To Friends and Family… A Letter from Shaina Flesser, Concerning Her Passion for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation!
Hi friends and family!
Hope everyone is doing well on this fine Tuesday evening. As you all know by now, I’m working for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation-an organization that I grew up volunteering at in San Diego that became very near and dear to my heart.
I lost touch with the Foundation during college, but was very fortunate to come to my senses one day and decide to reach out to the director of the Orange County chapter to see about getting involved with them and volunteering.
Best decision ever. Seriously. I mean it. Life changing.
So, apparently, the good folks over at the CFF Orange County office decided ‘hey, we like this chick. She’s a kick-ass volunteer. We should hire her’. So bam, they did.
I love it. Every day is crazy. It’s stressful, it’s long hours. 8:30-5:30? What’s that. More like 8:30-7:00, or 8:00 or 9:00. Weekends? What are those? Extra work days. 5AM, 6AM, working until midnight some weekends. But here’s the deal: It may be the most stressful job ever, but to me, it’s also the most rewarding. Why you ask? Our families.
For every event that we spend hours and hours and hours working, the families spend double that. They are out there constantly trying to find new ways to raise money to help find a cure for a disease that is causing pain and suffering to someone in their lives. A sister, brother, daughter, son, neighbor, niece, nephew, etc..
And not just that, but we get to know them. We see them day in and day out. We see their struggles and see the pain on their faces when someone they know and love goes into the hospital or has to take yet another pill, or has to stop doing something like walking up the stairs, because it’s too hard on their system. But we also get to see the advances we’ve made together and how it’s helping them. We know a patient who is 35. May seem young to you all, but for a CF patient? Damn, that’s good. Back in the day, if you had CF, you wouldn’t live past your teenage years.
Anyways, I digress.. the point is: I have a kick-ass job. I work with kick-ass people. And on a daily basis I get to see kids and young adults fighting the ultimate fight. To wake up one day and know that their life isn’t going to be controlled by this disease. That we have a cure, and they can live their lives just like the rest of us can.
So: I work all events, but I’ve been working very heavily on one specific one. Our CF Cycle for Life, which is happening this weekend. (sca.cff.org/cycleforlife) I get to experience all aspects of it. I’m really learning how to be a fundraiser, how to be a development director, and hopefully one day have my own events! So, it hit the event director, Michael, like a ton of bricks today. Why am I not registered for the ride? His thinking was mostly just so I get the communications about the event… But then I thought, wait, what the heck. If I’m going to be ‘registered’ for it. Well shit, I might as well fundraise!
Why the heck not right? So, here’s where you all come in. I’d like to ask you all to donate to me, to the foundation, to our families. Every dollar counts, and no amount is to small.
We told a CF mom yesterday how much money we raised at an event this past weekend (it happened to do $100,000 more than it normally does) and she started crying. She has no connection to this particular event, but she knows that, no matter what, it’s all going to help her daughter. Help her have a childhood that isn’t just hospital visits and pills and breathing treatments.
That’s why I do what I do, and why I’m asking for your support. The link below will take you to my fundraising page 🙂 Feel free to share this with anyone you think might be interested in helping a gal out as well.
http://www.cff.org/LWC/ShainaFlesser
I love you all so very much.
-Shaina
Help me make “CF” stand for “Cure Found”
