GiveForward

One of the wonderful things about working at GiveForward is that we find we are inspired on a daily basis by the amazing stories we hear.  Our awesome intern, Brennan, was inspired by an article in the Huffington Post by Kristen Houghton on the power of words and wanted to share his thoughts on words and how they impact others, particularly the words shared on GiveForward’s site, during times of real need.

Whether within our own thoughts, spoken or written, words have the powerful potential to transform the world we live in. I’ve experienced firsthand  how words have an amazing power to heal, improve, and change another person’s reality:

A few years ago I got a job working in a drapery store. On my first day, my boss led me to a giant fabric-rolling table and explained in a mind-numbing series of steps and procedures how it all worked. He rolled through a bolt of fabric and said, “It’s tricky, but you get it, right?” Before I had a chance to say, “No, not at all,” he was gone…back into his office to shuffle papers around and comb his mustache.  To say I struggled through that first hour in that cold concrete warehouse would be the understatement of the century. I ripped expensive fabric to shreds, jammed the machine twice, and nearly took my hand off with the enormous razor-blade.  I was a blunder away from heading back to the front office and telling my boss that I was not “cut out” to be a fabric-cutter. As I turned off the machine to give up, another employee walked through the door to start his shift. He introduced himself; he was a veteran, a real-life fabric-rolling professional. He saw the shredded fabric splayed about the floor and asked, “Don’t quite have it down yet?” I nodded. He told me, “It’s much easier than you’d think. Everybody struggles the first hour or so, but by the end of the day, you’ll feel like you’ve been cutting fabric your entire life. It’s really not all that hard.” He left, telling me he had some work to do, but that he would be back in a half-hour to check up on me.

Within a few minutes, something had changed. I was starting to get the hang of it; I was a fabric-rolling monster. You’ve got fabric, I’ll cut  it, i’ll cut the heck out of it, I’m the best fabric cutter this side of Mississippi. It wasn’t that any of the physical work had changed, or that the procedure was any less complicated. What had changed was the way I perceived the work. I trusted my co-worker when he told me it was, “easy…not that hard at all.”  Really, all I needed was someone to tell me it that it was possible. By implying that the job was easy, he made it so. Sometimes, especially when we are going through something for the first time, we need someone to tell us “it’s going to be okay.” I realized that day how a simple phrase, a few words, can inspire us to achieve goals or they can hold us back from even trying. One simple sentence can make a huge difference in the way we perceive the world.

As an English major at the University of Illinois the power of words were never lost on me.  Reading poets like Rudyard Kipling, Walt Whitman, and Saul Williams, I was forced to confront the meaning behind words. What is our unending desire to communicate?

I discovered: not only do we create the words we use, but the words we use also create us.

The Latin transcription of the word “person” translates directly to “beings of sound.” Meaning, our lives as human beings are literally defined by our words and our ability to communicate through sound with each other and the greater universe.  The power that words have on us can be observed every day. Whether it be that Ipad commercial that convinced you that ‘just had to have it,’ or the political speech that made you grind your teeth, or the comedian who’s story made you laugh until your sides hurt. Words are intimately entwined with our emotions and thus, our reality. The words we speak are every bit as alive and tangible as the people we communicate with.

If you need further proof of the power that words have in creating the world around us, look no further than the world’s most printed book: the Bible. In the first verse, it reveals, “God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.” God said, and then there was. The words came first, creating reality around us. If our world was literally created from words, then imagine the limitless power your own words possess. What you say matters- almost as much as what you do…and isn’t just Christianity that recognizes the power of speech: virtually every religion in the world, at one time or another, has focused on the power of sound vibration. Whether through the chanting of “ohm,” Buddhist and Hindu chants, Islamic prayers and calls to worship, or reciting “Hail Mary” and the Lord’s Prayer, the common thread has been the investment in the belief that change will come about through voicing these sacred words, aloud.

