Partner Spotlight: Fabry
By Jodi Chiz
October 27, 2022
The National Fabry Disease Foundation (NFDF) is an organization dedicated to supporting the Fabry disease community. The organization’s five primary functions are assisting with Fabry disease education, facilitating Fabry disease identification to improve Fabry disease recognition and diagnosis, providing various forms of assistance to individuals with Fabry disease, supporting Fabry disease research and promoting advocacy for Fabry disease issues.
In 2010, NFDF began partnering with Victory Junction to host a family weekend at the tail end of their annual conference for their families to find a place of retreat and community at Camp. Since then, they have returned annually to serve a number of families and bring a large population of volunteers from within their Fabry Community to create a widely successful event.
Each year, their families and volunteers participate in our traditional program area activities at Victory Junction, including offering their teens the opportunity to do a “night zip” on our zipline, and younger family members to participate in a fun family event like a movie night or campfire.
Family members also have the opportunity to participate in a talent show, and just spend time with other members of their community around Camp in a relaxing atmosphere. There’s nothing quite like the North Carolina air in fall to make for a wonderful, magical weekend.
Jerry Walter, NFDF’s founder and president, works hard with our team here at Victory Junction to create a wonderful event. He works tirelessly to help get families to Camp in his goal of giving them all the chance to experience camp together here at Victory Junction. On top of communicating with all the families set to arrive at Victory Junction, he also coordinates the conference, travel arrangements, and recruits volunteers and industry leaders to be a part of the events as well.
Due to COVID, NFDF took a slight pause from gathering in 2020 and 2021, but we were excited to welcome them back to Camp in October 2022 for their 11th annual family weekend camp.
Over the years, NFDF has averaged serving around 135 family members each weekend at Camp. We are so glad returned to Victory Junction this year, and we look forward to watching their program continue to grow!
