A New Path to Stroll On
Left: Isiah, Brandon’s mentor | Right: Brandon
“Now I got goals and a future,” Brandon shares during his speech for completing the Healing Hurt People program.
Losing both parents to gun violence as a child and being a victim of gun violence himself, Brandon is no stranger to the traumatic effects of community violence. “I feel like I’ve experienced death since a young age,” he said. Moving to Portland as a child, Brandon lost his mother in fourth grade and his father in fifth. His uncle raised him in their place. Beyond the grief of losing his family, Brandon faced obstacles as a young person that resulted in him living on the streets, and he describes he was “near homeless, being a knucklehead, moving too fast, and not really caring about anything.”
His wake-up call was a gunshot wound that left him in the hospital for 107 days. “I had a lot of time in the hospital to think about what to do when I got out,” Brandon said, “and then I met Isiah. He started trying to work with me and tell me things, have me read books and stuff like that. It made my mindset different… I had a lot of change.” Isiah is Brandon’s Intensive Case Manager from the POIC Healing Hurt People program. HHP staff members respond to victims of violence in hospitals to prevent retaliation, provide wraparound support to victims and their families, and ultimately lead participants to a different lifestyle in order to break the cycle of violence. The Healing Hurt People team members are ‘credible messengers’ in these hospital visits: people with similar lived experience who can relate more deeply to those sitting in the hospital beds. They come from life on the streets and now seek to help people find a better path to walk on.
Brandon’s Uncle “Unc” gave a touching speech at the celebration for the completion of the Healing Hurt People program. Having a distant relationship with his uncle while he was living in the streets, Brandon reflects on how good it feels to have his uncle’s consistent support now that he’s getting his life on track.
Before he met Isiah, Brandon says he was facing many obstacles and trying to figure out what to do in life. Having a mentor helped him “create a path for me to stroll down,” gain clarity for his life and start creating goals. Brandon began to use the tools he was learning in his day-to-day life. “I started just being happier to live. Happy to be alive - I don’t know how to explain it. I just know I have a purpose on this earth.”
Brandon relays that he feels like a better person and has much to give to other youth. He wants to ensure they don’t go through the same things he did. Turning the cycle of trauma and violence into a cycle of hope and healing is important. He wants to “uplift them and show them there’s a different way of living, of caring for yourself and being in the community.”
The POIC Healing Hurt People program has responded to 48 hospital cases this year and currently has 71 clients on a caseload. The program Brandon went through provided training in the violence prevention sector, mentorship, and wraparound support. He’s now wrapping up his intensive outpatient treatment program and moving out of his sobering living program into permanent housing. He plans to get a job working with youth.