There is no doubt that words have a tremendous effect on the outside world but also on the way in which we think. I had a coach once that liked to say, “Think of your brain like a computer… put good things in, good things print out.” The more we hear words of encouragement, the more encouraging as people we become. Take the phrase, ”When you say you can’t, it means that you won’t.” That statement is profound in its simplicity and its meaning is clear: If you think you can’t, chances are good that you won’t. The power of our words have compelling psychological implications. Even our thoughts are constructed from words. The more affirming the words we choose to use, the more positive we become as people. Researchers continue to explore the effects of positive thinking and optimism on our health. The health benefits that positive thinking have been linked such qualities as: increased life span, lower rates of depression, greater resistance to the common cold,  reduced risk of death from cardiovascular disease, and better coping skills during hardships and times of stress.

This is why on the GiveForward site we allow people to send out virtual hugs to family and friends in need. Although many of the fundraisers on the site are in need of funds to help cover medical expenses, words of encouragement are often equally as important to their recovery. As Kristen Houghton writes, “We have at our disposal a power that can change lives, make the sick healthy, encourage success, guide those who need it, and create a lasting impression of us as people.” So, this week while considering donating to a fundraiser, please don’t forget to leave some support by writing a few kind words in addition to your donation. One of the most powerful healing tools we have can be utilizing the words we use every day. As English poet Rudyard Kipling once said, “Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.”

Use them well.

Where does the time go? Summer is officially over and here at GiveForward we were sad to say goodbye to our summer interns, Sam, Olivia, and Natalia. But, being the resilient young company that we are, we wiped the tears from our eyes, dusted ourselves off, and found two amazing brand new interns. Come and meet the fresh new faces at the intern table!

To liven things up a bit, we’ve decided to bring back the  ”Two Truths  and a Lie” contest. You might be familar with the game…each intern will provide three statements about themselves. Your job:  figure out which one of these statements is a complete fabrication, totally false.

Oh and there are PRIZES! The first person to correctly pick out the lie from each intern by November 1st, 2011 will get a FREE Giveasaurus t-shirt! (I know…pretty cool, right?) To compete, you may submit your guesses as a comment on this blog, via e-mail (brennan@giveforward.com) or on our Facebook page.

Tracey Dewland - PR/Marketing Intern

Tracey comes to us all the way from Woodbridge, Virginia. Graduating from Depauw University in May, this Communications and Spanish dual major has been busy spreading the word about the GiveForward site with local and national media outlets. When she’s not doing an awesome job organizing ugly sweater pub crawls (you should come!), Tracey enjoys eating fro-yo, bikram yoga, and watching trashy television. She’s also super into music. Tracey worked  as a radio DJ for four years at Depauw and interned with a radio station in New York City. She’s a big fan of the alternative and local music scenes, and she tries to catch as many shows in Chicago as she can. Tracey says her favorite thing about working at GiveForward is the atmosphere and how “everyone here is so invested in helping others.”

Two-Truths and a Lie:

1) I’ve done a pub crawl in Dublin on St. Patrick’s Day.

2) I’ve been a victim of a bad case of swine flu.

3) I’ve been in the live studio audience at The Price is Right.

Tracy Trauscht - Interactive/Social Media Intern

Tracy comes to us from beautiful Mundelein, Illinois. She graduated from Emerson College in Boston, MA this May with a degree in animation and motion media. Since joining the GiveForward team Tracy has been manning the Twitter and Facebook feeds like a social media wizard. She’s been known to whip up a ‘crazy good’ batch of cupcakes, and the entire office can attest to her baking skills. In her free time Tracy enjoys cooking, sewing, working out, going to concerts and looking around grocery stores for hours without buying anything. Like most of the GiveForward team, you can find Tracy blasting mash-ups (Girl Talk and Mochi Beats most notably) through her headphones. Tracy hopes to someday become an internet famous cartoonist (or turn into caterpillar…whichever comes first). She is super psyched to join the GiveForward team and looks forward to sending out lots of love through virtual hugs.

Two-Truths and a Lie:

1) I’ve walked on my toes since I was 3 and still do on occasion.

2) I’m allergic to mangoes.

3) I have a phobia of roadkill.

