Support Yvette in her fight against ALS.

My amazing friend Yvette Saar was recently diagnosed with the crippling disease ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) and she needs the help, love, and compassion of our human community beyond her immediate circle. If you are not familiar with ALS, it is also known as Lou Gehrig's disease. Or perhaps you heard of Stephen Hawking or Senator Jacob Javitz or actor David Niven or Sesame Street Creator Jon Stone – all are other people who had ALS or a form of it. But let me tell you about my friend Yvette.

Yvette really does not want this GoFundMe set up because she’s a very private, independent, proud person and the last thing she wants is charity. But as her friends, we know she cannot do this alone and decided to put out this call to action. There is a long road ahead. This disease is not one where we can sit and wait for possible insurance benefits to kick in or the hoops of bureaucracy to be jumped through. There is no time to waste. Every day counts in this race against ALS – literally every hour matters to get the right resources in place to get Yvette on a path to living as comfortably as possible with ALS.

So why should you care about this total stranger? Well, we can tell you why we care. Yvette is a beautiful and vibrant native New Yorker, and she has a light that shines from deep within her that touches everyone and everything around her. Her smile and laugh are contagious and infectious. Before ALS, she led an extremely active lifestyle, so ALS is devastating to her on this front. She has not lived a privileged life and has experienced much hardship in her life. She is a widow and is a single mother to her 2 beautiful 16-year twin girls (she was a single mother of 3, however, she just lost her first oldest daughter a year ago way too early). We intend to surround her with all the basics so she can focus on the battle ahead. This ALS disease is going to be an expensive, drawn-out fight and we need all the help we can muster.

So please help us. Your donation – even if only the cost of a cup of coffee - will go towards the things that will set her up for success. Things like lawyer fees, renovations such as a ramp and walk-in shower, therapy, rehabilitation equipment, and necessities.

Lastly - if you don’t feel comfortable helping us as strangers, we please ask you to consider donating to the ALS community in general as there is no cure for ALS. Please visit ALS.org (https://als.org ) for information on your local ALS chapter as they are dedicated to finding a cure.

Thank you for your consideration to support our dear friend Yvette because ultimately, we all believe – we are STRONGER TOGETHER.