When her son was diagnosed with autism five years ago it proved to be a life-changing moment not only for Sarah Page, but for dozens of Auckland families in crisis.
"It made me realise how lucky my family is to be able to afford the best help for him," she says. "But I also thought it was not right many others facing tough times did not feel the same."
So, together with her husband Dave, Page began networking her family and friends to establish the Kindness Collective, a voluntary group specialising in going the extra mile to help make things just that bit easier for those in need.
The collective, which has grown to include around 120 people, fund-raises, donates food and supermarket vouchers, buys and delivers Christmas presents to well over 100 children and takes on special community projects to help improve the quality of life for many.
Most of the work is with a west Auckland women's refuge near Page's home in New Lynn. But she also helps refugees new to Auckland and works with Disability Connect to support families who have children with disabilities in crisis over shortages of food, clothing, furniture and money.
Page, who manages all this around her full-time job as a marketing manager for a hospitality company, has received an ASB Good as Gold award, the bank giving her $5,000 towards the Kindness Collective funds and $5,000 for her to take a holiday.
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"Sarah is an inspirational woman, devoting her time to help others," says ASB West Auckland regional manager Ngaire Angus. "We wanted to recognise all her work with the Kindness Collective and make sure she had some more funding to continue with this."
She was nominated for the award by a friend Monique Reid (also a collective volunteer) who says Page is the most generous and hard-working person she has ever met. Friends for about 10 years, Reid says: "She is just the most giving person and goes above and beyond for anyone who needs help."
Yet Page is humbled by the award: "What we do is not a big thing, we're not heroes and it feels weird to get an award just for being a good human. All I wanted to do was to inspire my friends to think about themselves less and more about others; to be honest it (the award) came as a big shock."
Page says everything changed for her when her son Max, now aged six, was diagnosed as autistic. Although he needs constant care at home and school, Page and her husband are in the fortunate position of being able to financially afford to get him the best therapy and to top up funding they receive for a full-time teacher aid.
"Max is the absolute joy of my life and is doing really well. He goes to a mainstream school and has gone from not being able to talk to being a real chatterbox.
"I realised how lucky we are so I got a bunch of people together - family and friends at first - who were happy to do things for people facing a rough deal in life or who don't have the resources to cope.
"Children in refuge centres often have very little in the way of belongings, or they may have had to flee quickly with their mum from a dangerous situation," she says. "They may be in shock or at least very unsettled and anxious so creating a calming environment will help them feel loved."
One of the other ways they are doing this is through a special project known as Operation Playground Makeover. Noticing the playground at the refuge was old and broken with peeling paint, rotting timber and much of its equipment unusable, Page set up a Givealittle page to help raise funds to renovate the area.
The project to create a new functional playground, plant vegetable gardens and fruit trees, provide picnic tables, sandpits and a trampoline is nearing completion - a trampoline has been donated and a BBQ provided - and is expected to be ready for use by summer.
"We wanted to create a fun playground and tranquil garden where kids can set their worries aside for a moment and just be kids and for their mums to have space to rest and watch their children happily play; a place to be a great start to the healing process."