OSOT - Operation Support Our Troops

I'd like to introduce one more initiative that I've named "Mending Spirits, One Stitch at a Time". This too is for our wounded and injured troops, but it is also for the victims of this war that you don't hear much about, the family members. The spouse and moms that sit next to their soldier's bedside, eighteen hours a day, seven days a week, 31 days a month, even in some of the worst cases, every day for over a year. Some of our spouses and moms have been living in the guest house so long that they can legally claim residency in Texas or Washington DC as their home of record. These "quiet victims" stay at Brooke and Walter Reed and just sit and watch and pray in hopes that their loved one will recover.

For our burn victims, the spouse or mom is are the only one who can be with them in the ICU. After weeks , but more likely months as the patient stabilizes and the fear of infection is less critical, the patient is moved to a less sterile environment , the Step Down Unit where they continue their recovery. More weeks or months pass and the patient moves to a private room, but still has weeks or months before they will be released. Hours of rehab, hours of occupation therapy, hours of learning to deal with fingers that are fused from fire or worse, missing. But the one constant in the soldier's life is his spouse or mom. They are the wheel chair drivers , the one feeding the soldier, or dressing , bathing or reading to them, writing letters for them, adjusting their pillow and blankets, soothing their pain, in short being their eyes, ears, hands, and legs.

As the soldier begins to heal, his or her schedule is filled with Rehab and OT and visits to have wounds cleaned and redressed or burns debreeded. Again, the Mom or spouse waits in the hospital corridor while the soldier is ministered to. Hours and hours of waiting. A very nervous, anxious time. Here is where OSOT can help. When I'm nervous or anxious, I find it very therapeutic to cross stitch, needlepoint or knit. If I knew how to crochet, I would do that as well. It seems when my hands are busy and I am concentrating on my stitchery project, I don't worry quite as much. When I try to read when I'm anxious, I read the same sentence over and over, but keeping my hands moving, seems to settle me.

I shared this fact with one of our talented angels and she is in the process of designing some very special patriotic cross stitch kits that she will be sending on a regular basis to Brooke and Walter Reed, but there are so many parents and spouses that are at the hospital for such a long time, I thought we could supply Brooke and Walter Reed with yarn, knitting needles, simple instruction books, needlepoint kits, plastic needlepoint canvas and yarn , tapestry needles, cross stitch kits, crochet hooks and someone even suggested jewelry making kits, Something that our patients who aren't into model building could use and something that our "quiet helpers, the Moms and the spouses, could do to help make the many hours that they sit and wait go by, to help relieve their stress and most importantly to let them know how much we are thinking of them and holding their soldier and their families in our thoughts.

If this is something you can help us with, please invite your friends and neighbors to help us as well. It is best if you send self contained complete kits. Send your kits to:

Mending Spirits, One Stitch at a Time
Walter Reed Army Medical Center
Deployment Health Clinical Center
ATTN: Dan Bullis
Bldg 2 Room 3G04
Washington D.C. 20307-5001

Mending Spirits, One Stitch at a Time
Family and Soldier Assistance Center
Army Community Services
2010 Stanley Road
Building 2797/ Suite 95
Fort Sam Houston, Texas 78234
ATTN: Judith Markelz