Big Sister Paula and Little Sister Mackenzie
Big Sister Paula still remembers meeting Little Sister Mackenzie nearly six years ago. “Mackenzie was so shy, she hardly made a peep!” Paula says. “But I could tell from the gleam in her eyes, she was excited about the match.”
Mackenzie had been waiting to be matched with a Big Sister for about a year, but the timing couldn’t have been more perfect for her to finally meet her Big. That initial match meeting fell on Mackenzie’s birthday and it was the first of many big moments the two would share together.
“Though we may not be blood relatives, I am proud to say I still have family here: I have a little sister.”
– Big Sister Paula
Four years after that first meeting, Mackenzie attended Paula’s wedding. A year after that, Mackenzie met Paula’s infant son. Paula watched Mackenzie graduate from 8th grade and was there to see Mackenzie graduate from high school.
“She’s been there for the big moments and the small ones,” Paula says.
The smaller moments have included shopping, getting pedicures, going out to eat, baking chocolate cake, cooking chili, and volunteering in the community.
Mackenzie’s mother says that volunteering with Paula has nurtured Mackenzie’s love for helping others and encouraged her to study nursing in college.
“When we meet, she is always interested in what I have been up to in my schoolwork, the latest trends, and any new friends in my life,” Mackenzie says. “She’s all-around a great person.”
Through it all, the two have grown together.
“I have watched her grow from a quiet, shy pre-teen to a much more talkative, focused young woman,” Paula says about Mackenzie.
“It has been an amazing experience to get to know someone and see them change over the years,” Mackenzie says about Paula.
Mackenzie mom feels like the match couldn’t be better even if she had selected the Big herself. “This is more than just a match,” she says. “They will forever be intertwined in each other’s lives.”
Paula and Mackenzie couldn’t agree more. Mackenzie recently started college, but she says her relationship with Paula will continue in the future, through big moments and small.
