JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Hundreds of people walked together Saturday at the Jacksonville Arboretum and Botanical Gardens to raise money to find a cure for arthritis.
Arthritis means inflammation of the joints and can cause pain as well as loss of movement.
According to the Arthritis Foundation, at least 60 million Americans live with the disease, including 300,000 children.
Alexis Sandler is 12 years old. For the last five years, she’s been suffering from arthritis.
“Sometimes it is hard when I want to hang out. It hurts. Sometimes I have to not be able to hang out or do some things because it is tough for tiring. I get tired easily,” Sandler said.
WATCH | Walk to Cure Arthritis: Nearly 60M Americans, including 300K children affected
Sandler’s specific form of arthritis is called juvenile idiopathic arthritis. She said it severely affects the joints in her left arm and left leg.
Her mother, Rachel, said it’s a guessing game of how each day will go.
“Every day is an up and down roller coaster some days she will wake up in Pain, so it is going to be a hard struggle for the day. Other days she is just fine and is not feeling any pain,” Rachel said. “Just came home one day from school and said that she had pain and cannot figure out what it was from. It took about five months for us to find out what she had.”
This walk helped people like Sandler continue to do things they enjoy without worrying — things like horseback riding, dancing and being a Girl Scout.
“I definitely see that in my daughter. She is so persistent and eager to do everything. She does not let the arthritis stop her,” Rachel said.
The goal for the Arthritis Foundation was to raise at least $38,000 for research to hopefully one day find a cure. That goal was easily surpassed way before the walk even started. As of Saturday morning, they had raised more than $42,000.
That money would help find a cure for people like Raj Samaluru who was diagnosed with psoriasis more than 20 years ago. But the next phase of that for him now is psoriatic arthritis, which he has been battling for the last few years.
“It is terrible. Your hands are so stiff. Your fingers are so stiff. You cannot even bend or make them straight. It just feels like they are stuck and anytime you try to move them there’s a lot of pain,” Samaluru said.
The support being shown through this walk for people like Sandler, Samaluru and the millions of others.
“Life goes on right? We definitely have to keep moving. There is a lot of support around us,” Samaluru said.
It means a great deal to them.
“It is cool because there are so many people who want to help out people with arthritis so that they don’t have to live with pain every day,” Sandler said.
According to the Arthritis Foundation, one in four Americans is diagnosed with a form of arthritis. There are more than 100 different types of arthritis and related conditions.