I received a really interesting email from my friend Taylor Conroy last Friday asking me to give away $100 for him. The only conditions were that I had to add $20 of my own cash and it had to go to a good charitable cause. I decided to support a Comox Valley organization called YANA – You Are Not Alone. YANA helps families with travel and accommodation expenses if their child needs to travel outside of the Valley for medical attention. There is a significant need too. YANA helps 12-15 families a month and the 4 apartments that they rent in Vancouver are full year round. It takes about $250,000 a year to provide this service but one thing is for sure, it means the world to people when their family needs to stay together in times of crisis.

We hear stories from the United States about people losing their homes to pay for cancer treatment or being left homeless and untreated after their insurance coverage is revoked. This is a reality that seems unfair but thankfully, for the moment, this doesn’t happen in Canada. However, families around our sparsely populated and land rich nation are pressed to the emotional and financial limits when their child needs to travel for medical attention.

I know three families personally who have been helped by YANA and when you ask around in the Comox Valley almost everyone knows at least one family who has been helped by them. YANA turns 25 in the coming year; it is a testament to the specific needs and the passionate support of this community.

Before donating the cash to YANA I posted a message on my Facebook asking the online community if anyone else wanted to help out… and boom – the post went viral. People asked me to come and collect the money which I did but pretty soon there were more donations than I had time to pick up. I started asking people to donate online through YANA’s website. This took all the work out of the process. Awesome!

After seeing the response online Taylor sent a message saying he would match any donations up to $5000. Haha beautiful. He is a pure spirit who shares my passion for giving without question. 27 people ended up donating to the cause and some sent money from as far away as Atlanta, Georgia, Vancouver and Victoria. Over three days and with very little effort we raised $670. Taylor followed through with his promise and went beyond it with an additional $700 donation. This generosity from everyone brought the total campaign to $1370. That is enough money to accommodate an entire family in downtown Vancouver for 1 month. I was shaking for hours after visiting the YANA office. I was charged with something much bigger than myself; much more powerful.

I would like to personally thank everyone who supported this whimsical fundraiser – it became something because you made it into something. There is an undefinable energy that radiates from the collaborations like this one and putting our time, money or skills into our humanity is never wasted. We are rewarded every step of the way because contribution is the glue that holds us together.

Thank you to Alissa Pratt, Kathy Yendall, Tara Moose, The Kids at Comox Valley Child Development Centre, Jeniffer Lewis, Lena & Stephen Saldivia-Jones, Hayley & Aniel Datoo, Carolyn Mulvaney, Gillian Benard, Mark Benard, Mark Planiden, Jim Whyte, Alissa Mather, Brian Chow, Courtnay Verbrugge, Pam Tessman, Brent Ried, Brian Mather, Sue McKeeman, Marika Gould, Meg Cursons, Dave Prothero, Robin Rivers, Hans Peter Meyer, Matt Rader, and of course Taylor Conroy who got the ball rolling on the whole endeavor.