OUR STORY
Burning Nights CRPS Support began as a fairly small UK non profit organisation to help those affected by the chronic pain condition; Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS.) It is now a fully registered UK charity dedicated to CRPS.
The idea of the website and organisation was thought of by the Founder and Chair of Trustees for the charity; Victoria Abbott-Fleming. Victoria has suffered with CRPS since an accident at work in 2003 and during the time she has had CRPS, she has needed both her legs to be amputated above the knee due to aggressive and extreme symptoms of CRPS. You can read Victoria’s story on her Founder’s page in our website. So how exactly did Burning Nights all begin?
BIRTH of BURNING NIGHTS CRPS SUPPORT
Burning Nights CRPS Support began as the title for Victoria’s, the founder and chair or trustees, autobiography that she is currently trying to get published and has been writing for a few years now. The actual words for the title for the book was because of the burning pain from the CRPS that she felt as a sufferer, along with thousands of other CRPS sufferers and because it burnt more at night after the day was over and things calmed down. So the name ‘Burning Nights’ it was! After Victoria was told in July 2014 that it was very likely she would need her 2nd leg amputated because of the aggressive and severe symptoms she had, she decided that she wanted to create an awareness website for CRPS sufferers in the UK and worldwide. Before this point in her time with the condition, Victoria had been far too poorly and in hospital so much that there was no possible way that she could do what she wanted to do to help other sufferers and their families, friends, carers and loved ones. The website, social media and content was finally up and running on 1st September 2014. So this was how Burning Nights CRPS Support began.
OUR LOGO
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However we now needed a logo! This proved to be very tricky indeed as we wanted something that wasn’t just the standard orange awareness ribbon that most non-profits and charities use. The design was created by LINDSEY McCORMACK in Phoenix, Arizona USA. Lindsey is a fantastic graphic designer who does work for clients corporate, non-profit and charities both in the USA and worldwide, making her an exceptional person to go to in the need of designs! You can see her design work on her DRIBBBLE PROFILE PAGE (dribbble.com/lamccormack) Lindsey gave us the logo and all the copyright to it, which meant that we could copyright our beautiful logo here in the UK, which is what we have now.
[Tweet theme=”tweet-box-shadow”]Learn more about how #BurningNights became a #CRPS #charity www.burningnightscrps.org/ourstory/[/Tweet]
THE BEGINNING OF BURNING NIGHTS CRPS SUPPORT
When Victoria finally found a great web design company to help her fulfill the task of setting up the website, she wasn’t disappointed in her eventual choice after some problems not concerning the company. The content for the website was written and one of the main aims for the website and for more importantly Burning Nights, is that the everything is evidence based and is as up to date as possible. This is a philosophy of Burning Nights is to ensure that you, the reader, can be reassured that the information we give out is accurate and current.
Products and awareness leaflets were added to the website along with an online community forum where sufferers as well as loved ones, family members, friends and carers can go and chat with others like you who have lived with the condition and who are going through life with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS). Burning Nights became a non-profit organisation and we didn’t realise the actual desperate need for our website, information and products from sufferers, family members, and friends as well as the need from the medical professionals themselves.
The social media side of Burning Nights CRPS Support grew and grew and now we have a great set of admins as well as 3 of the charities’ trustees who really get involved and who want to help others cope and deal with the condition either as a sufferer or a loved one or family member. Here are the links the our social media pages:
BURNING NIGHTS CRPS SUPPORT – THE CHARITY
At the beginning of summer of 2015, after several discussions with a number of people who were wanting to come on board with Victoria, the founder, it was decided to try and create a UK charity for Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. The last CRPS charity in the UK unfortunately was disbanded in the tax year 2007-2008, this was the last time the UK had seen a CRPS charity. It was felt that the sufferers and their families weren’t being adequately supported, so Pete and Victoria started the long road to fundraising, starting off with joining up with EASY FUNDRAISING in May of that same year.
[Tweet theme=”tweet-box-shadow”]Want an easy way 2 support us? Sign up with @easyuk www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/burningnight[/Tweet]
Easy Fundraising is a website that you sign up for FREE with and when you do your online shopping for whatever it is you are buying from your weekly grocery shop to your annual holiday and travel insurance – you could be raising a FREE donations for us at Burning Nights CRPS Support. There are nearly 3,000 retailers including Amazon, John Lewis, Aviva, thetrainline, Argos, Morrisons, Hotels.com, Vodafone, Amazon, Hobbeycraft, Moonpig, Carphone Warehouse and Sainsbury’s, who will donate a percentage of the amount you spend to us at Burning Nights to say thank you for shopping with them.
