Feeding hungry bellies and healing souls: Operation Feed looks to expand – New Brunswick | 24CA News
When Patrick Gordon returned from the struggle in Afghanistan, he discovered himself in a darkish place.
He had seen the brutalities of war-time and was injured whereas abroad, having hit an improvised explosive system. As time went on, and he started to see the haze of his psychological well being and post-traumatic stress dysfunction and determined he needed to offer again.
Gordon is the founding father of Operation Feed, initially named Operation Feed Saint John (OFSJ).
“Seeing what real poverty was and seeing what this world, the dark side of our world, and then coming home and realizing like, hey, this is in our own backyard as well, you know, I have the ability to change that so let’s do it,” Gordon stated.
The group feeds households and kids residing in poverty. Since its inception, it has supplied 100,000 meals – 50 at a time.
Saint John has the best ranges of kid poverty within the nation, about 33 per cent, in response to the group’s web site. That’s nearly double the nationwide common.
But because it feeds the wants of starvation, it additionally feeds veterans and first responders with an area to seek out goal and provides again. Gordon felt strongly about together with first responders, who are sometimes overlooked of the help supplied to these within the army.
“We’re promoting veterans and first responders to heal by getting involved in their community and pushing themselves out of their comfort zone,” he stated. “Our mission statement is to feed the bellies of the most vulnerable and feed the mind, body and soul of veterans and emergency workers.”
The group has paramedics and even nurses volunteering their time.
However, Gordon stated OFSJ wants extra help. It’s seeking to create a stand-alone house to permit for extra meals and to assist set up a wellness centre for volunteers.
Right now, OFSJ is working out of a small house in Kings Church in Quispamsis.
“Our goal is to create a wellness centre that will have gym, a peer support, a rec area,” he stated. “It will have our clinicians, massage, physical and mental therapy, we want to put hot and cold therapy and make it exclusive to veterans and first responders with a small membership fee of $75 a month and that membership fee becomes a sustainable piece of our Operation Feed.”
The membership charges would immediately pay for meals and for the power itself.
For Gordon, it’s partially about creating a way of goal for people who find themselves usually overlooked of the helps they want when recovering from on-the-job trauma.
“We’re promoting our veterans and first responders to healing by giving back to their community,” he stated, acknowledging there have to be sturdy investments into the look after each veterans and first responders psychological and bodily well being.
Gordon has arrange a GoFundMe with the aim of elevating $2 million.
He additionally made an attraction to Saint John City Council for help however hasn’t acquired any suggestions on whether or not help is forthcoming following his presentation final month.
“We’re only doing 50 bags of food right now, but we want to do 500 or as many as our community needs,” he stated.
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