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ANSWERS for VETERANS a Year in Review: May 2014 – May 2015 Participants Striking a Pose While Playing Bocce During Marineland July 2015 Retreat

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ANSWERS for VETERANS a Year in Review: May 2014 – May 2015 Participants Striking a Pose While Playing Bocce During Marineland July 2015 Retreat ANSWERS FOR VETERANS A Year in Review: May 2014 – May 2015 Participants Striking A Pose While Playing Bocce During Marineland July 2015 Retreat FOUNDER’S MESSAGE GratitudeAmerica continues to make your support to help us assist our deserving heroes and their tremendous progress as we seek to families. We owe them more than we can ever repay. fulfill our mission to provide critical support for our past and present military Thank you for your interest and support. God Bless America! service members and their families during Lewis Jordan their return to civilian life. Over the past Founder & CEO year we have expanded our retreat GratitudeAmerica programs to assist participants affected by deployment exposures, such as Post Traumatic Stress and Traumatic Brain Injury, and have successfully connected “I had a lot of pain, anger, and grief. Now I am warriors to the resources they deserve through our network a man of hope, smiles, and a little more joy. of community partners. This retreat treated me as future potential, not All of these efforts to support our military would not be possible as a mistake. I learned about non-traditional without the dedicated support of our corporate Board of ways to deal, address, and move forward in a Directors, Advisory Board, and the generous donors who happier state. Your small, but important, support support our programs. I pledge to ensure that every dollar helped me make a better future. Thanks for donated is spent prudently to positively impact the lives of saving my life (in more ways than one.)” as many military families as possible. - US ARMY MULTI-TOUR IRAQ VETERAN As you read through this annual report, please consider pledging Military Support Retreats “When my spouse and I came to the retreat, we had no support from the civilian world or GratitudeAmerica organizes and holds 4-day retreats the VA. The VA was beginning to stop various at NO COST for veterans and their primary support therapies on my spouse because he was not persons/spouses. Our retreats provide a supportive progressing at the rate they wanted. They wanted environment in which veterans can connect with their to give him narcotic meds, wheelchairs, and no peers, gain critical coping skills and interact with help for PTSD. We were reaching the end of our licensed counselors to begin healing where needed. rope ready to fall off. It was us literally against Our retreats provide various activities including, for the world. Then we came to the retreat and example, nature-based recreation, tai chi, breath learned of new therapies that relieved his pain awareness, kayaking, and dolphin interactions. In better than the meds and he tried meditation many cases our retreats act as a gateway for deeper to try and sleep when it was dark out. He made levels of care. Evidence from a Kansas State connections and shared his worst war feelings University study, using validated metrics over the and found another vet who had a similar story, last two years, demonstrated that our retreat model then another and another. Our group bonded created positive trends in reducing PTSD related and real recovery began.” reintegration challenges, and improved relationships between veterans and their spouses. - ARMY SPOUSE OF VETERAN WITH 26 YEARS OF SERVICE Our Impact From May 2014 to May 2015 we held six retreats in Florida (3), Georgia (2), and Illinois (1), where we served more than 160 participants from all five branches of the military. We developed a program in coordination with the Jacksonville Military Veterans Coalition to connect 25 military students with corporate mentors. 95% of participants surveyed at our past 6 retreats stated that they had reached their personal goals for the retreat. SCAN THE QR CODE TO DONATE : Participants Enjoy the Flow of Practicing Tai Chi at December 2014 Retreat at Marineland Bob Dole John November, Esq. Tracy S. Hejmanowski, Ph.D World War II Veteran Executive Director Clinical Psychologist and Honorary Chairman Gratitude America Program Manager of the Atlantic Beach, Florida Deployment Health Center Jacksonville, Florida STAFF J.B. Davis Victoria Bruner Ann McCulliss Johnson Chairman of the Board LCSW-C, RB, BETS MSW LCSW Retired Four Star General Clinical Consultant Retired Army Colonel Concluded an illustrious thirty-five-year Chicago, Illinois Military Outreach Coordinator career with the U.S. Air Force in 1993 Department of Psychology Palm Harbor, Florida University of Central Florida St. Augustine, Florida Lewis Jordan David Shoots Jack English CEO LCSW, MTH, CAPP Television Producer Distinguished 49 