Brennan Keller- Intern

I’ve been working with the GiveForward team since August and I have to say I love it so far. I graduated from the University of Illinois with a degree in English & Creative Writing this summer. I’m still getting acclimated to the ‘post-grad’ lifestyle. I do a little blogging, a little video-editing, and a little PR for the site. I love burritos, freedom, NPR, and Will Ferrell movies.  I’m really proud of the work that GiveForward lets me do, makes me feel like like I can make a difference in the world. But, that’s enough about me.

Two-Truths and a lie:

1) I met Michael Jordan at an arcade once.

2) My break-dancing skills have been described as “good” to “very very good.”

3) I was a student-manager for the Michigan State Basketball team.

So, now that you’ve met the Trac(e)y’s and me, the only thing left to do is guess, what’re we fibbing about? Which of our 3 statements would make our pants burst into flame? Remember, to be entered to win a Giveasauras shirt all you gotta do is guess the lies in a by November 1st via a comment on this blog, email (brennan@giveforward.com) or our Facebook page. Good luck!

This year in the United States an estimated 1.6 million Americans will declare bankruptcy. Many will attribute this financial misfortune to fiscal irresponsibility or indulgence in a lifestyle beyond ones means, but a new study done by Harvard University suggests that more than 62% of all personal bankruptcies are caused by the cost of over-whelming medical expenses.

Of the most financially devastating diseases, cancer reigns supreme. The American Cancer Society estimates that the 2010 total cost of cancer in the U.S. rose to $263.8 billion. So perhaps unsurprisingly, a new study by the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center shows a close link between cancer diagnosis and personal bankruptcy. Compared to the general population, bankruptcy rates are nearly twice as high among cancer patients one year after diagnosis.  Of the bankruptcies caused by a cancer, a surprising 78% reported having some form of health insurance, de-bunking the myth that medical bills only really affect the uninsured.

According to Duke University Medical Center, the average out-of-pocket cost for cancer patients is currently $1,266 per month. Medical bills for these patients can quickly wipe out retirement accounts, college savings funds, and home equity. Once a patient’s savings have been exhausted bankruptcy may be their only refuge.

Cancer costs billions of dollars each year, but it also can cost us the people we love the most. Eliminating the financial barriers a cancer patient faces can often be vital to their survival. The fact that 62% of all bankruptcies are caused by medical expenses is scary to us at GiveForward. This is why our goal has always been to empower the community to come together and help alleviate the financial burden due to medical bills and cancer treatments.

Cancer takes a heavy toll on our health, our emotions, and our wallets. What can you do to help? To combat the costs of cancer treatments and the risk of bankruptcy create a GiveForward page for a friend or family member in need or consider donating to one of the many fundraisers on our site today.

October marks National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, an international health campaign that raises awareness, empowers survivors, and assists in preventing the disease. This year in the United States alone over 230,000 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer and over 40,000 will die of the disease. There is a good chance that someone you know personally will be affected by this horrible disease in their lifetime.

The affordability of treatment for women diagnosed with breast cancer, the second leading type of cancer among women, has also become a growing concern for recent patients. As health care costs increase each passing year, women with breast cancer are facing mounting out-of-pocket costs for treatment. Breast cancer patients, even those covered by employer-based insurance, average a total of $6,250 out-of-pocket expenses. These women are frequently forced to make decisions based on their finances and not always on what is best for their health.

Thankfully, there are many ways you can support a woman with breast cancer today:

-        Wear pink! For the next 31 days the color will symbolize increased awareness and fundraising events for research, prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and finding a cure. Every time you wear pink you’re raising awareness for breast cancer. Awareness is key to more screenings and earlier detection. According to the American Cancer Society, the death rate from breast cancer has fallen steadily since 1990, about 3.2 percent per year for women younger than age 50, due to early detection.

-        Check your local papers and websites to find local events you where you can go to support the effort. You can find a breast cancer event near you: Here.

-        If you know a woman or a family struggling with breast cancer consider starting a GiveForward page. By creating a GiveForward page for a family, you enable loved ones and visitors from all over the world to provide emotional and financial support.

