LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) – A North Las Vegas non-profit combat’s veteran suicide by pedaling forward.
Those taking part in the bike program at ‘Forgotten Not Gone’ are coming together to help one another.
Most recent data from the Veterans Affairs shows more than 6400 veterans died by suicide in 2022.
Those numbers hit home for veterans struggling in the valley.
For veteran Reggie Currie, he came home after serving 8 years in the army and realized adjusting back to civilian life was harder than he realized.
“Being homeless, wanting to give up feeling like there is no reason for me to be alive I’m not providing for my kids I have no way to secure a job,” Currie sad. “I pretty much gave myself a deadline that if I wasn’t able to get a job or get some sort of purpose that it wasn’t even worth me even being here.”
The deadline Currie gave himself was June 17th, 2016, however the universe had other plans for him.
“It was one day before my deadline that this event was happening,” Currie said.
That event Currie came across involved special recumbent bikes.
“I jumped on the bikes, and I started riding around, immediately I felt like I had a purpose,” Currie said.
Part of that purpose perhaps was to meet Peter and Kelly Guidry, disabled veterans who founded Forgotten Not Gone.
“It’s a different breed of people that serve, we are taught to really be able to compartmentalize being able to do that keeps you alive however the opposite is true when you get out, we compartmentalize, and we are the best at isolation.” Kelly said.
Isolation is where Kelly found her husband Peter.
Kelly tells FOX5 it wasn’t until a visit to a VA psychiatrist that Kelly learned her husband of 16 years had a deadline of his own.
“It just really broke my heart to know the person I’m laying next to the person I think I’m helping considered that to be an out,” Kelly said.
However, there was an out as the doctors recommended Peter get a recumbent bike.
Kelly said he was able to see a difference in Peter within a month.
The couple bought another one, and then another thinking this could be the answer for veterans struggling in silence.
This led them to start their non-profit Forgotten Not Gone.
It has veterans riding 22 miles together each time they hit the road.
“It is in honor of the 22 lives that are lost daily that was so we ride that in honor of our fallen veterans and active duty,” Kelly said.
Their non-profit has helped many veterans cope through their struggles with peer support, bike rides and counseling.
Now there is another hurdle they have to get through.
Their lease where they store the bikes and meet up with veterans is up in a few months.
According to Kelly if they don’t raise $120,000 in the next two months to pay for next year’s lease, they are not sure where to go next.
“We need to either raise $120,000 and be able to stay here for another year or move to another location that has direct trail access. We do have the cheapest rent here that’s about $8,600 a month,” Kelly said.
Kelly told FOX5 some of the veterans are already expressing anxiousness about the future of the non-profit.
“I just don’t want to not be there for them because we spend a lot of money on reactionary dollars, once somebody is already at that threshold of wanting to take their life, or if they are homeless or whatever, but we can save so much more money if we use it on preventative dollars,” Kelly said.
For now, the non-profit will continue to hold their group bike sessions throughout the week.
If you would like to donate or learn more about Forgotten Not Gone, you can click here.
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