Change Your Homepage, Help Create Change for Girls

The following is a post sponsored by Yahoo! Every time someone clicks here to make Yahoo! their homepage, they're showing their support for Girls For A Change.

I was selected for this opportunity by Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do.


I'm a cause-driven blogger, meaning I'm always looking for ways to use my social networks and blogs to help, spread the word and create change. 

Today, I'm asking you to do something that takes only a few moments, but can help girls across the country and even internationally. 

When you change your homepage to Yahoo!, that company will donate $10 to Girls for Change, a nonprofit that  empowers girls. Yahoo! will donate up to $10,000 for anyone that does this by July 30. 

This is the first time I'd heard of Girls for Change, so I explored the group a bit. 

Girls for Change targets girls in low-income areas. From the website:

Today, in cities across the country, Girl Action Teams of approximately 10 girls and two volunteer women Coaches meet to identify an issue or problem that they want to impact. The Coaches then teach the girls essential project planning and execution skills to aid them in designing and implementing their social change project. Every year thousands of girls learn how to tackle community problems such as gang violence, low self-esteem, and environmental degradation.

I love everything about this mission, and really loved that I could help by just changing my homepage, and can urge others to do so too.

For the change of homepage to qualify, you must change your homepage using this link. It takes just a few moments.

Dogs Do Not Equal Babies

Of all the topics I've blogged about here on Cora's Story, I've gotten the most hate mail and messages for standing up and saying that the loss of a dog is not the loss of a human baby. 

I'll probably get more messages after this. But, I'm firmly standing my ground on this one. Stop comparing the loss of your dog to the loss of my baby.

I lost a dog in my arms. I had her from fifth grade until college. I cried for days. We drove two hours to bury her. I still miss her. 

However, it's not even remotely the same as losing my baby. It hurts when people bring up their dog when I talk about my baby. It hurts other moms that lose children as well.

I'm not discounting the pain from losing a dog. Doesn't mean it hurts less, but it's not the same. 

It's frankly offensive, and I'm an animal lover. 

I blogged on this site several months ago about a Facebook event for losing children where someone wrote they were lighting a child for their dog and how that was upsetting. After that I post, I got angry messages, of course from people that have never lost children that I was wrong. 

A few days ago, I wrote a post on Cora's Story including ten things not to say when someone loses a baby. Comparing your loss to a pet's loss was one of those. 

Anonymous had this to say:

I think anonymous is pretty self centered. You cannot empathize when someone loses a child unless you've been there, so don't even try. It sounds like anonymous is telling people about losing their dog to make themselves feel better. Also, to post that on a person's blog that has lost a child is just rude. You have no right to disagree with me unless you've lost a child, and then I fully realize everyone is a bit different. 

I'm standing firm.

Losing a dog is nothing like losing a child and saying it is riles me up.