PJ Day 2019 – Friday March 1, 2019

This March 1, don your PJ’s, bathrobes, slippers, and toques, take the ‘PJ Day Spirit’ and fly with it. Now it belongs to you.

Wear your PJ’s all day. Get co-workers to as well. Make PJ Day a school day, a work day, a play day, a concert day, a yoga day, a jogging day, a skiing day, a curling day, a coffee day, a biking day, a dinner party day, your call, your gig. Take pics, and share them online with a #PJday2019 (if on Facebook, make your posts public so we can all see them). If you want to donate to a charity, drop our name so they know the idea is for everyone to work together. Understanding that this is the way to find the answer.

March 1st also happens to be the first day of Autoimmune Disease Awareness Month, so for the diehards, you’ve got all kinds of other events to carry you on. March 1st is also one day after Rare Disease Day, a category many autoimmune diseases fall into when looked at singularly. Fighting for orphan drugs, or trying to figure out how to pay for that off label use of an expensive drug that will save your life. Yeah. That.

Herein lies the point. Autoimmune disease is its own disease because of the same etiology of the whole collection of ailments under that umbrella. It directly affects 20% of the population, yet we approach it as a bunch of different rare diseases and each silo of research is looking for a cure for that specific rare disease. Not a lot of support (financial, emotional, medical, physical, scientific, social, etc.) within this paradigm, however the knowledge that 20% of the population is affected by one disease, that has no cure, can render the afflicted with permanent disability, and usually involves a lifetime of toxic medication… that’s worth fighting against, and those people (and their families) are worth fighting for.

Also. We find a cure for one, we find a cure for all.
So the day we hear of a cure, that will change the whole game.

A Quick Recap

Find the Common Thread Foundation started as a group of like-minded individuals working to raise awareness for and help in the efforts to eradicate one of the costliest yet least talked about disease groups of our time. Over the years we’ve had many successes and a lot of fun times. Throughout the existence of the foundation, we’ve collectively lost some amazing humans to this disease, and we’ve been inspired by their strength, courage, humility and dignity throughout the process. Our losses were both local and global in nature as autoimmune disease has no borders, nor preference to age, race, or gender, it is an indiscriminate mercenary. For them and the more than a billion other folks around the world, we gotta keep our PJ’s on, just one day.

As an aside, you’ll be shocked at how amazing PJ’s at work is… we seem to be most productive, open to creative problem solving and relaxed conversationalists in our PJ’s – as I write this in my PJ’s, ha ha. Check out our PJ Day archives here.

 

What is Autoimmune Disease?

Autoimmune Disease is akin to having Homeland Security turn on its own population. It’s not a malicious attack but one based on confusion, and a lack of the ability to recognize self from non-self, the good guys from the bad guys, the cells in the body necessary for survival from the invaders like bacteria, viruses, cancer cells, parasites. Quite often the immune response of an Autoimmune Disease patient is strong, and has the ability to kill the patient quite efficiently. Treatment often revolves around suppressing the immune system with chemotherapeutic drugs (often same ones used with cancer patients) and corticosteroids (prednisone) to decrease the inflammatory response that comes with an immune response, as well as a box full of others to either make up for elements destroyed by the autoimmune disease, or ones to offset the negative side effects of the drugs keeping us alive – it’s a delicate balancing act.

There is no cure, and treatment is often toxic only addressing the symptoms or damage incurred, with remission being a best case scenario, and risk of death due to complications almost as heavy as the risks of the disease itself killing the patient.

If the disease or treatment doesn’t kill the patient, quality of life can be significantly reduced for indefinite periods of time with reprieves of remission in between.

There are over 140 Autoimmune Diseases and Disorders (and that number is growing) affecting 1 in 5 people, 3 out of 4 of which are female. Understanding the immune system will give researchers answers to other chronic and costly diseases including cancer, heart and stroke, mental health, AIDS, and more. Autoimmune Disease is the missing link to finding a cure for most of our costly (socially, economically, and emotionally) diseases of our time, and it itself is a burden too heavy to comprehend on our economics, and our society. Autoimmune is today where cancer was in the 1970’s and it affects far more people. See here for more info.

TOGETHER we can make a difference. Apart we will just continue to spend time, money and effort to keep status quo unchanged. Together we can change the world.

Donate to YOUR most meaningful charity

In 2019, we would like to see the PJ movement go in its own direction. Our challenge to you is to wear your PJ’s all day Friday, March 1, 2019. The more people that wear their PJ’s the more we see how this disease affects us all. If you want to take it one step further and donate some money, we ask that you donate to YOUR family charity. There are 140 diseases, and many reputable charities to support. Awareness and inspiring future ‘disruptors’ is our primary goal.

About a billion thanks.