It’s that time! Health Rising’s major donation drive is on to give us the funds to move forward for the next year.
My Story
When I came down with ME/CFS/FM around 1980 there was literally nowhere to turn. By the time I became aware of these diseases probably in the late 1980’s, the news wasn’t much better: yes, they were known but the treatment options were limited. After chemical sensitivities in the early 2000’s made it impossible for me to work I turned for the first time to the internet, but most of the information I found there seemed repetitive and shallow.
I created Phoenix Rising (PR) in 2004 in order to have a place to share what I was learning. After leaving PR in December 2012, I formed Health Rising (HR). My basic intention, though, remained the same – to learn as much as possible about ME/CFS/FM, to advocate for these under-served diseases, and to share what I found.
Why Support Health Rising?
- Get the Breaking News – When a major breakthrough in understanding or treating ME/CFS or FM takes place you’ll hear about it quickly on HR. We make dense technical information as easily understandable as possible. To that end we recently introduced “The Gist” – a list of bullet points containing the key highlights for each blog. HR provides hope for patients and their families by keeping them updated on the latest developments. Doctors, researchers and professionals all subscribe to the blog.
- Apply What You Learn – HR’s blogs are bit longer than most for a reason: we strive to give you a balanced analysis that puts research and treatment findings into context and provides you with the resources you need to benefit from them. We provide leads on medications, supplements, and other treatment options; diagnosis; finding doctors; obtaining disability; getting better sleep, etc. Many people use HR to keep their doctors updated.
- Empower ME/CFS Researchers – Health Rising empowers the research foundations that are making vital discoveries by spreading the word on what they are doing. The better off Health Rising is, the better it can support their important work advancing the field.
- Access Forums, Resources, Recovery Stories and soon more – Health Rising is not just a blog. It’s also a Forums; its Resource Center contains links to over 250 resources; and its database of Recovery stories now stands at 57, but it will soon be much more…
Next For Health Rising
- Over the Next Month – A lot has changed in the past ten years. Health Rising’s commitment to sharing complex information and advocating remains, but some needs have changed. For instance, a plethora of information is available but finding it can be difficult. Over the next month we plan to add the following three programs designed to further expand the process of sharing and advocating.
- Sharing Your Stories – a “Lives Interrupted” Program makes crystal clear the costs of ME/CFS.
- Experts – an “ME/CFS and FM Experts Q&A” Program will give you access to ME/CFS/FM experts.
- How To – a “How To” Program will allow you to quickly find information you can use to improve your health and successfully manage these illnesses.
- Over the Next Year – Two Programs are on tap for next year.
- Meetup – Facebook pages, Forums and blogs are great but nothing can replace actual in-person contact. In 2017 Health Rising plans to add a “Meetup/Dating Program” that will allow you to gain new friendships, find local resources and create new relationships.
- Use Your Skills – The FM and ME/CFS communities have only begun, as well, to maximize the skills and talents of both people with ME/CFS/FM and their family and friends. A “Project/Volunteer Program” is slated to provide ways to do that.
MODEST NEEDS – For all that Health Rising doesn’t require a lot of money. Health Rising’s financial needs include very modest salaries for one-full time person (me) and one part-time person (Stavya). Server and software fees, technical support, computer repairs, email blasts, travel to conferences, etc. make up the rest. Volunteer bloggers and editors make up rest of the “staff” at PR. We’re lean and mean.
We have about 10,000 subscribers and Forum members and 142 recurring donors. One-time donations are a vital source of support for Health Rising – we wouldn’t survive without them – but the truth is that enough people giving just $5 a month – an amount so small that most people would never notice it – and we would be set.
8 Ways to Support Health Rising
A little bit goes a long way at Health Rising
Recurring Donor
(1) Become a Recurring PayPal Donor – Recurring donors provide the financial bedrock for Health Rising. To become a recurring donor simply go the right sidebar of any page, click the amount you would like to donate, and hit the Subscribe button.
(2) Already a Recurring PayPal Donor? Want to increase your donation? Simply send me an email stating that and I will stop your current donation and you can restart it.
(3) Recurring Donations with Online Banking (non-Paypal) – Don’t want to use Paypal? Use Bill Pay or similar programs at your bank.
One-Time Donations
(4) Make a One-Time Donation — One-time donations provide important one-time cash infusions to Health Rising. You can make a one-time donation by clicking on the Donate button in the right sidebar.
(5) One-Time Checks! We Love checks! Please make out checks to Health Rising and send them to us:
Cort Johnson
2555 Hampton Rd Unit 6308
Henderson NV, 89052
USA
(6) Bothered by Currency Conversion Charges? Use Bitcoin and Avoid Them – Use Health Rising’s Coinbase Bitcoins account and save on currency conversion charges on your one-time donation. Our Bitcoin address is 18D9JkiGxPcpx8RYNcG5p2Be1joU9J6v5D
(7) Shopping on Amazon.com for HR – Earn money for Health Rising by shopping on Amazon.com. This nets us a commission of 4% to 10% (The exact percentage is determined by Amazon). U.S. residents can use the Amazon.com search bar on the right sidebar of the page. Click here to go to the Canadian and UK Amazon stores.
