Meet the Bothma Family
You don’t know about Ronald McDonald House until you need it…
Larisa and Emil Bothma live on Gabriola Island and are a sailing, foraging, outside-every-day family. They raised their daughter Marita in forests and sea. Life was full. Life was good.
Then their son Arend was born and four months later, Emil watch Larisa and Arend be airlifted to BC Children’s Hospital in the middle of the night.
Arend was diagnosed with Chronic Granulomatous Disease (CGD) a rare immune deficiency so uncommon it affects approximately one in a million people. His body cannot fight bacterial or fungal infections. He cannot swim in lakes. He cannot touch soil. He was born to a family who lived outside and he is essentially allergic to the life they built.
The only known cure was a bone marrow transplant. They had no match. No family in BC. And they were a ferry ride from home. A social worker mentioned Ronald McDonald House to them and neither Larisa nor Emil knew what it was. Within days, it became their everything.
One child is in treatment. It takes the whole family to stay strong.
The Bothma family lived at Ronald McDonald House for nearly nine consecutive months during Arend’s treatment. Emil cooked every meal in the shared kitchen and walked it across to the hospital, three times a day, every day, for 63 days while Larisa stayed with Arend in isolation. Their daughter Marita, just three years old when they first arrived, found her place in the art therapy and the education program, she formed friendships with children who understood what it means when your life changes around you, she learnt how to ride a bike for the first time at the house. And Arend, too small, too sick, found the music room and in it, slowly, visit by visit, found himself.
On the day Arend was discharged, Larisa walked across the street and asked if she could stay just one more night. Just to sleep in a real bed. Just to breathe. “I walked in and immediately had this feeling of: I’m safe. And I actually wanted to be there more than home.” – Larisa Bothma
Arend’s first transplant has since failed. He will likely need another. His family is saving the cord blood from a new baby, recently born, hoping a sibling might be his match. The road ahead is long and uncertain.
But Ronald McDonald House will be there. Because it is always there.
“You don’t realize it could be you… until it is you“
– Larisa Bothma
Families like the Bothmas don’t have to face the unimaginable alone. Right now, your support can go even further.
Every gift will be matched by Cambridge Plumbing Systems Ltd. up to $20,000 until May 16.*
How Ronald McDonald House BC & Yukon made it possible for the Bothma Family
A home away from home🏡
The Bothmas are from Gabriola Island. When Arend was airlifted to BC Children’s Hospital, they had no family in BC, no nearby support, and no idea how they would stay close to their son. Ronald McDonald House is steps from the hospital, and those steps made everything possible. Emil could walk across the street every morning. Larisa could have her family nearby. They didn’t have to choose between being together and being there.
Three meals a day, cooked with love🍽️
Arend’s diet was severely restricted, and so was Larisa’s while she was breastfeeding. Being in the hospital, feeding the family three times a day would add up financially. The kitchen at Ronald McDonald House gave Emil the space, equipment, and convenience to cook every meal, breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and carry it across the street each day. It may seem small, but for this family, it was everything.
She's not the patient. But she's part of the story 🎨
When Marita arrived at Ronald McDonald House at just three years old, she had just started school. She stayed strong for her brother and Ronald McDonald House made sure she didn’t do it alone. The education program became her anchor, something that was entirely hers. The art therapy room was her creative space, her corner of normal inside an anything but normal year. And for Arend, it was the music room. He arrived too small and too sick to show much of anything yet. But the music therapist gave him a space with no rules, just drumsticks, sound and time.
“He healed in that music room. I genuinely think so. I don’t know if the facilitators realise how big a role they play — even in just the little moments.”
– Larisa Bothma
Families stay strong together. The House made that possible. 💛
Larisa says it simply, Emil is her person. She needs him. She needs Marita. And Marita needs them. When a child is critically ill, the instinct is to pour everything into that child, but the rest of the family is going through it too, in their own quiet ways. Ronald McDonald House meant the Bothma family didn’t have to face any of it apart. They could be under the same roof. They could eat together, sit together, fall apart together and hold each other up. That togetherness didn’t happen by accident. It happened because there was a place built to make it possible.
“Being together at Ronald McDonald House has really helped us push through this. I need Emil. He’s my person. And I couldn’t be away from my daughter either. You need your family there, because this affects us all.”
– Larisa Bothma
Your one-time or monthly gift provides the essentials families need during long medical stays: home-cooked meals, restful nights, and programs that bring moments of joy back into daily life.
*Cambridge Plumbing Systems Ltd. will match donations up to a total of $20,000.
All gifts will be matched from 12:00 a.m. PST on April 1 until 11:59 p.m. PST on May 16, 2026, or until the $20,000 matching total is reached.
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Help families stay strong together. Your gift fills each stay with comfort, care, and the warmth of home, because when a child is sick or injured, family stays.