Joe Joe Bear Foundation

The Joe Joe Bear Foundation was created in memory of Joseph David Ordaz who passed away on March 10, 2009 from Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia, he was 24. Joe had a bone marrow transplant on July 17, 2008 that the doctors thought would be successful. However on December 3, 2008 he found out the cancer was back. Joe was undergoing treatment to prepare for a second transplant when he asked for a teddy bear to hold while he was alone so that he could feel like we were with him always. Joe was so full of life and had a smile that would light up a room whenever he entered. He was always in good spirits and always tried to make people smile, he is deeply missed. The Joe Joe Bear Foundation, a children's charity based in Katy Texas that serves the Greater Houston/ Galveston areas was created to keep Joe’s memory alive and to help others in the same situation.The Joe Joe Bear Foundation provides children with life threatening illnesses teddy Bears. It saddened Joe to hear the children crying at night in the hospital when they were alone and scared, he would say, “I wish I could help comfort the sick children.” The Joe Joe Bear Foundation provides teddy bears to 12 Greater Houston/Galveston area hospitals and hospices. In the past 12 years over 36,000 bears have been given to critically ill children. After extensive research and interviewing families that have lost children over 20 years ago to very recently, they all had the same needs and requests for information. The Joe Bear Foundation has identified a critical need in educating parents, family members, and even the children. There is a missing link in the parent support and available information. There was a need to add an education program with resource materials and online access. The Joe Joe Bear Foundation added educational materials and resources to the website giving caregiver access all the material online along with resources to external links for more information about the different diseases the children have.