Mom survived COVID depression in this Marshall County park. Now reviving it as manager.

“Potawatomi saved me,” Lacey Pfeiffer says, three weeks after she became manager of Potawatomi Wildlife Park near Bourbon, a mother who’s survived COVID and massive depression — now on a mission to get kiddos into nature.

After all, she’d come to the nonprofit park’s five miles of dirt and grass trails, lake, wetland and wooded banks of the Tippecanoe River to heal.

In November 2020, while 32 weeks pregnant, she found herself on a ventilator in an Indianapolis hospital. COVID-19 had struck. And after her daughter, Lux, was born there by C-section, the realities of COVID separation meant that she wouldn’t see Lux until she was two weeks old.

“We both almost died,” Pfeiffer says.

Add to that the hallucinations of torture and abuse, plus nine months of nightmares that all evolved from the medical trauma. She didn’t want to live.

But here, she attests, “Potawatomi is a place of peace for me.”

She was reborn through therapy and nature in this park. At her lowest point, she retreated to the woods and called her therapist, as she relates: "I prayed God would find me. As the tears flowed and I placed my feet in ice cold water, I found a peace I did not understand. When I say this place holds a special place in my heart, I truly mean it. … My life has taken a complete 180.”

Now she is seeking renewal for the 317-acre park, too. A lifelong resident of this small town, Bourbon, in Marshall County, she wants people to know that Potawatomi is an easy entry for families who feel “intimidated” by the idea of getting their children into nature.

Pfeiffer and her husband, Kevin, know this feeling. They have a 5-year-old son, Kruz, who’s unleashed his energy here. She says parents are daunted by the idea of an hour-long hike when they worry that their kids — a generation with too much technology and short attention spans — may have a “meltdown” after five minutes.

So, with Father’s Day this Sunday, she’s starting monthly events to help families learn and “jumpstart” their nature quests.

From 6 to 9 p.m. June 19, join leisurely guided hikes or tractor-drawn wagon rides on the trails, or try catch-and-release fishing with guidance from Boy Scouts and with gear and supplies that you can borrow. It’ll be free and will include hot dogs, chips, S’mores and live bluegrass music from the Blue Holler Band.

Next up will be a free overnight campout July 15-16. Just bring your tent; meals will be provided. On Aug. 5, an end-of-summer bash will boast hot dogs, S’mores, games and a trail scavenger hunt. The park’s annual pancake breakfast and fishing derby returns Sept. 15.

Pfeiffer comes with ideas because her family has plugged into 1,000 Hours Outside, a movement that a mother in southeast Michigan started to help families battle screen time. Parents share tips and tactics for the ultimate challenge: Get kids outside for 1,000 hours in a year.

What the public wants

But, at this point, Pfeiffer also wants to hear what the public needs in the park. As the only employee, she calls on anyone to bring ideas of how they’d like to volunteer. Eleven have signed up. One of them is a yoga instructor who plans to lead monthly outdoor yoga sessions.

Warsaw Astronomical Society volunteers hope to revive stargazing this fall in this state-recognized dark sky preserve. There’s a section of the park with concrete pads and electrical hookups for telescopes — a legacy of the late park manager Mike Stephan, who once was the club's vice president.

Horseback riding isn’t normally allowed, but trail rides could be a quarterly event through a local group.

There are canoes, kayaks and lifejackets to rent on the Tippecanoe River. If possible, Pfeiffer would like to add a drop-off and pickup service to boost their use.

This year, an addition will be built to the park’s nature center, thanks to donations to Stephan’s memorial fund. Additional fundraising, she says, would upgrade the interior to add hands-on kids’ activities to the existing taxidermy displays, birdwatching info, arrowheads and Native history.

2020 fundraising for the park: Many October adventures for turning greens into autumn gold

For now, Pfeiffer, who brings a background in tourism and event planning, says she spends 80% of her time mowing and reopening trails. It is catch-up time.

Stephan had served as the on-site park manager for almost 29 years. After he died from cancer two years ago, his wife, Sharon, carried on that role until she also succumbed to her much longer, 15-year battle with cancer on Feb. 14 this year.

Pfeiffer’s journey into depression forced her to re-evaluate how she spends her time. She was commuting almost an hour to her job in enrollment operations at Goshen College. It meant racing back home to grab her kids for family time Tuesdays and Thursdays in Potawatomi before sunset. Then, she thought of these healing wilds, “Why don’t I make this my living?”

Potawatomi Wildlife Park

Free admission. Donations accepted. Open sunrise to sunset. Dogs allowed on leash. Biking permitted on walking trails (suitable for mountain bikes on mostly flat trails). Fishing and camping only permitted at designated events. For volunteer ideas and to help, find a link here in this column online. The park is at 16998 Indiana 331, a half mile south of Indiana 10. Call 574-498-6550 or visit getintonature.com (expect a new website to go live in July).

Also in Marshall County

• New Bremen launch on Yellow River: The town of Bremen has installed a new canoe/kayak launch on the Yellow River that, technically, opens up paddling for 14 miles down to Centennial Park in Plymouth.

But the reality is that it’s only good for a 7-mile paddle from Bremen because, after the midway point, there are big logjams that require portaging over steep, muddy banks, Bremen Parks Superintendent Brian Main says. And before the midway point, you’ll have to climb over a log — not too difficult, according to one paddler, but you’ll have to get out of the boat and get your feet wet.

The new launch was completed this spring at Shumaker Westside Park, on Plymouth Street (Indiana 106) at the west end of Bremen. It’s really just a byproduct of a 40-year project to stabilize this and many riverbanks that have suffered from “relentless erosion” from river straightening, according to Scott Pelath, director of the Kankakee River Basin and Yellow River Basin Development Commission.

Paddling advocate Margaret Easton says part of the route is indeed channelized with high banks while the rest is “lovely” and mostly wooded.

The midway point is the Hickory Road bridge east of Plymouth (from Bremen, take Indiana 331 south, right on 9B Road, then right on Hickory). The Hickory bridge isn’t an official access site but has some public right-of-way to pull off in your car.

Pelath says a contractor has already been removing logjams in the river, and those efforts will continue. Apart from improved paddling, that helps with drainage and flooding issues. But he can’t promise that it’ll be 100% clear to Plymouth by year’s end, he says, because “there’s a lot more to do” and those jams are unpredictable.

Main says the relatively new Marshall County Parks Board, of which he’s a member, has a focus group where it is just starting to try and define where more launch sites should be created on the Yellow River.

Yoder’s Bremen Hardware store, 112 E. Plymouth St., started renting kayaks a couple of weeks ago at the suggestion of the city parks. So far, store manager Juan Prado says, no one has rented them. The store doesn’t offer any kind of pick-up and drop-off service. For now, rates are $35 for three hours, $45 for 24 hours and $55 for a weekend. The store also sells kayaks. Call 574-546-2971 (closed on Sundays).

• Argos park: The town of Argos, south of Plymouth, dedicated renovations this spring to William L. Foker Park, 137 Pond St., with a 1-mile paved trail around the pond (which has fish in it), a floating pier, a pavilion, play equipment and restrooms. From U.S. 31, go east on Indiana 10 (Indiana Avenue), then right on Kenilworth Road to the park.

Also in this column: Boat, beach or backwoods: Here's where to chill with Dad this weekend

Follow Outdoor Adventures columnist Joseph Dits on Facebook at SBTOutdoorAdventures. Contact him at 574-235-6158 or jdits@sbtinfo.com.

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Potawatomi Wildlife Park in Marshall County mom beat COVID depression