- There are several women battling breast cancer on GiveForward today that you can benefit directly by donating to their cause:

Consider helping the family of Leila Grossman. Leila, a single mother of two girls and a talented photographer, is hoping to raise $50,000 to help finance a double mastectomy operation.

Or donating to Brita Corradini, a 31 year-old woman battling stage two breast cancer- all while pregnant with her second child.

Or Danijela Hughey, who is hoping to raise $15,000 to help pay for the daily expenses that come with battling stage 3 breast cancer. You can follow Dani’s awesome blog: Holy Crap, I Have Cancer: Now What? Here.

At any given time there are dozens of women struggling with breast cancer on the GiveForward site that need your help. This October, in honor of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month consider donating to a victim of breast cancer or attending an event that raises breast cancer awareness. Remember that the promotion of a helpful, loving community of supportive individuals is vital for the healing and restorative processes.

Everyday at GiveForward we witness thousands of people, across the country, showing incredible compassion for loved ones and friends in need. Through donations and virtual hugs we’ve seen powerful impact that empathy and kindness can have on families in a time of need. In all this selfless giving, one aspect of compassion is often overlooked- the compassion we have for ourselves.  Are we treating ourselves as well as we treat our friends and family? This is the question being addressed in new psychological research: What effect does our self-image have on our health ?

Research has shown that many people, who find it easy to be supportive and understanding to others, frequently score surprisingly low on self-compassion tests, criticizing themselves for perceived failures, like weight gain and unfulfilled career aspirations.  A recent study in the Journal of Research in Personality suggests that by “going easier on ourselves,” and accepting our imperfections, may be the first step toward a healthier life.  Individuals that have high self-compassion tend to be less depressed, less anxious, and more optimistic and happy.

Nevertheless, practicing compassion toward ourselves may be the most challenging behavior of all to master. Many of us build our lives around a “contingent self-worth,” meaning that we construct our self-esteem around the character evaluations made by others. We are only okay as long as other people tell us we’re okay. According to Wendy Stragar of Care 2 Make a Difference: “Having your sense of self hanging on the evaluations of other people and outside events is deeply emotionally destabilizing because it is so impermanent.  High self-esteem moments are fleeting and attaching our self worth to the temporary successes and failures that make up life is unreliable at best and crazy-making at worst.”

It is important, for our own health, to be kinder to ourselves and accept our closeness to humanity.  Many people resist practicing self-compassion in the fear that they’ll become too self-indulgent. This fear can be overcome by understanding the difference between self-pity and self-compassion. Pity, by nature, separates us from other people’s suffering. Pity isolates us by making us feel sorry for ourselves, believing that we are the only person that has the capacity to understand our struggle. While compassion recognizes that everyone at some point experiences suffering and that your experience is one of the “fundamental unifying experiences of being a human being.” Self-compassion is being kind to yourself and others because, as people traveling on the road of life, we understand that all people will have to negotiate over difficult terrain from time to time.

So, today ask yourself: Am I treating myself with kindness?  If you find that you’re not, give yourself a break…it may be the first step toward a healthier life. While you’re at it, keep an eye out for friends and family who might not be practicing self-compassion, because they might need your help.  The easiest way to encourage a friend in need and lead them down the road toward self-empathy is to show them support. If you know a friend or family member with mounting medical bills consider starting a GiveForward page for them. It may be the simplest way to ease the burden of your loved one’s suffering. Your example of kindness toward a friend or family member may lead them to a greater empathy for themselves.  The greater our capacity to practice self-compassion, the more open we are to the power of human kindness and the experience of life.

At GiveForward our goal is to help our users cope with the financial repercussions of a cancer diagnosis. It is for this reason, we would like to introduce you to The SAMFund, a unique non-profit organization established to support young adult cancer survivors with a successful transition into post-treatment life.

