It is our intention that you get to know your Board Members a little bit better. In future editions of Hopes & Dreams, we will 'showcase' the members of your Illinois Chapter Board of HDSA and their 'message to the people.'
Maryann Moynihan
Newsletter Editor
(708/862-1364)
mmoyniha@bcsinc.com
I became active in the Illinois Chapter of HDSA in 1994 after attending my first National Convention in Des Moines, Iowa with my parents and becoming motivated to do more on a local level regarding HD (my mom has HD). At my first board meeting, I offered my desktop publishing, layout, and keyboarding skills to the chapter and volunteered to take over the Newsletter creation for the Illinois Chapter. As anyone knows who has been to our board meetings, if you come and volunteer, your in!!! So that is how my devotion to publishing this quarterly newsletter came to pass.
Some of you may not know, but our Illinois Chapter Newsletter, Hopes & Dreams, was nominated at the 1998 and 1999 National Conventions for outstanding chapter newsletter. Our chapter did not take home this award but we will continue to strive to receive this outstanding recognition. Our newsletter reaches approximately 2,000 persons each quarter. From families to doctors to nursing homes to psychologists. The more people that come in contact with us the better our chances are to continue to fight this disease till treatment and a cure is found.
HDSA does not have a celebrity spokesperson such as Michael J. Fox who is battling Parkinson's or Montel Williams who has MS to help us spread the word about HD and raise awareness and needed funds for research efforts. We are each ordinary people pushing along day-to-day in handling this disease as best we can and raising awareness by holding fundraising events such as our first-ever Illinois State Conference in April.
If I can just encourage you to come out to the upcoming events that the Illinois Chapter is sponsoring during the next year, all I can say is you won't be sorry. I am very much a loaner myself and have a very hard time meeting new people but I've got to tell you, I feel SO much better after being in the company of people affected by HD in their lives. These are people who understand what I'm feeling without me even opening my mouth. I get recharged after these events and am much more focused on what I need to do in my roles as a shared-caregiver and as an at-risk person.
Be sure to come say 'hi' to me at the upcoming events and be assured that I'll know how much effort it took you to get there and I'll also know you won't be sorry for attending!!! On a more personal level, I will be turning 40 on December 23rd of this year (YIKES!!), I'm divorced with no children and for the past 13 years have lived in the suburb of Calumet City, IL. Since 1994, I've been an Administrative Assistant for Blackwell Consulting Services, an IT firm in downtown Chicago. Prior to joining Blackwell Consulting, I worked for the IBM Corporation for 14 years in the capacity of Word Processing/Graphics Specialist.
My mom, Danette, currently resides in the Holland Home in South Holland, Illinois (this is a Retirement/Assisted Living facility). The Moynihan clan consists of my 2 sisters and their husbands, my brother and his wife, and 4 terrific nieces. My father passed away 7 years ago. I enjoy reading to an extreme and I am an avid crocheter.
Created and maintained by Renette Davis. Send comments to Renette by clicking here.
Created: Jan. 27, 2000
Last updated: Dec. 4, 2010