year career Daytona Beach Vet Center Decorated Army Medical in commercial aviation, Daytona, Florida Service Officer - Vietnam Lewis and his wife Joni founded Atlanta, Georgia GratitudeAmerica in 2011. Fernandina Beach, Florida & Atlanta, Georgia BOARD OF DIRECTORS BOARD Jim Jacoby Veteran Founder, Chairman and CEO Jacoby Development, Inc. Atlanta, Georgia Charles Nemeroff , M.D. Ph.D. Chairman Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, Tom Brokaw Miami, Florida “We should all be grateful that GratitudeAmerica is John Parrish, M.D. there for our fellow citizens Visit GratitudeAmerica.Org For Edward Wigglesworth Distinguished More Information or to Donate Professor Emeritus of Dermatology in uniform. For too many Vets Harvard Medical School the war is never over – and Inaugural Director Boston Red Sox/Massachusetts GratitudeAmerica is at their General Hospital’s Home Base Program side to help them leave the Served as a Marine Battlefield Doctor in Vietnam Boston, Massachussetts horrors behind.” L. Elaine Harris Terence Keane, Ph.D. Robert Taylor, M.D. Partner, Allen and Associates Assistant Dean for Research and Fernandina Beach, Florida Partner, Ernst and Young (Ret.) Professor and Vice-Chair of the Los Angeles, California Department of Psychiatry Boston University School of Medicine Boston, Massachusetts Rick Hartley James P. Kelly, M.D. Steven Schacter, M.D. Executive Director Director CAO Program Leader of The 100 Club National Intrepid Center of Excellence NeuroTechnology Houston, Texas Bethesda, Maryland CIMIT Professor of Neurology Harvard Medical School Boston, Massachusetts John Bradley, M.D. Charles Marmar, M.D. Rev. Ted Wiard Chief of Psychiatry and Professor of Psychiatry LPCC, CGC ADVISORY BOARD ADVISORY Deputy Director for Mental Health, Department of Psychiatry Co-Founder and Director VA Boston Healthcare System New York, New York Golden Willow Retreat Boston, Massachusetts Taos, New Mexico Marcia H. Scott Philip J. Hickey James E. Williams Jr. Kimberly M. Mitchell Director Jr. President and Ceo Deputy Director Corporate CEO Easter Seals, Inc. Staff Sergeant Communications Park Row Ventures Chicago, Illinois Donnie D. Dixon Center for Military Mesa Airlines Atlanta, Georgia Veterans and Community Service Phoenix, Arizona Washington D.C. Alicia Wadas Bruce Hicks David Sutherland Rachel Yehuda, Ph.D. COO Principal First Advisory Board Member Professor of Pychiatry and The Lavidge Company The Alliant Group Special Advisor Neurobiology Phoenix, Arizona Houston, Texas Washington D.C. Mt. Sinai School of Medicine Bronx, New York Clark Howard Jerry C. Jones, Jonathan Sherin, M.D. Rob M. Ray, Esq. Consumer Advocate Esq. Ph.D. Attorney Broadcast Journalist CLO Executive Vice President, Savannah, Georgia Atlanta, Georgia Acxiom Corporation Veterans’ Affairs Chief Medical Little Rock, Arkansas Officer, Volunteers of America Alexandria, Virginia Bill Canady Dirk Henson Haley Scott DeMaria Jesse Duke Vietnam Veteran, CEO Inspirational Speaker/Author Business Consultant - Innovation “Chaplain” TecportVision Inc Hadella LLC Delta Air Lines Morganton, GA Jacksonville, Fl Annapolis, Maryland Atlanta, Georgia CONNECTING VETERANS TO THE SERVICES THEY DESERVE During the Fall of 2015 GratitudeAmerica will be launching a resource guide for NE Florida which directly connects veterans and their families to community and wrap-around “Having war injuries can be very isolating, services and benefits. This easy-to-use electronic portal lonely, and hard for many to understand. will allow service members and their families to easily Being surrounded by others who can navigate and obtain vetted and proven federal, state and completely understand your issues, fully local resources from a trusted online source. We have relate, and offer support works better than secured the seed funding essential to launch the web years of therapy. In a few short days, a group portal this Fall and are now looking for corporate partners of strangers was able to bond and become and community providers to ensure the portal’s success. family. Knowing we have connected with 15 service members and 15 caregivers allows us GratitudeAmerica has catalogued comprehensive local resources that have been used to connect our retreat to be hopeful and optimistic we do not have participants to local, state, and federal benefits to to go through this alone.” improve their lives. - SPOUSE OF VETERAN WITH SPONSORS 20 YEARS OF SERVICE We are pleased to acknowledge the support of the following corporations who have supported our mission over the past year: Retreat Attendees Move the Dinosaur Egg During Team Building Exercise at our November 2014 Retreat at Winshape in Georgia. FINANCES INCOME Fundraising ...........................$145,836 In Kind ..........................................$10,008 Individual ...................................$17,034 Corporate ...................................... $5,117
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