This year, I had the privilege of being Team Captain for Home Instead in 4 separate community events, including the Parkinson’s Association of San Diego 5k walk on August 21st and the Alzheimer’s Association “Walk to End Alz” 5k on October 9th.
The Home Instead team raised over $400. Each event was successful raising high-dollar funding for Research & Development as well as increasing community exposure about many of the current challenges families face with aging.
As a healthy youth, it is often too easy to brush off the concern of aging. Such effects of aging are seen as something to worry about "later" and it is too easy to view Dementia or Parkinson’s as something to consider "far down the road".
However, that timetable is not guaranteed and you never know when it will affect you or someone you love. Parkinson’s and Dementia are a reality. They are a challenge most of us will face. In fact, Alzheimer’s San Diego reports that more than 84,000 in our community are living with dementia, a number that has increased from 65,000 in the past 5 years. AlzSD even states "There is truly an Alzheimer’s crisis here in San Diego County. While it’s the 6th-leading cause of death nationally, it’s the 3rd-leading cause of death locally." (Alzsd.org)
This increase in Alzheimer’s is one of many reasons why I believe it’s important to invest in your community and build local awareness. To not invest in and nurture your community is, in a sense, to not invest in yourself and to not invest in yourself, is a plan to fail. With such an unsettling increase in the numbers of aging adults with dementia in our local San Diego community, it is important to have a set plan. And it's important to invest in it personally.
A successful plan has been that of the Alzheimers and Parkinson’s walks put on in the San Diego community. In the past these walks have been a huge success.
The 2021 Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s 5k events were almost no different than those pre-COVID-19. For a few moments, in the chilly hours of each morning, as music blared over the speakers and families connected over a single cause, I forgot all about the pandemic, politics, and anxious distractions. My mental bandwidth was occupied by meeting the needs of the community. I felt empowered - I have a way to help the person in need who stood next to me, a fellow American. This made me smile. I felt renewed- something small that made a big difference...just like the occasional drop of dew that made its way into my shoes, as I walked across those long wet grassy fields.
These events are more than just small moments. These events are the embodiment of well-made plans that are the stage for more, future successful changes. Changes that will benefit the community, create a lasting impact, resulting in truly enhanced lives. I enjoy representing Home Instead in being this beacon of hope and light for such a future.
I look forward to more opportunities to lead Home Instead in meeting the needs of our San Diego community.
This year isn’t over yet! We have made a lot of successful progress and there’s still plenty of opportunity to serve!
I’ll see you out there!
