United Way helps single mother find success

By Mary Pat Murphy

United Way

Since the day she was born, Karstin Ray has benefited from United Way agencies, and now, with her newly earned teaching degree in hand, she's giving back to the society that nurtured her through the years.

Ray was adopted as an infant through Lutheran Social Services, a United Way member agency in another community, and has been helped along the way by a variety of other support networks associated with the United Way.

"The United Way has been so great to us," she said. "I can't thank them enough for what they've done."

Ray and her two daughters, now 11 and 14, once fled an abusive home situation in the middle of the night and moved from Oregon to Kalispell, where she found support in starting a new life.

"We packed up and left everything in the blink of an eye," she said.

She looked through the Answer Book, a comprehensive listing of local services produced annually by the United Way, to gather information about the help available in her new community,

"I was looking for any kind of help I could get my hands on to get on my feet again," she said.

That Thanksgiving, she witnessed the violent death of her fiance and later suffered from post-traumatic stress syndrome. She turned to the Mental Health Crisis Line for help and found a lifeline.

"Many communities in Montana do not have a crisis line," she said. "We're so lucky to have that and that's a resource I've used many times."

The Mental Health Crisis Line, which provides crisis intervention by responding 24 hours a day to mental health crises, is just one of 26 agencies and services that benefit from United Way dollars.

For the past two years, Ray has been a patient advocate and has spoken on behalf of the Mental Health Crisis Line to citizen review panels that consider funding levels for United Way agencies.

"The whole point of those programs is to stand on your own two feet - and we did it," she said. "That's what the United Way is about: finding resources and putting them together."

She found satisfaction in working through the Americorps program at Flathead Valley Community College on the Montana 211 Project, a statewide online resource that helps connect people in need with the services that can help them, and was placed at the United Way as an Americorps worker while she completed her degree through the University of Great Falls.

"That has been a huge help because it's given me an opportunity to give back and help people," she said.

Ray has volunteered in a number of capacities, and has instilled the importance of volunteerism in her two daughters.

"They know they have something to offer to the community even at their age," she said.

After graduating from college in May, Ray was hired to teach in Valier, and she looks forward to instilling in her students the value of volunteerism she has learned through the United Way.

"Helping them understand that they have something to offer is huge," she said. "I'm going to be working to create some of those volunteer opportunities, so that they become participating members of their communities, not just taking members."

Ray is grateful for all the help she and her family have received, and looks forward to helping others succeed.

"Now we can stand on our own two feet. We don't need to rely on public assistance, United Way or anything else - and that feels really good," she said. "Now the girls and I are moving on. We're able to buy a house, have our own car and have a life again."

The theme of this year's United Way fundraising campaign is "Give. Advocate. Volunteer. Live United" and the goal is $1 million. Last year, United Way member agencies helped nearly 57,000 people in need. Ninety-nine percent of all funds raised stay in local communities to help local citizens.

Donors may choose how to donate, including cash, payroll deductions, charging to a credit card, direct billing or through an automatic bank transfer. Donors also may designate which member agencies or non-affiliated partner agencies or the Montana Shares Federation they want to receive their gift.

For more information on the United Way campaign, call 752-7266.