Kate Root, senior vice president and managing director of Chesapeake Bank’s Payment Systems, was in for a surprise when she moved into an eighteenth-century farmhouse in Coatesville, writes Williamsburg Yorktown Daily.
It did not take long for Root’s five-year-old son Billy to start hearing a young voice calling him to play. Then one night, Billy caught a glimpse in a mirror of a little boy dressed in a Civil War outfit.
However, her attention soon switched to her daughter, who had been diagnosed with aggressive brain cancer and given only ten days to live when Bethany was just twenty-four-years old.
After emergency surgery and chemotherapy, Bethany started to recover, beating the slim odds. Now she is celebrating ten years cancer free.
Her illness still haunts Root, not only because she had nearly lost her child, but because Bethany had aged out of all the emotional and family support provided to children with a critical illnesses.
That’s why she has looking for an organization that she could work with to bridge the gap in young adult support, deciding finally on St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
“It’s a good fit,” said Root. “You never feel you can give back enough.”
Read more about the banker at Williamsburg Yorktown Daily here.
