Awareness Week is fast approaching!!!

Tell us your Awareness efforts!
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hope16_05
Posts: 1670
Joined: Tue Jul 01, 2003 11:33 am
Injury Description, Date, extent, surgical intervention etc: 28 years old with a right obstetrical brachial plexus injury. 5 surgeries to date with pretty decent results. Last surgery resolved years of pain in my right arm however, I am beginning my journey with overuse in my left arm
Location: Minnesota
Contact:

Awareness Week is fast approaching!!!

Post by hope16_05 »

Hey everyone, Did you know that Awareness Week is October 19-25 this year. Thats just around the corner so its time to start planning if you havent already!

There have been a lot of great suggestions so far. Keep them coming. Lets see how creative we can get.

Instead of having a list of activities that you should do for a specific day of the week, here is a list of ideas that you can do over the week and for the rest of the year too. Thats the best part about awareness...It does not have to end because the week ends.

Do some sort of community outreach. Some people are having fundraising walks with family, friends, and coworkers. Some are having people over for an evening of awareness. Some are going out to a local hang out and spreading awareness there through handing out information, talking to people and wearing awareness gear. See the UBPN Store if you dont have any awareness gear...Its not too late to get some!

Hand out awareness items...The UBPN Store has car magnets, bracelots, zipper pulls, ribbons, and stuffed puppy dogs.
You could also print info from the web site and hand that out. In the coming weeks, there should be new brochures available online for you to print and hand out.
You could share your Outreach or share the link to the online version.

Another great way to spread awareness would be to send an email to everyone that you know asking them to support UBPN by searching through goodsearch.com shopping through the UBPN amazon store or simply making a donation.

Another great idea is to call a local hospital and ask to come speak with whomever is in charge of OBGYN and have an informational meeting about bpi's.

Send in a story to your local papers...Many have in the past written to the editor however if you have a story line you might have better odds of getting a story in the paper. Do you or your child excell in something (for exapmle, community service...Raising money for ubpn ;) ) Papers might be willing to print a warm fuzzy story as a change from the negative that is seen al too often.

Go big and write to television stations and see what happens. You never know, you might get lucky and get on TV!

If you happen to be a high school or are a college student, capture your classmates!!! They have to sit there and listen if you do your presentation on bpi's. I even got my OT class to participate in lab one handed and this week we are going bowling and my classmates want to know what its like for me. Capture them once and they might just desire to learn more and even educate others!

Thats just a few of the countless possibilities...Who can come up with the most creative way to spread awareness??? I want to know your secrets, I have shared my biggest one (I captured my classmates who are all studying to become occupational therapists!) I educated 27 future occupational therapists! You all can do better! Save babies from preventable injuries and make your friends aware that bpi's can occur at any time. Drive safe and act responsibly!

Lets spread awareness!
Thanks,
Amy Theis
Awareness Committee Chair
Amy 28 years old ROBPI from MN
Carolyn J
Posts: 3424
Joined: Tue Apr 06, 2004 1:22 pm
Injury Description, Date, extent, surgical intervention etc: LOBPI. I am 77 yrs old and never had a name for my injuries until 2004 when I found UBPN at age 66.

My injuries are: LOBPI on upper body and Cerebrael Palsy on the lower left extremities. The only intervention I've had is a tendon transplant from my left leg to my left foot to enable flexing t age 24 in 1962. Before that, my foot would freeze without notice on the side when wearing heels AND I always did wear them at work "to fit in" I also stuttered until around age 18-19...just outgrew it...no therapy for it. Also suffered from very very low self esteem; severe Depression and Anxiety attacks started at menopause. I stuffed emotions and over-compensated in every thing I did to "fit in" and be "invisible". My injuries were Never addressed or talked about until age 66. I am a late bloomer!!!!!

I welcome any and all questions about "My Journey".
There is NO SUCH THING AS A DUMB QUESTION.
Sharing helps to Heal. HUGS do too.
Location: Tacoma WA
Contact:

Re: Awareness Week is fast approaching!!!

Post by Carolyn J »

AMY YOU ARE Awesome!!
I honor you. [I made it a verb just for you!] ;)

Hugs too,
Carolyn J
Carolyn J
Adult LOBPI
mamaofsix
Posts: 214
Joined: Sun May 11, 2008 5:20 pm
Injury Description, Date, extent, surgical intervention etc: Second son, Cameron, left obstetric brachial plexus injury in 2005.
Primary never graft surgery at 3 months old at St. Louis Children's Hospital
and several rounds of Botox injections.

Re: Awareness Week is fast approaching!!!

Post by mamaofsix »

Those are great ideas! We were on a local tv show here a few days ago speaking about the awareness of BPI injuries and our upcoming picnic on Satuday! I had a mom email me that has a son with BPI that saw us on TV that will hopefully be attending the picnic! We are so excited! We have 10 families with BPI and close to 100 friends/family members attending! I am still waiting on the proclamation from our governor for awareness week. We plan on doing something on a smaller scale during awareness week as well.
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