The Milkshake Challenge started out as a promise from one friend to another: that she would have a milkshake in honor of Angie Burrow, a young victim of Mitochondrial disease who passed away on April 3, 2019. The challenge will officially launch at the Mito 5K on May 16 at Liberty Station in Point Loma.
Ashley Burrow, Angie’s mother and the driving force behind the challenge tells the story of how a heartfelt request between friends sparked a growing national movement that she would ideally like to see used as a tool to spread awareness of Mitochondrial disease.
“We were in the hospital on April 1, trying to wait for the organ donor program so Angie could participate and help someone in need but it just wasn’t coming together and in the meantime it was really hard on her. On April 3, we decided it was just too much for her and made the decision to let her go earn her wings. I talked to my best friend in Michigan and told her to go have a milkshake for Angie, who loved them. She promised to do so and posted about it online, coining it the Milkshake Promise,” Burrow said.
The milkshake promise was later recoined The Milkshake Challenge for better name recognition by Alpine resident and Mito Research Fund Chair Christina Whaley. Burrow said the idea was to somewhat emulate the Ice Bucket challenge, a campaign that peaked in 2014 and raised awareness of ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) and according to the ALS Association ultimately resulted in $115 million in research funding donations.
Burrow said she hopes that the Milkshake Challenge achieves even a fraction of that public success after the 5K launch. She said she is attempting to raise awareness of the disease because she believes increased research funding begins with informing the public that Mito exists.
She is hoping to partner with a local food vendor who can supply small milkshakes for free or at a discount to participants at the 5K. Burrow said she envisions participants who enjoy the shakes will then post a photograph on social media tagged with #milkshakechallenge and #milkshakesformito along with an accompanying challenge for friends and family to do the same.
“If every registered participant at the 5K has a milkshake, we’d hit 1,000 posts in May alone. I’m guessing we could be at 3,000 by June. If we could just find a business to support us and market their support for our cause it would raise awareness that way as well. Ideally, I’d like us to have a truck at the event with free milkshakes or a deal of some sort like a buy-one-get-one that would encourage people to have their milkshake right there at the race, then take pictures and spread it online,” Burrow said.
She has yet to find a business that wants to partner with her cause for the 5K.
“The hardest thing about doing anything to help Mito kids is that people don’t know about it and trying to mainstream it is the first step. It is horribly underfunded but unless people know about it, they can’t help the situation,” Burrow said.
According to the Mitochondrial and Metabol ic disease center, virtually all chronic complex diseases including diabetes, heart disease, and autoimmune diseases like lupus and multiple sclerosis have mitochondrial dysfunction and over half of all Americans will suffer with a chronic disease that can be traced to mitochondrial dysfunction.
“It makes me sad because Mito is so common and people just don’t hear about it. It’s hard to see kids pass away because there is no cure,” Burrow said