The SAMFund was founded by Samantha Eisenstein Watson in 2003. At the age of 21, while most of her friends were enjoying their senior year of college, Samantha was diagnosed with Ewing’s Sarcoma, an aggressive form of bone cancer. A year later, after seven rounds of high-dose chemotherapy and several surgeries, Watson returned to school in remission. Her joy at returning to school was short-lived, however, as just three months later she was diagnosed with cancer again – this time, Myelodysplastic Syndrome (a precursor to leukemia). After additional chemotherapy treatments and a bone marrow transplant, Samantha was declared in remission for a second time.

To Watson, it seemed each time she finished treatment that the biggest challenge she faced had less to do with her diagnosis and treatment, and more to do with her age. Says Samantha, “I had a tough time – socially, physically and emotionally – after treatment ended. While everyone thought I should just be celebrating the fact that I was still here, I struggled with the aftermath: a different body from the one I had started with, total uncertainty about my future, and brand new priorities and perspective.” Watson realized that on top of the life-changing experience that is cancer, young adults are left at a further disadvantage when it comes to integrating back into the real world. Cancer is not only a devastating disease physically, but also financially. This is especially true for young adults who, after treatment, are left with no savings and are often too old to be on their parents’ insurance. Many young adults feel the effects of their treatment long after its conclusion: stacks of medical bills, sizable holes left in their résumés in an already challenging job market, and few resources available to them. For many young adult cancer survivors, it can often feel like there is nowhere to turn for support.

It is for this reason Samantha founded Surviving And Moving Forward: The SAMFund for Young Adult Survivors of Cancer to help young adults move on with their lives after treatment. To date, The SAMFund has awarded a total of $600,000 in grants and scholarships to individuals across the country. The fund has helped grant recipients cover a wide range of post-treatment financial needs, including: medical bills, insurance premiums, rent, utilities, family-building and transportation costs. The SAMFund is currently the only organization in the United States designed specifically to help young adults regain their financial stability as they get back on their feet after cancer treatment.

If you know a young adult cancer survivor in need, SAMFund’s annual grant application is posted in June each year. In the meantime, consider creating a GiveForward page for a young adult in need or visit SAMFund’s free Webinar series entitled: “Moving Forward With Your Financial Health” for information about insurance, financial planning and more.

September marks National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, drawing attention to the leading cause of death by disease in children throughout the United States. The rate of children diagnosed with cancer has increased steadily over the past twenty years with thirty-six children in the United States being diagnosed with cancer per day. Over 40,000 courageous children and devoted families endure the lasting effects of cancer treatment each year.

Despite the increased number of cases of pediatric cancer, 80% percent of childhood cancer cases are treated successfully. While most childhood cancers are considered highly curable, survival often comes with a “cost.”  Two-thirds childhood cancer survivors face at least one chronic health condition and many survivors will receive on-going monitoring and continued physical and psychological care throughout their adult lives.

Beside the lifelong health implications, treating childhood cancer often comes at a great financial cost to families. The average out-of-pocket cost for a family with a child battling cancer is over $9,700. Even in cases where health insurance is available, expenses can add up quickly. In addition to the cost of cancer diagnosis and treatment, the hidden costs of: food, transportation, and accommodation often add to the financial burden for these families.

Thankfully, there are ways you can help.

You can visit: Alex’s Lemonade Stand a foundation committed to finding a cure for childhood cancers. On their site they list: 30 ways you can raise awareness and funds throughout the month.

If you know a family struggling with pediatric cancer consider starting a GiveForward page. By creating a GiveForward page for a family, you enable loved ones and visitors from all over the world to provide emotional and financial support.

There are also several families on GiveForward who you can benefit directly by donating to their cause.  Consider helping the family of 4-year old, Mia Deligeannis, who has been battling Leukemia the past two and a half years. Mia’s family is half way to their goal of raising $5,000. Or Tucker Reeves battling cancer of the spinal cord. The Reeves family is hoping to raise $6,000 to offset travel and accommodation costs while Tucker receives radiation treatment in Miami, Florida. Or 19-month old Idalya Estevez, who has been diagnosed Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. Her family is hoping to raise $10,000 to counterbalance her extensive medical expenses.

In honor of National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month consider donating to the victims of childhood cancer as they fight on in the hope of a better tomorrow.