{"id":8065,"date":"2023-12-19T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-12-19T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/?p=8065"},"modified":"2023-12-19T08:00:00","modified_gmt":"2023-12-19T13:00:00","slug":"this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/","title":{"rendered":"This Is My Why with James Harrison"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>There are a lot of times that people who do not have to deal with a life-long illness or rare disease do not understand why there is so much passion around the cause or supporting that illness or disease.\u00a0 I want to share one of my whys.\u00a0 This blog comes at a challenging time.\u00a0 I will share the background with you.\u00a0 On December 2nd, my family and I were gathered in Nashville to celebrate a family member who passed her exam to become a Registered Nurse on her very 1st try.\u00a0 I have a picture below that shows the 4th Generation of the family, along with my 2 Sickle Cell Warriors.\u00a0 We had an awesome time, an awesome celebration.\u00a0 Well, in less than a week, as pictured below, my daughter had to receive two units of blood because she was having a sickle cell pain attack.\u00a0 The pain attack was triggered because she had a double ear infection.\u00a0 A double ear infection can be a normal illness during the change of weather.\u00a0 What is normal to someone without sickle cell, such as an ear infection, is a risk for someone with sickle cell disease.\u00a0 There are things that people with regular blood cells take for granted.\u00a0 Although a person with normal blood cells will still have to work through the illness, a person with sickle cell disease will always have to wonder if this simple illness will trigger a sickle cell crisis or pain attack, which multiplies the illness.\u00a0 A simple cold, ear infection, or virus can turn into pneumonia or a crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In less than a week, my sickle cell warrior had to deal with being hospitalized and receiving multiple units of blood because of the uncertainty and unpredictability of how her body responded to the ear infection.\u00a0 This uncertainty is also very frustrating for a sickle cell warrior and their network.\u00a0 There is no more helpless feeling than watching someone you love suffer, and you cannot do anything to ease the pain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This helpless feeling is what originally motivated me to start training for the half marathon.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Once again, IT\u2019S on!!!\u00a0 I am going after my goals with a raging inferno burning inside of me\u2026. increasing donors, specifically diverse donors, increasing Sickle Cell Disease awareness, and 10,000 donors are the goals\u2026 One Dad Can!!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-gallery has-nested-images columns-default is-cropped wp-block-gallery-1 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"768\" height=\"1024\" data-id=\"8066\" src=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-8066\" srcset=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1.jpg 1149w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"767\" height=\"1024\" data-id=\"8067\" src=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture2-767x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-8067\" srcset=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture2-767x1024.jpg 767w, https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture2-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture2-768x1025.jpg 768w, https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture2.jpg 1044w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 767px) 100vw, 767px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There are a lot of times that people who do not have to deal with a life-long illness or rare disease do not understand why there is so much passion around the cause or supporting that illness or disease.\u00a0 I want to share one of my whys.\u00a0 This blog comes at a challenging time.\u00a0 I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-one-dad-can"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>This Is My Why with James Harrison - Medic Blood<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"This Is My Why with James Harrison - Medic Blood\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There are a lot of times that people who do not have to deal with a life-long illness or rare disease do not understand why there is so much passion around the cause or supporting that illness or disease.\u00a0 I want to share one of my whys.\u00a0 This blog comes at a challenging time.\u00a0 I [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Medic Blood\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/medicblood\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-12-19T13:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin_Med1cB10odW\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@MEDICblood\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@MEDICblood\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin_Med1cB10odW\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin_Med1cB10odW\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9ff3da0bb7b2027058f2928b3eaa3d39\"},\"headline\":\"This Is My Why with James Harrison\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-12-19T13:00:00+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/\"},\"wordCount\":393,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"One Dad Can\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/\",\"name\":\"This Is My Why with James Harrison - Medic Blood\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-12-19T13:00:00+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1.jpg\",\"width\":1149,\"height\":1532},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"This Is My Why with James Harrison\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/\",\"name\":\"Medic Blood\",\"description\":\"MEDIC Regional Blood Center\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Medic Blood\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/medic_blood_logo_transparent.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/medic_blood_logo_transparent.png\",\"width\":350,\"height\":114,\"caption\":\"Medic Blood\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/medicblood\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/MEDICblood\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/medicbloodcenter\/\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9ff3da0bb7b2027058f2928b3eaa3d39\",\"name\":\"admin_Med1cB10odW\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4c71175dd08389dcb40b58bb1c2d937f5e2d356ba229abf8ab08c3764205ee06?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4c71175dd08389dcb40b58bb1c2d937f5e2d356ba229abf8ab08c3764205ee06?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"admin_Med1cB10odW\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/author\/admin_med1cb10odw\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"This Is My Why with James Harrison - Medic Blood","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"This Is My Why with James Harrison - Medic Blood","og_description":"There are a lot of times that people who do not have to deal with a life-long illness or rare disease do not understand why there is so much passion around the cause or supporting that illness or disease.\u00a0 I want to share one of my whys.\u00a0 This blog comes at a challenging time.\u00a0 I [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/","og_site_name":"Medic Blood","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/medicblood\/","article_published_time":"2023-12-19T13:00:00+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg","type":"","width":"","height":""}],"author":"admin_Med1cB10odW","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@MEDICblood","twitter_site":"@MEDICblood","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"admin_Med1cB10odW","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/"},"author":{"name":"admin_Med1cB10odW","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9ff3da0bb7b2027058f2928b3eaa3d39"},"headline":"This Is My Why with James Harrison","datePublished":"2023-12-19T13:00:00+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/"},"wordCount":393,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg","articleSection":["One Dad Can"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/","url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/","name":"This Is My Why with James Harrison - Medic Blood","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1-768x1024.jpg","datePublished":"2023-12-19T13:00:00+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Picture1.jpg","width":1149,"height":1532},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/this-is-my-why-with-james-harrison\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"This Is My Why with James Harrison"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/","name":"Medic Blood","description":"MEDIC Regional Blood Center","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#organization","name":"Medic Blood","url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/medic_blood_logo_transparent.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/medic_blood_logo_transparent.png","width":350,"height":114,"caption":"Medic Blood"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/medicblood\/","https:\/\/x.com\/MEDICblood","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/medicbloodcenter\/"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9ff3da0bb7b2027058f2928b3eaa3d39","name":"admin_Med1cB10odW","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4c71175dd08389dcb40b58bb1c2d937f5e2d356ba229abf8ab08c3764205ee06?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4c71175dd08389dcb40b58bb1c2d937f5e2d356ba229abf8ab08c3764205ee06?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"admin_Med1cB10odW"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/medicblood.org"],"url":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/author\/admin_med1cb10odw\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8065\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicblood.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}