WHAT WE DO

The military provides world-class care while injured service members are in the hospital. But sometimes gaps open up between the support the military can provide, and the support the injured and their families need.

The Yellow Ribbon Fund helps bridge the gaps while they’re recovering in the Washington, DC, area at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and Fort Belvoir Community Hospital.

Even after they return to their hometowns, YRF continues to help.

HOUSING & TRANSPORTATION

SUPPORT
PROGRAMS

ACTIVITIES
& EVENTS

The Yellow Ribbon Fund provides free
HOTEL ROOMS for visiting relatives desperate to be at the side of their injured loved ones.

We provide free
RENTAL CARS and
TAXI RIDES to give them some freedom and control at a time when they control very little.

As injured service members recover and become outpatients, we provide free, furnished APARTMENTS for families who otherwise would have to endure the added stress of separation or crowding into a hotel room.

When a service member is injured, a family member or close friend leaves home to come help with the recovery, often for a year or longer. YRF’s FAMILY CAREGIVER PROGRAM has pioneered support for caregivers. We’re still one of the only service organizations to offer childcare and family-oriented activities, plus stress-relieving massages and spa visits, mutually supportive dinners out, empowering horseback rides, and more — all at no charge.

Meanwhile, after a life-changing injury, our innovative MENTORING PROGRAM helps injured service members build new lives through education and career guidance, networking, and job shadowing that opens doors.

After injured veterans return home, our AMBASSADOR PROGRAM connects them with volunteers all over the country. These “ambassadors” provide one-on-one support to ensure no one falls through gaps in community safety nets.

And when injured service members need an advocate to stand up for them, VOLUNTEER LAWYERS FOR VETERANS provide pro bono legal services.

Yellow Ribbon Fund volunteers and donors make it possible for injured service members and their families to enjoy sporting and cultural events, tours, outings, and get-togethers — MORE THAN 100 ACTIVITIES every year.

These events are more than just fun — they’re an important PART OF THE HEALING PROCESS. YRF activities offer stress-reducing breaks from the grueling rigors of recovery, while reducing isolation, nurturing family relationships, and building confidence.

“Free Rental Cars: Why they’re needed”

“New YRF Initiative: Caregiver Retreat”

“Celebrities honor the injured with help from YRF”

The Yellow Ribbon Fund got its start when two local businessmen learned about the predicament of a mother whose son had been wounded and medevaced to Walter Reed. She’d just arrived, she was exhausted and worried about her son, and she had nowhere to stay and no way to get around. So they got her a hotel room and rented a car for her, making free hotels and free rental cars YRF’s first services.

Eight years later, they’re still among the most needed and appreciated services we provide. A car gives stressed-out family members some independence and control over their daily lives at a time when they control very little. It also simplifies logistics — between helping their injured loved one with daily tasks and managing medical appointments and the military bureaucracy, their days are already complicated enough. Plus, a car makes it possible to just escape for a quick mental health break.

“The car was a huge improvement in our situation,” explains the mother of a wounded soldier. “It allowed us to shop for clothing for Sam once he was able to get out and about. We bought groceries. We met people at restaurants occasionally. I was able to get my hair done. And we could shuttle family between the hotel and Walter Reed when they were in town.”

To date, more than 1,800 rental cars have been used for nearly 70,000 days by the families of injured service members and occasionally the service members themselves. Whether they’re being treated at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., or Fort Belvoir Community Hospital in northern Virginia, they and their families can access a free car during their stay.

All this is possible thanks to the generosity of Jack and Dottie Fitzgerald and their FitzMall Organization, including NextCar Auto Rentals. The “in kind” portion of their contribution now adds up to more than $1,000,000. (That’s the NextCar team receiving a plaque of appreciation, below, from YRF’s Transporation & Housing director Diane Shoemaker, on the right.)

The families we help tell us that the cars solve problems they don’t even know they have yet. “Your fund made our stay here much easier and much nicer,” that grateful mother told us. “Your unexpected assistance opened possibilities we might not otherwise have explored, and the result was overwhelmingly positive.”

YRF services like free rental cars make it possible for our supporters to show, in practical ways, how grateful THEY are for the service and sacrifice of all the families and service members recovering from the wounds of war.

Jacqueline Goodrich had hit the discouragement wall when she arrived in Gettysburg, Pa., for a two-day retreat with a group of women, none of whom she knew. But that didn’t matter. What she did know was that, like her, they’d all spent months, even years, putting their lives on hold while they helped someone they loved recover from a serious combat injury.

For the family caregivers of injured service members, every waking minute is filled with helping their injured loved one get ready for the day, then get through seven hours of appointments for wound care, traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress support, physical and occupational therapy, dermatology, prosthetics, and adaptive sports training. After that there are more hours of rehab on their own, plus medications to manage and paperwork to fill out, meals to prepare, and in Jacqueline’s case, an infant and toddler to care for.

