Secret Santa surprises mother who was homeless but has now changed her life in a big way
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Secret Santa is back and this Christmas is bigger than ever!
The EastIdahoNews.com team is busy helping a local man gift more than $500,000 this holiday season. A lot more. Secret Santa is a real person who wants to remain anonymous and hopes to help as many individuals in our community as he can.
We will be surprising deserving people and families every day from now until Christmas with gifts unique to their circumstances.
Clellie is a prime example to anyone looking for motivation to change. She has completely changed her life and is five years sober from addiction, homelessness and being in the legal system to now being a mentor and peer for those trying to find recovery. Clellie even did a TED talk, which was very challenging as she had to be extremely vulnerable about her past.
Clellie is a mother of two and works for the Department of Health and Welfare as a Peer Support Specialist. Every week she is consistently recognized for her contributions to the team and to her clients. During COVID, Clellie is the only member of her team who voluntarily comes into the office every day so her colleagues can work from home. Clellie can engage and help clients in ways others can’t. She uses her personal past experiences as a tool to help others with their future and she truly is inspiring.
Clellie is still trying to overcome her past and fully move on but there have been challenges. She recently took her car to get new tires as they were completely bald. She was discouraged after dropping her car off as she was told she needed additional car parts, tie rod, brakes and other parts. She only had enough money to replace the tires.
Secret Santa heard about Clellie’s incredible accomplishments and asked the East Idaho News elves to go surprise her with some special Christmas gifts. Watch the video above to see what happened!
