Taking Stock – A Year Later
Traffic over time
About a year ago Health Rising rose out of the ashes (:)) and began. Two hundred and twenty blogs and over 200,000 visitors and 720,000 pageviews later, we can say it’s a pretty darn good year.
Traffic has steadily risen over time and we expect that to continue.
2014
ME/CFS Recovery Stories – Early next year we’ll begin a series of blogs on ME/CFS recovery stories as we dive into the over 100 recovery stories we’ve gathered over the past two years. Blogs were our focus last year. This year programs are going to be a focus.
Programs
The ‘Ask the Experts’ section will debut next year
Ask the Experts Section – the ME/CFS community will be able to ask a team of doctors and experts in various fields questions as our ‘Ask The Experts’ section debuts early next year.
Physician Review – The Physician Review program is moving forward. Several major fixes have been done and more are on the way. Once they’re done we will overhaul the presentation and get it out. It’s probably 80% done.
Watch your local community bloom with Community Rising
Community Rising – The Community Rising program will allow people to put themselves, doctors, support groups, clinical trials, events, etc. on a map and communicate with each other, is about 60% done. Once this program is up you’ll be able to find friends and support in your community you didn’t know were there.
Lives Interrupted – This program will show the costs, both in years and dollars lost, that people with ME/CFS have incurred over the years in dramatic fashion. It will also show just who gets ME/CFS. It’s going to be an eye opener.
Forums, finding good practitioners, (avoiding bad ones :)), asking experts, building local communities, documenting the costs of ME/CFS …The next year is going to be exciting. Please consider investing in these projects and supporting Health Rising.
Make an Impact – Invest in Health Rising!
Thanks!
Many thanks arWithout my father’s support none of this; Phoenix Rising or Health Rising would have occurred. The Simmaron Research Foundation and Courtney and Bob Miller have and continue to provide incredibly vital support for Health Rising. Without their support at a crucial time Health Rising might not exist. Thanks to Rich Carson and Prohealth for his support as a friend and Prohealth’s financial support over the past year and a half in particular.
Thanks to two donors who have been providing significant monthly support since early in 2010, and to everyone who supported HR financially this year with a special mention to Linda Reed and her husband.
Bloggers – Thanks to the many bloggers who contributed. In particular, thanks to Marco, with whom I’d just begun working with at Phoenix Rising, but who was willing to take a chance and publish his deeply researched Neuroinflammation Series on HR. His work and his delightful sense of humor has been very gratifying. Special thanks to Carol Lefelt for poignant series of blogs, Ken Lassesen for his provocative gut blogs, Johannes Starke for his intriguing blogs and personal support, Corinne Blandino for the same (good luck, Corinne!), Niki Gratrix for opening my eyes to gluten, Christine McLaughlin and Tim Vaughn and others.
Jim Wright – I came across Jim when an email popped in from someone who was livid at the some of the grammatical errors he’d caught. He’s been HR’s editor ever since. Jim’s spent many hours scouring my and others blogs to ensure that they at least approximate good English. I and Health Rising are very lucky to have such a dedicated editor. Jim’s wife has ME/CFS.
Dennis – without the research materials provided by Dennis I really don’t know how HR would exist :).
Stavya – thanks finally to Stavya for all his work on the tech end above and beyond the call. Stavya will be going back for the first time since he became ill to finish up his last semester of college. Good luck!
Cort and Health Rising team, thank you for timely and interesting reports on developments in the ME/CFS/FM world. I look forward to future reports as research progresses. Happy new year to all of you and thanks for your hard work.
Thanks. I think next year will be very interesting on the research front.
Thanks for this Cort. I’m truly excited about 2014 for you, and I’m thankful for the contributions from everyone on your team. Go HR!
Thank you, Joey and right back at you with HealClick 🙂
Thanks Cort, Keep up the good work. Hopeful for a healthier New Year!
Greg
Indeed! Thanks 🙂
Many thanks with deep appreciate for your hard work and perseverance.
Thanks Susan 🙂
Thanks for all your work, Cort, and all who have helped. Thanks also to those who support financially.
For many, Health Rising has been a beacon in the dark night. Cort, I appreciate your determination to hold fast your mission -despite what hardships you’ve encountered. I’ve seen your determination to uncover the secrets that lay at the bottom of our mysteries. Bringing the pieces of the puzzle together and articulating their meanings so that those that don’t have a good understanding of the complex workings of the body or the science can understand. Thus, bringing hope to the masses of us that fall under catagories of poorly understood dysfunction. I well know how tiring that gets. You manage to remain positive. Keep up the search, Cort. We are getting closer!
Issie
Thanks!
Cort – Thank you for Health Rising, it has brought me so much, congratulations for the growing and much deserved popularity, and … “Ask the experts”?! – Wow, that is an exciting addition! (so are the others of course but this one stands out!) Everything you always wanted to know about ME but did not have the CHANCE to ask. Too sick and housebound or living in the wrong place to see knowledgeable doctors… Great new program.
My best wishes to you and Health Rising and to everyone here for 2014.
Thanks Christian!
Cort. Thank you and the rest of the gang for all the hard work. I have learned so much. The plans for next year sound very exciting!
Happy New Year to all..we are getting there one baby step at a time. So much is happening…finally!
THANK YOU FOR YOUR EXCELENT REPORTS AND GOOD LUCK
AND HAPPY NEW YEAR
Cort, the team, and financial backers – ditto to all the above!
