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In case you missed it, here are some of the top stories of the weekend:
Two years ago, Jerri Clark and her son, Calvin, found themselves in the midst of one of the worst times of their lives.
Calvin, then 21, jumped off the Interstate 5 Bridge into the Columbia River while experiencing a mental health crisis — miraculously, he survived.
He was previously diagnosed with bipolar I disorder. Before he jumped, he had been incarcerated for months at the Clark County Jail for a bench warrant and received treatment at Western State Hospital, an inpatient psychiatric facility in Lakewood.
He was once an honor student and member of the debate team at Mountain View High School. He graduated with a college scholarship and toyed with the idea of studying law. But his bright future took a sharp turn during his freshman year in college.
Calvin left college after suffering symptoms of a suspected mental illness. His life since then has been characterized as a roller-coaster ride of hospital stays, mental health clinic visits and run-ins with the criminal justice system.
The Clarks’ story is just one of many for Washington families struggling to find proper and timely care for their mentally ill loved ones. When those challenges are coupled with big bureaucracy and a family member who’s unable or unwilling to help themselves, the situation can feel hopeless.
Read the full story: Clark County mothers fight for mentally ill children
Ben Jacobsen started making salt in 2011, and it didn’t take long for the former Vancouver resident to land on some important radars.
The New York Times wrote a story about him in 2012. Noted chefs started to use his salt from Oregon waters. And a Williams-Sonoma Inc. partnership sent his business on a fast, ascending trajectory that hasn’t slowed.
Jacobsen, 43, no longer participates in making the white, flaky crystals. And long gone are the days when he’d drive a seawater-loaded truck from the Oregon Coast to Portland for processing into salt. These days, the Hudson’s Bay High School graduate’s focus is marketing, sales, and product development.
For the future, he plans for more of the same, convinced he’s got the world’s best job.
Read the full story: Jacobsen CEO worth his salt
A framed cross-stitch pattern faces the living room inside the Ridgefield home of Haris and Cristina Hadziselimovic. Created by their sister-in-law Cait Ceccacci, it reads a phrase that characterizes the couple’s journey toward parenthood: The greater the storm, the brighter the rainbow.
For eight years, their storm of unexplained infertility meant struggles and frustrations, disappointments and emotional tolls for the Vancouver natives who first met in college.
Their rainbow couldn’t be more clear or the pot of gold at the end more rewarding. That’s their daughter, Avyn James, born via gestational surrogacy one month ago.
Technically, Alicia Green is a wife, aunt, sister, mother of four and a gestational carrier. But Green, Columbia River High School’s head gymnastics coach and a local CT and MRI technologist, is more than that.
A better-fitting description of a role she played is a lead character of an inspiring story conceived in sisterly love. She became an aunt for the third time when she gave birth to her niece Dec. 27 by scheduled Cesarean section.
Read the full story: Sister surrogate: Columbia River coach helps provide gift of parenthood
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