By Colleen Marshall
Managing Editor
Nearly 50 years ago, Cheryl Carrier was born at Maine Medical Center and spent her first 18 hours fighting for life. Doctors determined it was a case of severe jaundice and following a complete blood transfusion, Carrier recovered from her critical state.
“Luckily, I had something that could be fixed,” the Scarborough resident says. “But I always listened to my parents’ talking about the fear of having a critically ill baby when I was younger.”
Those conversations coupled with her own more recent experiences of having friends and employees who have had babies born prematurely was the reason behind Carrier’s decision to team up with the Maine Chapter of the March of Dimes Foundation five years ago.
Since that time, the owner and founder of the Toddle Inn Child Care Centers and her staff have participated in annual sponsorship and fundraising events, helping to raise more than $17,000 to help the organization’s mission of improving the health of babies by preventing birth defects, premature birth and infant mortality.
And, on Monday night, Carrier was honored for her “tireless efforts” at the seventh annual Greater Portland Signature Chefs Auction event at the Sheraton in South Portland.
Hours before the ceremony, Carrier sits at the end of the conference table at her Toddle Inn administrative office surrounded by enlarged photographs of families in the Maine Medical Center’s neonatal intensive care unit. Carrier says she took a tour of the facility on Oct. 4 to get a first-hand look at the families and infants the March of Dimes helps.
“It was like…wow,” Carrier says, as she runs her finger along the edge of the photograph of Winslow resident Andy Lambert, cradling his day-old son Bretton. “I just couldn’t believe how tiny they are. I was just shocked.”
Carrier continues to lay out items on the table in front of her – a blue knitted hat and booties, both that fit in the palm of her hand, a diaper a few inches in length, a zip-up pink onesie that when folded nearly disappears. All of the items soon will be hung on a tri-fold display, created by Carrier’s daughter, to be exhibited at the night’s fundraising event.
She says she hopes people looking at the display see what she sees – her own philosophy, one she uses when dealing with her childcare center business – the importance of providing babies with a healthy start.
When her children were born, Carrier says she quit her job at BankNorth to become a stay-at-home mom. Soon after her neighbors began leaving their children with her and in 1985, she opened the first Toddle Inn center in her home. As the need for childcare in the area continued to grow, so did Carrier’s business. In 1991, she relocated the center to Scarborough and in the years that followed, new sites opened, including those in Cumberland, South Portland and Saco.
“The most satisfying thing is seeing kids happy,” she says. “And then seeing their parents happy – that’s a huge thing.”
Three years ago, Carrier started the franchising process and now has a total of seven centers up and running with another 10 in the works. Carrier says Toddle Inn employs 150 staff members and 1,400 children attend the centers.
Their lives are often intertwined, Carrier says, as everyone associated with Toddle Inn feels the pain and struggles of family members dealing with a sick child. There are the celebrations when the children pull through – like the one staff member whose set of twins are now 7 years old, and healthy, after a difficult entrance into the world. And there is pain – like the recent death of another staff member’s baby, who died after a few week stay in the neonatal intensive care unit.
“When we look at the numbers, 10 to 15 percent of our families have had to deal with these situations,” Carrier says. “These babies start out so helpless. All babies start out that way, but especially with sick babies, they deserve every bit of help they can get. The community needs to pull together to help – it really does take a village to raise a child.”
Carrier says the Toddle Inn family will continue to support the March of Dimes at their annual walk-a-thons, as well as other various non-profit organizations that support the health and well-being of children.
“I’ve been determined and a fighter for all of my life and now I get to give these little guys a fighting chance,” she says.
Carrier recalls when she was born, her father, uncle and a neighbor all donated blood to replace the units doctors used in her transfusion.
“That’s what happened in those days,” she says. “And, maybe that’s what they should do now. It’s just common sense to help.”