The first time April and Conrad Bentley walked through the doors of Ronald McDonald House Missoula, they were overwhelmed new parents with a premature baby in the NICU.
They couldn’t have known then how many times they would return, or how much Ronald McDonald House would come to mean to their family.
Over the years, the Bentley family stayed at Ronald McDonald House four times as April and Conrad navigated premature births, NICU stays and pregnancy loss.
Their first stay came after their daughter Charlee was born at 34 weeks and spent 16 days in the NICU. With their home in Helena, nearly two hours away, Ronald McDonald House gave April and Conrad a place to stay close to their daughter.
“I still remember sitting down in that quiet room and realizing we finally had a moment to unpack not only our bags, but also our emotions,” April said.
Each evening, they returned from the hospital to a warm meal and people who genuinely cared about how they were doing. They celebrated Christmas Eve at Ronald McDonald House with other families. And on Christmas morning, they got the gift they’d been waiting for: they were able to take Charlee home.
But the years that followed would bring the Bentley family back through those doors under very different circumstances.
When their daughter Faith was born much too soon, April and Conrad faced an unimaginable loss.
This time, the place that had once supported them through Charlee’s NICU stay gave them somewhere to grieve.
“I was met with the same compassionate smiles, the same comforting hugs, and the same feeling of safety and love,” April said. “There is nowhere I would have rather been.”
No one expected them to be okay or to have the right words.
“We were simply given a place to grieve, to heal and to be loved,” April said.
After more heartbreak and another pregnancy loss, April and Conrad eventually learned they were expecting again.
By the time their son Emmett was born, Charlee had a younger brother, Colton, and Ronald McDonald House had become a familiar place for the whole family.
When Emmett needed time in the NICU, Ronald McDonald House was there for the Bentley family once again. April and Conrad had a place nearby while he grew stronger, and Charlee and Colton were eager to visit the playroom and the people they remembered.
Returning to Ronald McDonald House felt very different from that first overwhelming stay.
“I wasn’t checking into a building,” April said. “I was coming home. Ronald McDonald House no longer felt like a place. It felt like family.”
And April wasn’t the only one who felt that way.
When she asked Colton where he wanted to celebrate his fifth birthday, he answered without hesitation: “The Ronald McDonald House!”
That year, Colton had to settle for a birthday party at a park near their home in Helena, something April says was “a bit of a disappointment.”
Today, the Bentley home is filled with what April calls the “beautiful chaos” of raising Charlee, Colton and Emmett. Faith remains an important part of their family, too, and they continue to celebrate and honor her life.
Looking back, April sees Ronald McDonald House woven through some of the hardest and happiest chapters of their family story.
“The people there didn’t just care for our family,” she said. “They cried with us, grieved with us, celebrated with us, and reminded us we never had to carry our story alone.”
