Tiffany Arrowood is exhausted. She’d recently given birth a month early to her second child, Zackery. Little Zack, as Tiffany affectionately calls him, weighed only three pounds, 15 ounces when he was born, a side effect of Cornelia De Lange Syndrome, a genetic disorder. “Babies with this syndrome are born small no matter what,” explains Tiffany. “It doesn’t help that he was born premature. He’s also missing a bone in his arm.”

Tiffany and her husband, Matthew, are Western North Carolina natives and they live and work in Bostic. When Tiffany went into early labor, they traveled to Mission Hospital in Asheville.

It quickly became apparent once Zackery was born that he would require special care at the hospital. He needed to gain weight, so he would be on a feeding tube. Zackery would have to stay at Mission Hospital for at least three to four weeks depend- ing on how quickly he gained weight.

“I didn’t know what we were going to do,” says Tiffany. “I wanted to be with Zackery as much as possible but we couldn’t afford to stay in a hotel for too long. Then a social worker at the hospital told us about The Rathbun Center. The Center and the staff have been a lifesaver for my family.”

The Rathbun Center is the only hospital hospitality house in Western North Carolina. It is a haven for anguished families who are dealing with medical crises or serious illnesses. For 16 years, the Center has provided lodging and other supportive services at no charge to patients and/or their caregivers coming to Asheville for medical treatment.

“I’m at the hospital with Zack from 7:15 in the morning until 9:30 at night. I go back to The Rathbun Center at night and collapse,” says Tiffany. “It’s nice to have somewhere to stay that’s only minutes away from the hospital. Sometimes I’m the only person who can calm Zack down. I can sleep at night knowing he’s close by.”

The Rathbun Center is expanding in order to make room for more families like Tiffany’s, as well as others who need the services of the hospital hospitality house while a loved one is receiving medical treatments in the Asheville area. The expansion will include an addition of six guest rooms to create a ten-room children’s wing, a laundry room, large storage area, common area/playroom, and a new roof for the entire home.

For more information on The Rathbun Center, visit rathbuncenter.org.