By Kim Paskorz

Butler Eagle Staff Writer

Drugs can wreck your life ... even if you have nothing to do with them.

That’s the message Michelle Soladati says her family’s story should send to others.

Soladati, her husband and children went from comfortably sleeping in their own beds one night to being virtually homeless weeks later due to the alleged drug use by a stranger.

“We need to stand up as a community and get this under control,” Soladati said.

The family’s ordeal followed an otherwise average day Feb. 9. They had gone to bed when a suspected drugged driver crashed a Jeep Cherokee into the Soladati’s rental house on Old Plank Road.

Soladati said she heard an engine rev. She heard a thump. And her quality of life went down the tubes almost as quickly as the items on her bedroom night stand flew across the room.

“My daughter’s ashes,” Soladati said when listing the items that had been on the night stand.

Soladati lost her daughter, Brenna, the day she was born, May 18, 2015, and she kept the urn close to her. It was not damaged in the crash.

But her 9-year-old daughter, Cianna, who had been sleeping in the room above the crash site, was treated for a deeply bruised wrist.

“They thought it was broken,” Soladati said. “But it turns out it wasn’t.”

The family’s rental home, which was lifted from its foundation, will take months to repair, she said. And a second rental house, signed up quickly, didn’t seem suitable for their children.

So now the family is living in Ross Township with Michelle Soladati’s parents.

“It’s a little cramped,” said Soladati, who drives the children an hour each way to attend their regular schools after dropping off her husband at his job in Mars.

Their belongings are in storage, and Soladati attends court hearings as a potential witness in the case against the driver who hit the house.

“It’s been a terrible couple of weeks,” she said.

And, she said, you can look no farther for casualties then Buster, the beloved pet dog of 18-year-old Justin Soladati.

Justin, who has special needs, had formed a bond with the 10-year-old boxer. But when the Soladati’s home of three years was declared unlivable, they quickly found a new home that would permit Justin to stay in the Butler School District, where he is thriving.

But the landlord did not permit the dog.

Buster went to the Butler County Humane Society, where he is still. A worker there described the surrender as “heartbreaking.”

In addition to Justin and Cianna, the children of Michelle and Chris Soladati include 12-year-old son, Tyler.

At present “all of our stuff is in a storage unit in Shaler,” Soladati said. “We joked that we were going to have a housewarming party at the storage unit. We just need a three-bedroom place ... and a lot of prayers.”