Now, for the first time in more than a year since Jacqueline’s husband was hit by rocket fire in eastern Afghanistan, she was taking a break. She’d come to the Yellow Ribbon Fund’s first-ever Caregiver Retreat, two full days of rest, relaxation, and mutual support at the historic Gettysburg Hotel.

Originally, ten caregivers were signed up to participate. Seven actually made it.

That didn’t surprise Jessica Allen, director of YRF’s family caregiver program. “At Walter Reed, it’s hard to even get them to go out now and then for dinner. You get so busy taking care of everybody else, you’re too tired to even think about taking care of yourself.”

Jessica, whose own husband lost both legs in Afghanistan, adds, “This is a crazy life.”

The retreat was the brainchild of Jessica and Annie McChrystal, a longtime advocate for military families and a YRF board member along with her husband, GEN Stan McChrystal. They were joined in the planning by two fellow military spouses: Ann Campbell, wife of the Army’s vice chief of staff, and Lisa Morgan, coordinator of YRF’s family caregiver program who’s also the wife and caregiver of a wounded soldier. Lisa speaks from experience when she says, “You can’t take care of your injured service member if you don’t take care of yourself.”

Annie McChrystal agrees. “That’s why we wanted the caregivers to have a couple of days of doing nothing but nurturing themselves,” she says, “with no demands being placed on them.” So she and the rest of the retreat planning team tossed out the typical jam-packed retreat agenda full of get-to-know-you exercises and self analysis drills.

Instead, they blocked out time for naps, reading, craft-making, a relaxed walking tour, and good eating. Even those meals were undemanding. Caregivers could go out together and be waited on in a cozy restaurant. Or they could order room service and eat in bed if that’s what they felt like doing. For the first time in many, many months, the only agenda was their own.

For Jacqueline, it was just what she needed. “Having this opportunity to vent and also talk about the amazing good things that are part of wounded warrior life made me feel very relaxed and yet very energized and motivated at the same time.”

Beforehand, one mother was hesitant to leave her wounded son, even for just two days. But Jessica kept encouraging her, and enlisted hospital staffers to do the same. Once the mother finally found herself in Gettysburg, she turned to Jessica and said, “Thank you for not letting up on me.” In fact, the only complaint that was heard from any of the caregivers was they wished they could have stayed another day.

Back home again, Jacqueline says, “My family has to be thinking, oh my gosh, she’s so much nicer now – that’s what a good night’s sleep will do! We should send her away more often!” She also reports that the retreat participants are all friends on Facebook now and planning to get together again soon on their own. “We’re bonded for life,” she says.

More Caregiver Retreats are planned for the future in locations around the country. As for this first one, many thanks are due to those who helped the Yellow Ribbon Fund make it happen…

…complete with goody bags designed to promote self-care:
Bank of America
Hero Miles
Country singer Maggie Rose
The Pampered Chef
Enterprise Rent-a-Car
Simply Stampt by Tina Davis
Booz Allen Hamilton

The visitor watched, fascinated, as Army Staff Sergeant Travis Mills demonstrated his high-tech prosthetic arm at Walter Reed’s Military Advanced Training Center (MATC). Travis told his man-made hand to turn to the left, and it did. Turn to the right — it did that, too. He encouraged his visitor to try talking to the hand to make it move. Nothing happened.

“It’s too loud in here,” Travis said, and he shouted for silence. The big, busy room, packed with staff and injured service members undergoing therapy, went still. Travis directed his visitor to try again — loudly.

“TURN RIGHT!” the visitor shouted at Travis’s prosthetic hand. The hand STILL didn’t move.

“Actually,” said Travis, “that’s not how it works.”

The room exploded in laughter, the visitor, too, because being a comedian, Stephen Colbert is always up for a good joke.

Without any fanfare, the down-to-earth star of Comedy Central’s “The Colbert Report” had come down from New York to spend time visiting with the wounded warriors at MATC. Then he made his way to the hospital to visit with inpatients.

It was the latest celebrity visit arranged by the Yellow Ribbon Fund. “These visits serve two purposes,” explains YRF’s events and volunteers director, Ashley Keene, who shepherded Colbert through the Walter Reed visit. “First of all, it brightens your day to meet famous people. But more importantly, when someone successful puts everything else on hold to come spend time with you, it sends the message that you’re the one who’s really important. It says to our injured service members and their families: YOU are the ones who really deserve to be honored. And it’s important for them to hear that because it’s true.”

Other celebrities who’ve had the honor of spending time with injured warfighters, thanks to YRF, include country singer Maggie Rose, the famous boat captains of the hit reality TV show “Deadliest Catch”, Washington Redskins football stars, and members of the Washington Capitals hockey team. Click here to watch a video of the Caps’ visit to Walter Reed.