Alberta’s pets need our help. Many of their owners are struggling to pay vet bills, or are having to give them up because they can’t find a place to live that allows pets.
Alberta’s Help A Buddy Fund has a solution to this problem. On February 15 and 16, they will be hosting a video game marathon fundraiser. All proceeds will go to nine different animal rescue organizations.
Participants will start gaming at 10 am on the 15th. They’ll game all the way until 2 am.
This is Help A Buddy Fund’s fourth year running the Gameathon. In both 2024 and 2023, they raised $25,000. Last year, 60 gamers participated in the event. This year, the fund is hoping to have at least 100 participants.
“We have a wide range of people who participate,” Help A Buddy Fund’s founder Jillianne Bowler-Veltman tells TheRockies.Life. “We have people who are streaming games regularly, some are doing it professionally. We have people who sign up for the event and it’s their first time setting up a video game stream.”
All levels of participation are welcome, whether you already have a Twitch stream following or whether you’re only a casual gamer. Help A Buddy Fund helps participants get started– they provide a manual that explains how to set up a video game stream, and they can help answer people’s questions about the process. Streaming a video game marathon is as easy as having a webcam and a computer.
Streamers play at home, in their living rooms or in their bedrooms. Still, participating in the event brings people a sense of community rarely felt in other areas of life.
“What’s really interesting about the video game community is the sense of camaraderie, the sense of community in the event,” Bowler-Veltman says. “When you bring animal rescue into the fray, you get the feeling of really working together towards a common cause.”
Donations Rescue Pets
Pets need food, and the price for pet food and supplies increased more than the inflation rate for several years after the pandemic.
PackagedFacts, a group that researches the price of goods, confirms that this is true. In 2023, they reported, “Although inflation has diminished, the resulting high prices persist. 70% of respondents reported spending more on pet products than they used to.”
Organizations, too, have been hit by the rise in prices. Many have been struggling to stay open and to do their work.
There’s not a lot of steady, stable funding available to animal welfare organizations. Most of Alberta’s over 130 organizations rely on donations and fundraising to be able to do their work.
It’s not just animals that benefit from rescue organizations. For many people, owning a pet is the difference between feeling good in their life and feeling down. But more and more, it’s only people who have money to begin with who are able to own pets. Animal rescue organizations change this. Thanks to them, people are able to adopt pets for little or no cost.
As the cost of everything increases, it’s even more important that those who have a bit of extra money give to organizations that are helping those in need. Even as little as $50 can make a difference.
And, it turns out, fundraising and pushing yourself to your physical limit through things like a video game marathon brings a sense of satisfaction and community that you don’t often feel in other areas of life.
“At the end, maybe it’s the sleep deprivation that kicks in, but it feels so good to be a part of something bigger than yourself,” Bowler-Veltman says.
