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by Tamara Rubin, Healthy Child’s 2011 Mom on a Mission Award Winner

Winning the 2011 Healthy Child Mom On A Mission Award has been an incredible journey for me, presenting me with opportunities beyond my wildest dreams!

When my children were poisoned by lead in 2005, despite a college education, and more than a passing involvement in real estate (I had studied historic restoration as a young woman and had bought and sold several older homes) I knew very little about lead poisoning and how it could impact my kids. Why?

Ever since I learned about the misrepresentation of the issue of childhood lead poisoning in the U.S. my dream was to create a feature-length documentary film to generate a groundswell of awareness and to educate parents who are ignorant that this is still a huge problem in our country. Government agencies keep people in the dark about the extent of the problem by republishing the false, refuted statistic that only 250,000 children are poisoned—when current research shows that in reality, closer to 22,000,000 American children today have unsafe levels of lead in their blood.

I could not think of a better way to change the scandalous state of affairs and to spread the word so all parents would be educated about this incredibly costly, yet entirely preventable environmental illness that has impacted my own life so profoundly, and costs the United States more than $50.9 billion annually in increased health care costs and lost earning potential.

For years I tried to contact documentary filmmakers, asking them to answer my email pleas requesting that maybe they could just meet over lunch (I would fly to them) so we could spend an hour together. I was confident that after an hour of hearing about such a dramatic and important issue from the perspective of a passionate parent, they would be compelled to produce my film! But many, many e-mails later, I received not one response.

And then – fast forward to September 2011. Healthy Child told me the Discovery Channel had offered to do a video about me for the Mom on a Mission Award. I had no idea what opportunities would unfold as a result of a professional film crew coming to my home to film this piece.

Diana Dixon with the Dixon Collective flew up from L.A. to my home in Portland to direct the movie. I told her about my dream of making a film and she said she knew Daniel Marracino, the cinematographer who had filmed all of Michael Moore and Morgan Spurlock’s recent successful films! She suggested I call Daniel, the genius who put their visions on film!

I called Daniel and told him about my ideas. He immediately said yes, he’d help me make my film. His own 3-1/2 year old son had just tested positive for lead and he wanted to blow this issue wide open!

My dream is coming true—we’ve spent the last two months filming! We’ve already shot more than 25 hours of footage; created a YouTube channel with previews of our expert interviews video footage, and on January 3rd, we launched a Kickstarter project to fund the film.

I can hardly believe it! I am just a mom from Oregon with four kids, yet we’re making a movie—and it would not have come together without Healthy Child Healthy World!

Daniel and I have a goal of creating a tidal wave of awareness about childhood lead poisoning, generating 20 years of momentum in the one year we will spend putting this film together. We can do this! With your help, by using the power of social media — Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Kickstarter and your personal and professional networks — together we can bring about a sea change in awareness to preserve every child’s potential!

My request to you:

Please help one mom with a very important mission:

1. Check out our Kickstarter project. Watch the video. Our goal is to have 10,000 people log in to Kickstarter and pledge $1 or more by Valentine’s Day. Can you pledge $1? Please also click the FaceBook “like” button under the video on Kickstarter, then share the link with your friends and networks and ask them to do likewise.

2. If you want to take it one step further, please follow me on Twitter @LeadSafeAmerica

3. Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

4. Join our Facebook group

Gandi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” With a few clicks of your mouse, YOU can create the change we all want to see in the world! You can help us protect children and raise awareness about the tragedy of childhood lead poisoning by doing four simple things!

Thank you!

Tamara Rubin
2011 Healthy Child Mom On A Mission