Wes Linda

So yesterday, I posted a note about a new weight loss challenge that I’m interested in participating in.  After signing up, they sent me a new email.  This time encouraging me to do more if I can.

The details are:

So, if you listened to me rant lately on Hunger and the issues faced in Baltimore, you know this struck right in the heart of my passion.  I’m really interested in starting a team and doing everything we can to raise funds for the Maryland Food Bank.

My question to you is, would you join me?  Would you join a team to help raise funds to help those struggling with hunger?  I’m taking a minor poll and if you can post a comment below sharing your interest, that would be awesome!  Tonight, over 60,000 people in Baltimore are going to bed hungry.  We may not be able to help all of them, but we can start.  Please join me!

14 Years ago, in December of 1995, I was home from college for the winter break with the usual worries of an 18 year old kid. Friends & Girls. Just a few days before Christmas, all of those worries went out the window. I was at work, at Chick-Fil-A in Westminster, when I got a phone call I never imagined I’d get. On the other line was a voice telling me that my father had been in an accident and was in the hospital.

My father was working in the only job he could do after years of diabetes and heart disease had ravaged his body. Of course, I didn’t understand the real scope of his illness, and was only able to comprehend what should have been obvious if I wasn’t a teenager and oblivious to anything but myself. While making a delivery, as a courier, my father had a heart attack while driving down the highway. Amazingly, he crossed both of the lanes on his side of the road, the median, and the oncoming lanes without hitting anyone on the road.

Over the next week, our family went through one the most horrible times a family should ever be forced to go through. Decisions regarding care, life support, and when to say Goodbye. I’ll spare you the deep details, but it was a horrible week. One that affected my mom, my sister and myself in unique and life altering ways. All of this during the Christmas Holiday season no less.

Heart Disease & Diabetes stole my father. It was a horrible time, and one that I still struggle with to this day. I’ve decided to start trying to make a difference and that’s where this post, the video above and your support comes in.

I currently work within the School of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University. We received an email from within our division a few weeks ago asking for our participation in the upcoming Heart Walk.  I’ve decided to participate and would like your help raising funds for this great cause.  My goal is small, but I know it will be funds well spent on research to fight heart disease and strokes.  If you can donate my Heart Walk,  it would mean so much to me, my family and families around the world that have suffered from the destruction heart disease can cause.