Change is coming!

 

2020 is definitely a year of forced change for sure.  Never in our lives could we have imagined living through a World Wide Pandemic.  Yes, we've learned about them through our history studies but it honestly is another one of those things that we said "That was x amount of years ago. That won't happen now" and yet here we are living in the midst of one.

Covid-19 is definitely having a huge impact on the world as a whole from living in periods of quarentine to social distancing to wearing a face mask anytime we are in public.  The impacts of Covid-19 are also impacting our economy with so many people out of work whether by choice or by force.  This has also created a huge impact on the Arthritis Foundation as well.  With so many people out of work and money tight amazing organizations like the Arthritis Foundation also are feeling the impact greatly.

This year all of our major events have been moved to virtual events and that has definitely had a major impact on the amount of funds that are raised by these events.  In May we held our first ever Virtual Walk to Cure Arthritis.  It was definitely not the same as the excitement, the community, and the inspiration of an in person event but the Foundation did a great job of creating something with very little time that managed to bring together the entire country in one giant Walk event instead of all of our individual community events.  

As the year has progressed other events have also been moved to a virtual platform including the annual JA Conference and the JA Summer Camps.  We all know virtual isn't the ideal way to have these events but it is also better then outright cancellation of the events.  Even now as I type this blog post the Foundation is very busy reorganizing in order to be able to continue to not only provide these events we have all come to embrace and look forward to in any format and manner that they can but to also continue to reach out to those affected by arthritis and provide them a community of support along with continuing to find new and creative ways to raise funds for research towards a cure.  

I am excited to see where the Foundation is headed and to also be a part of it.  I knew even before the pandemic and our physical relocation to North Carolina that when we did move I wanted to be even more involved and help the Foundation in any way that I could.  There are lots of things in progress and I will be sharing all that I can as I can moving forward but in the mean time, please be sure to jump over to our both our Facebook page www.facebook.com/MackenziesSidekicks and our Instagram page www.instagram.com/mackenziessidekicks/and be sure to like and follow them for the most up to date information and announcements.  Also, if you or anyone you know has arthritis please be sure to visit or share the Arthritis Foundation's website at www.arthritis.org and click on the Connect Now button to begin finding help and connection with the arthritis journey.  Nobody has to fight this battle alone!