Roseville Automall - Ranger Road
Roseville Automall - Ranger Road
I find it that every once in a while, like, I've got a lot of anxiety going on. I don't know if it's anniversaries. I really don't know what the triggers are, that's kind of when I decide I'm going to go jump out of a plane and kind of just takes that edge off, When you retire, separate, we lose a lot of that camaraderie, so to find that again is incredible, that's what I credit Ranger Road to. There's no limits what you can do especially with help of other veterans. Ranger Road is a veteran nonprofit organization. We work with disabled veterans and their families. And what Ranger Road is really good at is putting together events and programs to assist veterans with various disabilities. scuba diving, skydiving. We have car racing. We have hunting, fishing. We have an MMA program, which is a mixed martial arts program. We have shadow arts, and the list goes on. I get to work with a lot of amputees, guys missing arms, some guys missing two legs or one of each. The water, being an equalizer, or being a weightless environment, it helps kind of make you feel normal again. I had a neck injury from falling and after I got out of the military and I ended up linking up with a guy named Alex. He let me know about this guy named Mikhail, who runs a nonprofit called Ranger Road. He figured out that I was big into scuba diving also, so with Ranger Road’s help, they helped me become an instructor and now I run the scuba program for Ranger Road. It's almost like a selfish thing. We do this so we can still kind of hang out with the guys. Yeah, we're giving back to them, but they're giving us so much more back being needed to do something. The feeling that I get when I help other veterans is like none other. So I'm an Air Force veteran. I've been with Ranger Road about four years now. And I've been overseeing the shadow arts program for about a year All disabilities aren't visible. I'm on 100% disability due to a back injury due to PTSD. When we are able relate to another veteran about similar experiences, it not only puts us on an equal playing field, but we empathize with each other and talk about some of those difficult things that we may not say to even our spouse. When I got connected with Ranger Road, I just got out of the military, and a lot of negative stuff going on in my own life. I'd actually got hooked on cocaine during that time. I’d separated from my wife. And then Mikhail started asking me if I wanted to go work out with him At first there was a lot of nos, he was persistent and I started hanging out with him. And so when I started being more active in the veteran community, kind of was able to kick that, and I started my business. I ended up getting back together with my wife, and so I just put my life back together. I was in 82nd Airborne Division, so I already jumped out of planes. Skydiving, it wasn't nothing new, but it was new with no legs. So it was a tandem jump. Not much to worry about because you have an instructor that's really doing everything. You're just falling. Then we started exploring the possibility of me actually getting certified to skydive on my own. And so that was kind of how the skydiving program started. Ranger Road sponsored me to get certified. And then after that, Mikhail asked me if I wanted to run the, program to certify other veterans. And so I told him yes. We are 100% volunteer-based. Everybody within Ranger Road is a volunteer. That gives us the ability to take the funding that is coming into Ranger Road and stretch our dollars. We have volunteer positions. We have opportunities for folks to be involved as a sponsor or as a donor. What Ranger Road does is it teaches you to give the best and be the best of yourselves. And if we could only save one guy, you know, and that's– that's enough
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Roseville Automall - Ranger Road
Support a veteran’s journey, Roseville Automall proudly backs Ranger Road, a nonprofit dedicated to providing veterans the tools to be successful during the transition from military to civilian life. Roseville Automall Ranger Road
Support a veteran’s journey, Roseville Automall proudly backs Ranger Road, a nonprofit dedicated to providing veterans the tools to be successful during the transition from military to civilian life. Roseville Automall Ranger Road
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