11/19/2024
Please consider Writeface when planning your Extra Give donations. I am on the board of this non-profit in hopes of helping vets who like my father came home from the war and after what he saw, lived, and did, bore unbearable pain, untreated and misunderstood, for the rest of his life.
https://www.facebook.com/PattiSpencerAuthor/posts/pfbid02tjuA3pFfpXhcRSikgfN13GM5BFfQEv4BBuRB7LgueHbEtBG43vYRxEA81fo91H7Yl
EVERYDAY IS VETERAN’S DAY AT WRITEFACE
Scott Hower, an 11 year USAF veteran, returned from Southeast Asia in 1973 with issues. The war followed him home. Nineteen years later in 1992 after a trip to Washington DC, and a visit to “The Wall”, he spontaneously picked up a pen and wrote about his intensely emotional response to the wall. He felt an immediate cathartic effect. Slowly over time he used his writing to learn how to manage the disadvantageous effects of his behavior that resulted from his issues.
In 2006, a younger veteran of the Iraq/Afghanistan war approached him in the Home Depot parking lot in Torrington, Connecticut, and asked to talk about the readjustment problems that he was experiencing and to seek some advice from an older veteran. Over the next few years this event repeated itself several times. By the spring of 2011 it was apparent to Scott that a need existed to assist veterans returning from war to transition more smoothly mentally, emotionally, and spiritually into civilian life. The idea of Writeface was conceived. In April of 2011 Scott was discussing the idea with Annie Ginder who had just completed a certification in journaling instruction. They spent the next 15 months meeting and designing the first Writeface curriculum.
On the 17th September of 2014 Writeface began it first writing workshop at the Veterans Victory House with 9 veterans participating. Writeface was registered as a 501c3 nonprofit organization in March of 2015.
Writeface has collaborated with Tabor Community Services, The Lebanon and Coatesville Veterans Administration Medical Centers, Building Bridges Equine therapy, Columbia Creative Factory, Millersville University’s MILLI program, PaArtners of South Central PA, Lancaster County Veteran Court, Caring Hospice Services and the Coatesville Public Library. Writeface has been collaborating with Music for Everyone for the past four years turning the writings of veterans into songs.
Writeface has provided over 500 creative, expressive, journal writing, storytelling song writing and art workshops during its ten years of service. It has provided service to veterans of all branches of the US military with service from 1942 to the present. The youngest participant was a twenty-four year-old male Iraq war veteran. The oldest was a 95-year-old WWII navy veteran in hospice care. There is no demographic that applies to the American veteran who seek our service. We have had all ethnic, gender and religious participants in our workshops as well as family members and caregivers of veterans. Most of our veterans are male with an average age around 50. Writeface has had over 900 veterans and family members participate in its workshops since 2014.
All Writeface workshops are FREE to the Veterans, family members and caregivers of veterans. Writeface is funded almost entirely through public donations. Please consider a donation to Writeface during the this Friday November 22nd by clicking this link. https://www.extragive.org/organizations/writeface.
THANK YOU!
