About Us
Meet our family: Justin, Stephanie, Bernadette, and Isabella.
We are a close-knit family who cherishes our time together and is deeply committed to supporting one another. Bernadette, with her infectious smile and loving nature, has inspired us to create a nurturing environment that meets her unique needs. With the love and support of her sister, Isabella, we embrace every moment, celebrating Bernadette’s milestones and advocating for others with special needs. Together, we have founded Bernie’s Happy Home, a community built on compassion and inclusion, where individuals like Bernadette can thrive and build meaningful connections.
Bernadette was born September 2017. Our first indication that Bernie was special was when she was born, she had wide thumbs (turns out this is a distinct feature of Rubinstein Taybi Syndrome.) At 2 months old Bernie was put on an angel flight to The Childrens’ Hospital of Colorado due to low oxygen saturation. Doctors performed many tests on Bernie and after about a week they still could not figure out why she could not keep good oxygen saturation. Bernie was diagnosed with intermittent breathing. While in Denver, the genetics department ran Bernie’s blood to check for different genetic disorders, one of which was Rubinstein Taybi Syndrome. After 6 weeks of waiting to hear back on the genetic testing we got 2 separate phone calls. The first call we were told that Bernie did not have any of the disorders that they were checking. The second came the next day, stating that she has Rubinstein Taybi Syndrome with a partial deletion of one of her chromosomes (not a complete deletion.) We went back to Children's Hospital of Colorado to talk to the geneticist about what Rubinstein Taybi Syndrome was and what it meant for Bernadette.
Since then, Bernadette has continued to push to be the best she can be. Bernadette is someone that walks in the room and makes everyone smile. She is always waving, smiling and giggling; which is infectious to everyone around her. She continues to impress us and challenges do not limit her with preconceived expectations.
Justin and Stephanie Brown married August 7, 2009. Justin got a job with Sysco foods, and Stephanie got a job with the Natrona county school district which moved us to Casper Wyoming. In 2017, Bernadette was born after 5 years of struggling with infertility. We were thrilled to finally be able to have a child. In 2019, our family moved back to Billings Montana. In 2020 we added Isabella to our family. Stephanie is a state home mom helping with therapies for Bernadette and getting the kids to and from their activities. Bernadette has started school and loves going to class. She loves music, dancing, reading books, and doing anything with water. Isabella likes being “fancy”, princesses, reading books and playing board games. Isabella has patience and compassion that far exceeds children her age because of the interactions with her older sister, Bernadette. Stephanie and Justin have always wanted to push their daughters to have a fulfilled life and exceed all expectations. We have realized that we want our daughter Bernadette to be able to live on her own, but know she will have limitations. In talking to families that have children with special needs, we have realized this is something that is needed. That was a huge motivator for Justin and Stephanie to start up Bernie's happy homes. Our goal is to give her independence while still staying very involved in her life. We hope to be able to give other families this exact same dream.
