Helping service men and women every day

Most Americans will take a moment to recognize and honor veterans today either privately or publicly.

But at Texas Health Fitness Center HEB our commitment to active duty military members has taken a tangible form.

Imagine coming home from serving your country. You’re used to routine of frequently being in the gym and working out with your fellow service members. Coming home you are thrilled to see family and friends, but it throws you out of routine. So what do you do? Do you join a gym for the two weeks of your leave? Keep a membership while you are gone? Neither is very feasible.

To help members of our military when they are on leave, Texas Health Fitness Center HEB would like to invite any active duty members of the military who are home on leave to use the fitness center for free during their time at home.

“We recognize that exercise is important for individual’s minds, bodies and spirits and want to help our service men and women to stay current with their exercise when home on leave,” said Mike Lofland, director of the Fitness Center. “This is just one way we can give back for the sacrifices these individuals make each day for our country.”

To find out more about this offer, please call 817-267-9191.

Support group leader turned pain of losing a baby into a way to help grieving parents

It is estimated that more than a million babies a year die in our country during pregnancy, at birth or within the first year of life.

On the first Thursday night of each month, Lynne Moffatt, Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Hurst-Euless-Bedford Board of Trustees member, can be found welcoming parents to Share, a face-to-face support group for those who share the experience of losing their baby through miscarriage, stillbirth or neonatal death.

Lynne remembers the overwhelming grief and isolation she felt as she left the hospital without her baby girl in October 1979. She longed for someone to talk with that truly understood what she was going through. Thirty years ago, you didn’t talk about it in public and there were no support groups, so the yearning remained. Eventually Lynne met another young woman who had a similar experience and they decided to do something to honor their own babies, as well as to help the healing of others going through the loss of a child. They started the Share support group at Texas Health HEB in 1982 and have been listening to and supporting young parents ever since.

Lynne says the support group can be powerful for two reasons, “Listening to similar stories of other people and telling their own, parents come to realize they are not alone in this experience. The second reason is that when newly bereaved parents see others who have experienced some healing, having discovered some tools for coping, they are able to see hope for themselves, that they have a future even though they can’t see it yet.”

Lynne believes losing a child will make parents either bitter or better. She is committed to helping parents find their way toward being better, more compassion people as they heal from this terrible pain.

The Share group meets on the first floor of the hospital from 7-8 pm each 1st Thursday of the month. For more information about the Share support group, contact the Department of Pastoral Care at susanbriggs@texashealth.org or at 817-848-4811.

Looking to get holiday shopping wrapped up?

There are only nine weeks left until Christmas! Get an early start on shopping at the Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Hurst-Euless-Bedford Auxiliary’s annual Holiday Bazaar.

The event will be held from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 30. Proceeds benefit the Oncology Department at Texas Health HEB.

About 50 vendors will line the halls of the hospital selling items such as jewelry, gift items, handmade clothing and flower arrangements, to name a few of the items that will be on sale. A silent auction will include tickets to Bass Hall and NASCAR races, spa treatments, art and gift baskets. A Carnival cruise for two also will be raffled off.

And if you’re one of those people that already has holiday shopping taken care of the Auxiliary will be selling tasty treats of home-cooked baked goods, which I hear usually sell out by noon.

For more information, please contact Judy Daley at 817-848-4853.