At the last date of Bamboozle Roadshow, in Mansfield, MA., I interviewed Chloe Grabanski of the organization To Write Love On Her Arms. Chloe runs communications for TWLOHA, and is also the Benefit Coordinator. As of the end of August, she will have been with the organization for a full two years. Her full biography can be viewed here.Here’s the full transcript from the interview.
Nick: Have you been on all of Bamboozle?
Chloe: Yeah, I’ve been on it for all but 8 days, because I had an event in LA to do.
Nick: How has [Bamboozle] been?
Chloe: It’s been awesome. It’s such a great tour and there are so many great bands on it and it’s so awesome to meet all the kids and hear their stories. It’s been a blast.
Nick: What does TWLOHA have for upcoming events?
Chloe: [To Write Love On Her Arms] will be on all of Warped Tour, we have Cornerstone, we have a bunch of festivals this summer that we’re going to, so we’re busy. Summer’s always a crazy time for us.
Nick: Back in the spring, [TWLOHA] was going to different colleges, [right]?
Chloe: Yeah, we did a U-Chapter tour, and we’ll probably do one again in the Fall.
Nick: Since you won the USA Today ad, what’s the effect of that been like?
Chloe: Well we have a lot more site traffic and we heard from a lot of people that really loved the ad and love what we had to say. So, it was so awesome winning that. We were so excited and we really wanted to take the time to tell America that there is hope.
Nick: And for people who don’t know, could you give a basic overview of TWLOHA’s vision?
Chloe: Yeah, we’re non-profit and we exist to raise awareness for depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. Also to present hope and find help for those struggling, and then we invest directly to treatment and recovery. In four years, we’ve donated over $700,000 and answered over 175,000 messages.
Nick: Is there anything that somebody in high school could do if they want to help out?
Chloe: Yeah, they could go to our official website, and there’s a section called “Move”, and it lists all the ways to get involved.
Nick: I saw the peer-to-peer [program] that you guys are setting up on your website…
Chloe: Oh, I Am Alive, yeah. We’re excited. Hopefully it’ll be launching this fall. It’ll be the first ever online crisis counseling over instant messenger, that’s staffed by people one hundred percent trained and certified in crisis intervention.
Author’s note: TWLOHA is consistently entered in contests in order to win cash prizes which go directly to those in need. If you see anywhere to vote for them, please do so. They also have an abundance of awesome merchandise in their online store, where 100% of the profits go towards preventing suicide, depression, self-harm and addiction, in addition to things like their online crisis counseling program, IMAlive.
If you would like to find out more about To Write Love On Her Arms please visit their website.
