rooms and other uses.
Rouse said that PICCO is in the final stages of its charitable status, something it hopes will be a fait accompli within the next few weeks.
"I think that will open a whole lot of doors in terms of fundraising."
Afterward, the doors will open wide to offering tax receipts to encouraging donations, and applying for grants will – fingers crossed – mean that its search will be made so much easier to find funding for a home to call its own.
It has a Raise Our Roof campaign to help kickstart its bank account to fuel the dream. Chisholm suggested that it's entirely feasible that temporary space could be rented within the year, while the organization works on a five-year plan to create a permanent home.
Rouse knows that PICCO has the support of those hundreds of families from Infinite Resources, and she hopes that the community at large can get behind them too.
"We need all the help that we can get."
