One in five children is living with a serious mental illness that interferes with everyday life and half of all lifetime mental health concerns start by age 14.
While fundraising for a charity is not required to participate in Badwater, it is encouraged. When I ran Badwater eight years ago, I raised money for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation in honor of three meaningful families in my life, auctioning off the playlist I used deep in the race. This was an incredible experience during the race – not just enjoying new and unique music after months of training, but thinking of those who had chosen it – as well as a fun way to fundraise, since those who donated got a little something back “Kickstarter” style in being able to “buy” space on my playlist.
Fundraising is a tricky thing. The cause or thing that means so very much to one person may not be the cause that resonates with or has impacted another, and I’m mindful of that. For me, however, this year’s charity is “On Our Sleeves,” the movement to transform children’s mental health through education, advocacy and research. The mission of “On Our Sleeves” is to provide every community in America with free resources necessary for breaking child mental health stigmas and educating families and advocates.
Over recent years, I’ve become more open about my own mental health journey; the challenges of living with PTSD, anxiety, and OCD as a result of severe childhood trauma. But there’s a piece I’ve held back, not due to shame as much as to closed doors – the month I spent in the hospital my sophomore year of high school. Finding me in the midst of a severe panic attack, my mother took me to the hospital, where I couldn’t accurately answer questions about wanting to harm myself. No, I didn’t want to harm myself – but I didn’t want to live either. This was at a time when 15-year old girls didn’t get diagnosed with PTSD; when I had been instructed to not speak about and “leave behind” some of my most severe trauma; and when my coping mechanisms were beyond inadequate for the number of unique traumas I had faced. As such, I was admitted, at 15, to an adult psychiatric ward, an experience that in many ways compounded the trauma I was trying to escape.
Enter Nationwide Children’s Hospital, not only the home of the “On Our Sleeves” movement, but The Big Lots Behavioral Health Pavilion – America’s largest center dedicated exclusively to child and adolescent behavioral and mental health on a pediatric medial campus. I will continue to do my work as an adult, but the opportunity to offer support to an organization that ensures the next generation quality mental health care appropriate to their age, development level, and specific traumas or diagnoses is a gift to me, and yet another way to keep re-writing my own story.
The gig, however, is the same: for every $10 you donate - and $10 itself is a deeply appreciated donation - you get to place one song on the playlist I’ll use anytime I listen to music after mile 59. You can private message, text, or email me your songs once you’ve donated. There is only one real “rule” – no repeats, each song must be unique. If two people each request the same song, it will appear twice, but I shall not fall into the trap of getting five renditions of – well, I shan’t give you any ideas.
Thank you, all, for the support across the years, as well as the past few months. I look forward to “hearing” from you on the course ; )
All donations are tax-deductible and will be acknowledged by Nationwide Children's Foundation.