Mental illness is a pretty serious issue that touches millions of lives all over the world every year. Last year, in New Hampshire alone, the National Alliance on Mental Illness’s New Hampshire chapter provided education, support and advocacy for more than 21,000 individuals affected by mental illness – that’s a lot for a state with a population just a little over a million.
That’s why NAMIWalks NH, taking place this Sunday, is such an important event for the organization. The walk, now in its 16th year, is the largest mental health education and fundraising effort in the state, bringing several hundred walkers and supporters together to celebrate mental illness recovery, honor those who have lost their lives to mental illness and to raise money and combat the stigma around mental illness. It’s also just a day for the community to come together and have some fun while helping out an important cause.
One of the defining features of NAMIWalks NH is that while it is the biggest fundraiser of the year for the organization, there is no fee to register and no minimum fundraising amount – if you can only come up with 20 bucks, that’s just fine, said Brittany Porter, development associate with NAMI NH.
“We want it to be open to all,” she said.
While it might not be as popular as, say, the Making Strides walk or the Rock ‘N’ Race, NAMIWalks NH is still a big deal. Last year’s event saw a record-breaking 1,200 participants, who raised more than $60,000. As of last Thursday, there were already 772 registered participants for this year’s walk, up from the 521 that were registered last year at this time. Revenue is at $72,589, up from $60,096 last year at this time. So the fundraising total has already blown last year’s total away, and there’s still plenty of time to sign up and donate.
“The goal is generally based on revenue from last year and trying to increase the goal from year to year,” Porter said of NAMI NH’s fundraising target. Looks like they should be pretty happy with the results so far.
The event will be much more than just a walk. The regular walk is a 5K, but there will be a shorter route as well. There will also be a grilled lunch of hot dogs and hamburgers, plus a puppet show, a dog costume contest, a bounce house, music, a bubble station, zumba, clowns, face painting, balloons, a raffle and more – and all of it is free. It’s just a big day of fun for the whole family.
The walk will take place at the soccer fields on South Fruit Street, with on-site registration opening at 9 a.m. and the walk getting underway at 10:30. You can also register online ahead of time by going to namiwalks.org and clicking the “View More” button under the “Find a NAMIWalks” heading and choosing the Concord walk.
The walk is open to all people of all ages. Porter said many of the walkers are people who either suffer from a form of mental illness or have friends or family members who have experienced mental illness.
NAMI is a national organization, with chapters in dozens of cities across the country. While there are many branches of NAMI, the walks are not nationally coordinated – each city has its own walk on its own date, and if there are any that happen on the same day it’s just coincidence, Porter said. Some larger areas hold multiple walks per year, but since Concord doesn’t fall into that category, there’s just the one – though based on the early numbers, it seems like the Concord walk does just fine with the fundraising.
NAMI New Hampshire is a grassroots organization working to improve the quality of life for all by providing support, education and advocacy for people affected by mental illness. Learn more about NAMIWalks NH and the vital work of NAMI NH by visiting naminh.org or calling 1-800-242-6264. More information specifically about the walks can be found at namiwalks.org.
