Main fundraiser photo

Volunteer Organization - ARC

Donation protected

Please join us in raising funds for the Aphasia Recovery Connection - who has a mission of helping ending the isolation of those recoverying from aphasia.  Like Chris.  And over one million in the USA alone.  Aphasia affects language - but not his intellect.

As many of you know, Chris suffered a massive stroke on Dec. 28, 2012 following ACL knee surgery.  His goal prior to surgery was to run his first Ironman race for which he was training.  After suffering the stroke he was completely paralized on the right side and had a complete loss of speech.  He was determined to get his strength back after his stroke to run again.  He has done several small runs in our local area but is on his way to Iceland to run his first Marathon on Aug. 23, 2014 (just 20 months post stroke).  His right side will never be 100% but 90% seems to be good enough for him to run.  He still has severe speech problems and will deal with that for years to come.  Chris is not alone to suffer what is called Aphasia and Apraxia among young people.  Before he had his stroke we didn't know what those words were.  In January of 2013 he came across ARC (Aphasia Recovery Connection).  This is a total volunteer group of people with Aphasia and Apraxia due to strokes or brain injury who are trying to make isolation amongst the sufferers come to an end.  The organizations founders are two young adults, Christine Huggins and David Dow, who suffered from strokes and with their parents help they want to make it easier for young adults to cope with their issues.  Many of them had very prominent careers which came to a complete halt as did Chris' career.  Chris has turned to them to make many new friends who communicate with him in their own way to try to make the most of their lives. 

ARC has no funding at this time and is working on getting a nonprofit status.  It is a social networking site which had about 600 members in January when Chris joined and now has over 2500 members.  Since the organization is only a few years old and it is growing in leaps and bounds they can surely use any donations that you can provide to help support them to make the lives of other people with Aphasia and Apraxia get help in their recovery.  Especially at this time when insurances are cutting back on therapeutic treatment, ARC will be there for them.  You can visit their site and join the group on
www.aphasiarecoveryconnection.org

Chris is dedicating his run to ARC so please help by making a donation.  Thank you for your prayers for the 26.2 mile run Chris completed without walking - he ran the whole way!  And thank you to those who are continuing to keep the campaign going to raise funds for the Aphasia Recovery Connection!

Donate

Donations 

  • Janice Cossette
    • $25 
    • 9 yrs
Donate

Organizer

Renate Gessner Conlon
Organizer
Baltimore, MD

Your easy, powerful, and trusted home for help

  • Easy

    Donate quickly and easily.

  • Powerful

    Send help right to the people and causes you care about.

  • Trusted

    Your donation is protected by the  GoFundMe Giving Guarantee.