Soaring Words

This week in September has been set aside as National Chronic Illness Awareness Week.
None of us likes to think of any child being ill, but the truth is each year it is estimated that 18% of all children in the U.S. suffer from chronic illnesses. (Source: American Academy of Pediatrics). This means that each year 22 million children and their families and friends, potentially 66 million people in all, face the challenges presented by these catastrophic illnesses.

Soaringwords' mission is to empower communities to embrace ill children and their families to inspire them to "Never give up!" Doctors and hospitals provide medical care, while Soaringwords provides in-person and online support to help boost the child's self-esteem and to reduce feelings of isolation. The fun, creative and educational healing activities provided by Soaringwords include story telling, poetry, art, songs, and photography.

Soaringwords Vision
Soaringwords' success is fueled by volunteers who want to do something fun and meaningful to make hospitalized children and their families feel loved and supported. Many Corporations, Boys & Girls Clubs, community groups, and schools have already embraced over 150,000 children and families through many programs across the Nation.

How Soaringwords Serves Your Community
Soaringwords enlists the help of schools, special-need schools, JCCs, YMCAs, churches, synagogues, after-school programs, community outreach centers, and businesses to create meaningful experiences for chronically ill children. These events bring children, families and seniors together to do something positive to inspire ill children. Our ability to inspire patients to boldly embrace their own healing and to actively help others has strong roots in the tradition embodying Hillel's adage "If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for others, what am I? And if not now, when?"

We enlist healing resources from the "best of the best" leaders in mind-body wellness (Dr. Ron Taffel, Dr. Marc Siegel, Dr. Gerald Epstein, Rachel Naomi Remen) along with an extensive repertoire of fun and therapeutic activities which are enjoyed in hospital clinics, hospital rooms, pediatric and family lounges, and community settings. Soaringwords initiatives also embrace at-risk children in foster care, and children and families who have been affected by catastrophic events (such as 9/11) and natural disasters, such as Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Soaringwords initiatives can be layered onto your company's existing programs with local schools, Boys & Girls Clubs, and Big Brothers, Big Sisters programs.

Soaringwords Actvities
Soaringwords' signature event is decorating SoaringQuilts and SoaringPillows with colorful pictures and inspirational messages for hospitalized children. People come together to decorate the quilts and pillows and then bring them to the hospitals to give them directly to the children. People who have completed a Soaringwords project know how rewarding their efforts have been when they see these children receive the beautiful and thoughtful gifts. We also encourage the children in the hospitals to create personal messages and pictures for other children who are sick. This event creates an instant community where everyone involved feels a part of the healing process.

The Soaringwords Resource Center, www.soaringwords.org, is a tremendous resource with the potential to reach millions of children nationwide and around the world with the kinds of interactive experiences that kids love. Some of the tangible healing activities include: Storytelling, Poetry, Art, Songs and Photography.

Please visit SoaringWords for a tour of their inspiring website today.