(8) Volunteering – Interested in writing blogs, providing help with accounting, helping us manage or produce or projects? How about creating a new project? Contact us using our contact form (click on Contact Us in the top menu bar).
Health Rising never provides your email address or personal information to outside parties.
Please note that Health Rising is not a non–profit; therefore your donations are not tax-deductible.
Cort, having followed your blog since you first started, and having gotten CFS in late 70’s, I was there ,also, when there was nothing to be learned, no name, just one disbelieving doctor after another, no help of any kind .
You have been such a light in this illnesses darkness. Without your blog, without your travels to the different conferences, without your great grasp of very difficult research and science talk, and your ability to gel it all down to what a lay person can understand,without your encouragement, without you, we would be so stumbling around, with no knowledge of the great researchers who are taking a huge chance with their reputations in the medical community and plowing ahead uncovering the mysteries of CFS.
All I can say is a tremendous THANK YOU ‘. You are a gem.
?Jeanie
Thanks so much Jeanie – I should put that on my wall! :). I greatly appreciate your support over the years.
Update – almost six hours into our donation drive thanks to the 12 people who have provided one-time donations and the 3 people who have made recurring donations.
I encourage everyone to consider making a small monthly donation. We’re aiming for about 60 new recurring donations or upgraded donations but think if we had 500 people giving just $5 a month – something most people would never notice. Health Rising would be able to do sooo much more. We would be able to get programs out quickly and we would be able to advertise.
Advertising may not sound exciting but consider that Health Rising has about 10,000 emails in its database…out of 12 or 15 million people with ME/CFS and/or FM.
If we could increase that number five or ten times that’s five or ten times more people learning about ME/CFS/FM; 5-10’s more people acting on it; 5-10 times more people supporting ME/CFS/FM research and 5-10 more people engaging in advocacy. It would make a huge difference.
Out of that 5-10’s more people think how many more major donors this field could attract.
It really is a numbers game. If Health Rising gets small amounts of money from many people it can thrive and do its part to move these fields forward without causing financial pain to anyone. I encourage everyone to think of a number that would cause them no financial pain at all – which they wouldn’t even notice – and take the small recurring donation plunge!
Thanks to the 21 people who have given one-time donations and 4 people who have become recurring donors. We are almost a third of the way to our goal :),
Everyone should be able to contribute $5 monthly to support Health Rising. I don’t even notice it’s missing. Cort is a very bright light for the ME/CFS Community and we want to keep his work going. Thanks so much, Cort, for all you and HR do for us!!! 🙂
Thanks to the 33 people who have contributed to Health Rising.
Congratulations to the OMF for their success.
They deserve every penny and please consider where you probably heard about the OMF and the work Ron Davis is doing there. My guess it’s likely it was from Health Rising. We have in-depth story after story on Ron Davis’s and Bob Naviaux’s work. We don’t need $240,000 or $100,000 or $50,000 but we do need money to continue.
Please support the website that provides you the most in depth information on ME/CFS anywhere.
Thanks to the 55 people who have contributed! We are 55% of the way to our goal :).
59 people have contributed to Health Rising and we are just over 55% of our goal. Health Rising has very modest, (embarrassingly modest actually) salaries and it doesn’t need much, but we, like everyone else, need money to continue We don’t get grants, we don’t have ads (yet) – 95% of our funding comes from donors. If 60 people gave us $5 a month we would be set for the next year. Please support us and keep HR going.
Come on, people!!
I second that! We’re getting there – not that far away now.
Thanks, again for your support, Jeanie
Cort, I am more than happy to continue to support HR. I look forward to each posting and you keep the community current on all goings on. Now that I have watched tou work several times at conferences I often wonder if we were at the same place. I obviously miss the detail of issues and I am amazed how you manage all that material and get it out so quickly and correctly. Thank you.
Thanks Ceil – nice of you to say! And thanks for your very generous contribution 🙂
You are an invaluable resource the the ME/CFS/Fibro community. Without you, many people would have little to no knowledge of what is going on in our medical community. Thank you for all that you do!
Is it easier for you to process a PayPal payment than a check? I assume that my bank can’t send an electronic funds transfer the way PayPal can.
This is already a great resource, I look forward to the new things you’re planning.
Thanks November Girl! Yes, Paypal is the easiest; you don’t even need a PayPal account to send money – and it goes right into HR’s Paypal account.
Thanks 🙂
If you’re with Wells Fargo we could do a transfer I think, and checks are good. PayPal is probably the easiest I would say, though.
you have been a marvelous resource!!!
Thanks 🙂
Thanks to the generosity of the almost 150 people who have contributed to Health Rising we have only about 15% to go to meet out goal. Remember – there’s no such thing as a small donation to Health Rising; they are all big to us. Just a bit more and we’ve made our target. 🙂