Cort – you are my GO TO for EVERYTHING I have the energy to read. As mentioned before, South Africa does not support ME and I have no doctor or specialist. You are the person who has made my ME life bearable. I have gained a huge amount of knowledge from you and applaud your gargantuan efforts on behalf of ME/CFS sufferers the world over. Thank you again. Margaret
Thanks Margaret 🙂
Thank you Cort, and team, for all the information you have given me over the years; having information about ME has made it much easier to live with ME.
Good luck with this next year and I am really forward to reading stuff that I can understand.
I’ll do my best 🙂
I’ve just read elsewhere that 2014 will kick off with a full moon. A relatively rare event that last happened in 1995.
Astrologers suggest that this along with other astrological events means that 2014 will be a year of great change and renewal – stripping away of the old, purification and rebirth.
I don’t know about that – I never read horoscopes or similar and always believed that you make your own luck – but I’ve a really good feeling about the year to come.
For the first time in recent years I have a feeling that we’re about to get some real answers – there just seems to be so much momentum and all homing in on a smaller number of key areas.
Here’s to a REALLY good 2014 with Health Rising going from strength to strength!
I’ll take that full moon and the idea of rebirth personally :)…
I think you’re right; I think we are getting so much closer and I think we’ll get help from other disorders; that’s very encouraging. I have a good feeling about next year.
Thanks Cort. Keep on the good work and your optimism. Are the visitors on your website unique visitors?
Dear Cort, Health Rising team, and supporters,
I am very happy with how Health Rising has developed this year. The essence of Cort’s journalism, which I perceive as clear writing and absolute authenticity, shines brightly through every page of this website.
I am also excited about your focus on projects in 2014. I find it incredible how much good you do with your limited resources. I wish you continued success and a clear focus on the projects that the Health Rising community finds most important.
With gratitude for what you’ve done this year and excitement for what will happen in 2014,
Johannes
Thanks Johannes and thanks for you personal support over the past couple of years. I’m not a very good patient, but I appreciate it a lot. 🙂
Thanks so much Cort for your generosity and for your accessible and informative articles. You have made me feel that there is light at the end of the tunnel for my daughter.
Cort,
I don’t know how to find the words to say thank you for your perseverance in continuing to provide all these insights to those of us struggling with this monster. Your example has been an encouragement to many of us and your well written, concise, and informative postings on your sites have opened my eyes to many possibilities. I love the directions you’ve been developing for 2014 and I really can’t wait to see these fleshed out in the new year. Many prayers and blessings to you for a year of actionable discoveries and better health.
Gratefully,
Julie
Thanks Julie!
Cort, I would like to give my heartfelt thanks to you and your team for all the clear information you’ve supplied over the last few years. With the help of your writing I’ve been able to discern the causes and possible medical aids for several of my most troubling symptoms and to make my life more comfortable as a result.
Please keep it up!
Regards, Lynne
Thanks for all you’ve done to help with my posts over the past year, as well as for all the information and different perspectives. I look forward to what you project for next year. Best wishes to all for a healthier 2014.
Thanks, Cort. I agree with others that the New Moon called a Supermoon which is starting off 2014 is a great sign for a new start. The New Moon is for creating and setting intentions and aspirations so it makes sense for us all to hold the positive outcome we need for ME/CFS.
Many people have been working all around the world to make changes for the ME/CFS community as well as other related illnesses. It is starting to come together…at last. You are keeping these pieces together like glue for us to see at a glance. It sounds like Health Rising is just getting started. Wishing a great New Year to you, your team and all your readers.
Hey Cort!
With my endless research, perusing website to website to website, I finally found what I consider to be the DE FACTO platform for anything autoimmune, even if it’s dedicated to CFS/ME. It is the one site that has PRACTICAL (AKA “common sense”) yet pioneering thinking! I feel blessed to have this as a resource.
After developing my condition, I made a promise that if I can sustain a decent amount of health, that I would sufficiently devote myself to working on projects that could help causes aimed at research for treatments and cures. Treatment and cures for what I believe are the root cause of our ailments (as you know, I subscribe to the theory of latent-infecting viruses and bacteria).
Thanks for allowing me to be a part of this community. -Albert
Thanks, Cort. It’s a pleasure to work for Health Rising. Wishing everyone here a very happy new year! 🙂
Cort:
Thank you and many blessings for what you have created.
I had long since given up looking for information on ME/CFS. What a great resource library of articles to review. It’s like a candy store to a kid. Have a great year and I will follow along and join in when I can.
Good work in general, Cort Johnson and thanks for all you have done. I’m surprised you intend to publish stories of “recovery” though on several grounds. First, I have never met someone with ME who has truly recovered to their post illness condition. The “recoveries” I’m aware of are actually just variable improvements in quality of life achieved with primarily self-learned management strategies. Second, how will you know those who “recovered” actually had ME and not something else? The risk in publishing these “recovery” stories is that the public could falsely assume that ME is a relatively trivial illness that can be beaten without some kind of formal treatment.
It’s true it’s impossible to determine who had what at this point. All we can say is that someone has been diagnosed by a doctor with ME/CFS. I can tell you, though, that many of the stories come from people who were very debilitated, many start with a flu-like onset and that a wide variety of treatments were used. Looking at how debilitated many of these people were (which will be described in the blogs), and the long road to recovery many of them took I think most people will get what a problem it is.
There’s also the fact that I have about a hundred stories of which I got maybe 30 replies from the blog I posted requesting stories and that blog has been viewed thousands of times…not a particularly response rate which suggests, as we would guess, that recovery is pretty rare. That will included in the blog as well as proviso’s about the great heterogeneity present in ME/CFS population.
The recoveries appear to be very real with many people stating they are 100%, they are working full time and exercising full time.