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Jordan Banks

My name is Jordan Banks and I am the guy who came up with the idea for A Million Tweets to Remember. I live in Toronto, Canada with my wife, my 8 year old daughter and 5 year old son. 


I am blessed to have come from a very large and tight knit family led by an incredible group of grandparents. In fact, when I first started dating my wife, we were lucky enough to have nine grandparents alive and well. There is no doubt in my mind I have learned more from my grandparents than I did from any school I ever attended. Their stories, lessons learned, advice and sensibilities have been massive influences on the person I am today.


The one common theme amongst all my grandparents was their unwavering commitment to helping those less fortunate than themselves. Whether it related to economic, medical or family issues, there have been numerous times in my life I watched them reach out to help others. They generally did so quietly and without fanfare but they always took great pride in their contributions. They very much subscribed to the motto “community service is the rent we all need to pay for living”.


Today, I am left with only one grandparent. Of the eight grandparents who have passed away since my wedding, three suffered badly from Alzheimer’s and another had signs of dementia. Sadly, my one living grandparent (my mom’s mom) has now been diagnosed with early stage Alzheimer’s. Since I grew up most of my childhood with a single mom, my remaining grandmother was, for a long period of time, my second mom. As a result, she has had a very profound influence in my life and we are very lucky to share a friendship that transcends the typical grandmother/grandchild relationship.


She is an incredible lady with a wonderful sense of humor and a limitless amount of love for her two daughters, her seven grandchildren and her ten great grandchildren. She is also very lucky to have a dedicated family of caregivers that insure she is happy, safe and comfortable 24/7. My kids see her often and talk to her on the phone just about every other night. Although she struggles to remember their names and she often gets confused, listening to the conversations that take place between them is magical. The thought of those conversations slowly becoming more difficult over time makes me sick.

Over the past ten years, I have devoted a significant amount of time raising money and awareness for Alzheimer’s research and care. I sit on a couple of Boards of leading Alzheimer’s research and care institutions. Also, through a fundraising event I started called Sportsfest, I have raised over a million dollars for the cause (through Baycrest and the world renown Rotman Research Institute) and along the way have hopefully opened up thousands of minds to the need to act now to eradicate this most awful of diseases.