“Love Me, Love My Fart” Taught Her She Was Enough

This AAPI Heritage Month, we’re launching The Stories That Made Us, a series spotlighting the family memories, objects, and words that shaped our community into the people they are today. 

Staff Spotlight:

Sarah Park – Apex for Youth, Alumni Program Manager

“Love me, love my fart.”

That was Sarah Park’s dad. He said it all the time when she was growing up.

It was his way of saying that if you love someone, you make room for their imperfections.

She remembered how her parents never told her to clean her room, even when the bedroom floor was buried in clothes, because that was her space to just be.

That sense of unconditional belonging made Sarah fearless outside the home, because she already knew what it felt like to be fully known inside it.

Somehow, I was still enough. I wasn’t afraid to be different in other spaces because of that.

What She Carries Into the Work

As Alumni Program Manager at Apex for Youth, Sarah carries forward what her father taught her into her work. When alumni walk through the door, she wants them to feel it immediately: there is room here for all of it – farts and all.

“I’m eager to know the good, the bad, and the smelly of what they’re going through,” she says. Because belonging isn’t something you earn by having it together. It’s what makes it possible to take risks, to celebrate failure over easy success, to get genuinely curious about yourself and the people around you.

It is so powerful to be known and seen by the Apex community, because along the way – whether you’re a staff, volunteer or youth – we become the ones we’ve been waiting for: People who are spacious, believe in each other, and can thrive together.

Along the way, we become the ones we’ve been waiting for: people who are spacious, believe in each other, and can thrive together.