It’s really simple and doesn’t cost you anything! Why not join up for free? Go to the EASY FUNDRAISING website!
Eventually Sadie Brunton joined the trustees team and we started to get support from both sufferers and non sufferers who wanted to help and donate, which was great news for us! It was during October 2015 that a chance tweet was sent by us, in reply to a tweet by ALTAF PATEL, a serious personal injury solicitor with Irwin Mitchell’s solicitors, that we managed to get a meeting with Altaf and a business development manager from the Irwin Mitchell. This meeting was so successful that we were offered sponsorship from them! We couldn’t believe it! A large national company wanted to help us achieve our goals and aims of raising awareness of CRPS in the public as well as amongst the medical professions.
Altaf joined the board of trustees as well as an accountant, Tom Lowes, from ABS Accountancy, joined the trustees as the treasurer. We now had our full board of trustees! You can read more on each of our trustees, on their own pages.
We are always wanting people to help us with fundraisers, do sponsored events, sponsorship and donate towards the charity and help us to help CRPS sufferers and their families, friends and loved ones.
Burning Nights CRPS Support is a fully registered UK charity for CRPS as of 13 April 2016. Our charity number is 1166522 and we are registered in England & Wales.
AWARENESS MONTH – NOVEMBER
Every year during the whole of the month of November, starting off with ‘Colour The World Orange‘ day on the 1st Monday of every November, we have International CRPS awareness month. Overall International CRPS awareness month, November 2015, was extremely successful! We had our inaugural meet & greet conference on Saturday 7th November which was a huge success for everyone who came. We had some great speakers and at times the day became quite emotional. You can watch a short 5 minute video of the highlights of the meet & greet conference which you can watch in our YouTube channel.
[Tweet theme=”basic-full”]Watch short 5 min video of #BurningNights Inaugural #CRPS #conference Want 2 come 2 our next 1? Contact us! https://youtu.be/SM1eM46WcnU[/Tweet]
There were a number of fundraisers that went on including; Lisa Davis who shaved off all of her hair and raised £1,000! There were coffee mornings, a Curry night, House of Commons bottle of wine with the signature of David Cameron MP & Prime Minister auction, 3 month sponsored beard grow, raffle during the conference, generous donations and much more! You can read about the fundraisers on our FUNDRAISING page.
ANNUAL MEET & GREET CONFERENCE
7 November 2015 was the date of our Inaugural Meet & Greet conference event and we held it at the Birmingham Marriott hotel. It was a fantastic day and everyone enjoyed it! We held a raffle with some great prizes including a unique painting by an artist who is also a CRPS sufferer, Natalie Sheridan and another CRPS sufferer, Larissa Ralph brought some beautifully made cupcakes and she kindly donated the money received to us. In 2016, we held our 2nd Annual conference on SATURDAY 10th SEPTEMBER 2016. It was a full FREE 1 day event, lunch and refreshments were included within the day.
If you are interested in coming along to our next CRPS Annual National Conference but you’re not sure, why not watch a short 5 minute video of what went at our Inaugural Conference! Contact us to put your name down and let us know the number of free tickets you would like. (At the moment the maximum number of tickets you can ask for is 4)
SUPPORT GROUPS
We are currently holding regular CRPS support groups in MANCHESTER. If you are interested in coming to our next CRPS support group in Manchester please keep an eye on the EVENTS page for the date of the next group!
We are now also holding support groups in BRISTOL. If you’re interested in coming to our next Bristol support group please contact us and put your name down.
However if you are interested in running your own support group for us in your own local area, please contact us and let us know. We can send you the necessary paperwork and details and we will look for an appropriate space.
AND FINALLY….
Our charity application is now completed and we are now a registered UK charity for CRPS, which is fabulous news! Our charity registration number is 1166522. We really hope that with the sponsorship from Brian Barr and BLB solicitors and any other companies who chose to help us with sponsorship, that we will be able to create a long term, successful and sustainable charity for CRPS sufferers their families, friends, carers and loved ones. Thank You to everyone who has helped, who is helping and who are planning to help us grow this important charity. This is Our Story!
Last Updated: 31/05/2017
