ALS ice bucket challenge

I typically make it a point to not follow trends. I've never had a man crush monday or throw back thursday, I don't post "truth is" statuses or do a whole lot to garter towards the typical social scene, a lot of times I think the social scenes are stupid.

This is different.

I was nominated to do the ALS ice bucket challenge, as I'm sure many others have been. This is a "trend" I happily accepted.

No, it's not that I was particularly excited to throw freezing cold water on my head. Though, just throwing it out there, you do burn more calories when you're in the cold because your body has to work harder to keep it's regular temperature up, so uh, I probably burned a few extra calories this way.

But anyway, if you're unfamiliar with amoyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrigs disease, it is a disease which affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. It is fatal. It is progressive, as the disease progresses those suffering from it will eventually become paralyzed, losing even the ability to talk or breathe on their own.

Here is my ALS ice bucket challenge.

Now I've seen a lot of people complaining about the ice bucket challenge, if you're one of those people who think it is stupid, well this one is for you.

Since July 29th over 40 million has been raised for ALS research. This is a horribly underfunded cause, last year in the same span of time they had raised only around 2 million, they had only raise 19.4 million in an entire year last year! There have been over 760,000 new donors in just these past few weeks.

The ice bucket challenge is about more than just raising money though. It is about awareness. And let me tell ya, you would have had to have your head stuck in the sand for quite a while to be missing this one. Before this challenge even started a lot of people didn't even know what ALS was! Myself included, I had heard of Lou Gehrig's disease before, but like so many others my focus was on breast cancer, autism, and causes like the march of dimes. Don't get me wrong, these are all charities we should be funding, if you catch wind of a MS walk or gay rights parade by all means, march away. These are the things everyone knows about though. ALS is something terribly horrifying that so many people in our world are oblivious to! The ALS ice bucket challenge has for the first time since 1939 that the disease has really been front and center in our faces.

I've seen a few post about how "if you feel so bad for people with ALS why not do something about it!" I've seen "It's so sad that so many people would rather dump water on their head than donate to ALS" I even saw "For all you people posting how awesome you are on a social website for dumping water on your head and how much you actually care about ALS me and my boyfriend actually care about the people with ALS and are making cards for them!" First off, we are doing something about it! We're raising awareness! Second off, just because we dumped doesn't mean we didn't donate. I'll admit I didn't donate the full $100, but I'm barely scraping by as it is with two kids a minimum wage job and zero financial help from dad, most of the people who dump also donate. The average ALS donation is ranging around $46, so if that's the average and they've made 40 million, obviously every dollar counts. And third off, to the couple who is so much better than everyone else for not publicly doing something for attention, your nasty post and bragging about what you're doing is no better than are dumping...actually, it's just about the same...AND IT'S STILL A GOOD THING!

I've seen quite a few videos featuring someone who knows or even has ALS, but this particular one here is one that made me the most emotional. It's a very powerful video, and it really is something everyone who hates the ALS ice bucket challenge should watch.

Here are some facts about ALS, some of them might even surprise you.

• 30,000 Americans currently have the disease.
• Is usually diagnosed between 40-70 years of age but can start much later.
• The 29 year old who started the trend was diagnosed in 2012
• Men are 20% more likely to be affected
• 93% of people diagnosed are white
• Military veterans are one of the most affected group.
• Only about 10% of cases are hereditary. 
• Most live only 2-5 years to live
• Most ALS deaths are from respiratory distress.
• There is no known cure for ALS
• Lou Gehrig lived only two years after being diagnosed

And now, just for grins and giggles here is my post-icebucketchallenge selfie, a picture of my battle wounds (ice cut me!) And just because a photo grid with only two pictures is lame here's one of my best friend after she accepted my nomination.

Now I challenge YOU.