The Clock is Ticking…
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Dear Friends,
Today marks the end of SWAN’s fiscal year, one packed with many triumphs. We thank you for all of the ways in which you have supported us.
As the next year starts, we have much work left to do to guarantee equality for all service members and veterans. We are prepared to take on the challenges ahead knowing that you, too, believe in and will defend equality.
Last night, we received some exciting news! V-Day generously donated $5,000 to our National Peer Support Helpline! With their donation, our $25,000 Matching Campaign has raised $12,460. A generous donor will double this amount and will continue to do so until midnight tonight. read more
Help SWAN’s Helpline!
Dear Friends,
SWAN exists to ensure that service women will, one day soon, not be subjected to job discrimination under the Combat Exclusion Policy, or harmed by sexual violence, physical violence, or harassment of any kind while serving.
Almost all of the calls we receive on our National Peer Support Helpline are from service members and veterans needing help with gender-based discrimination or violence. About half of our calls require that SWAN involve an attorney. Many of these calls require real-time help and legal intervention.
SWAN has depended on volunteers in the legal community to assist our clients-but now the demand for our help is so great that we need to hire an in-house Legal Director. While we are receiving some funding from our foundation partners, we need YOUR help to make this happen now. read more
Today We Can Ask and Tell: SWAN’s Continuing Work for LGBT Equality in the Military
To learn more about how to achieve full equality for LGBT service members and veterans, read SWAN’s Post-DADT LGBT Fact Sheet.
Celebrate the End of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
Dear Friends of SWAN,
We are extremely excited to gather with veterans, family members and allies next week to celebrate the historic repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell!
DADT was a policy that harshly impacted service women — while women make up only 15% of total service members, in recent years they made up well over one-third of total DADT discharges. Women of color were hit particularly hard.
We invite you to celebrate with SWAN at the RF Lounge in New York City on Tuesday, September 20th, between 6 and 9 PM. Click here for details! read more
Justice For Women Veterans
SWAN is featured in a New York Times editorial on the VA’s unfair treatment of Military Sexual Trauma survivors. Highlighted are SWAN’s policy efforts to reform VA benefits claims regulations.
Help in Healing: Yoga for Vets
Dear Friends,
SWAN is thrilled to launch a new schedule of two free yoga classes for veterans!
SWAN’s free Yoga for Vets NYC program has served hundreds of veterans since its inception in 2008. Taught by veterans, for veterans, the class fosters a community where veterans and their loved ones can learn techniques to heal from military-related wounds and the stresses of re-integrating back home.
To read a piece I wrote for The Huffington Post about learning and teaching yoga, click here: “Yoga and PTSD: One Veteran’s Story”.
Morgan Cooley, a returning Afghanistan veteran, had this to say about the class:
Yoga for Vets NYC changed my life. The class came into my life just after returning home from Afghanistan. It showed me that medication wasn’t the only form of therapy out there. Since going there my anxiety and stress levels went down and I felt a sense of peace I had never known.
Yoga And PTSD: One Vet’s Story
By Anu Bhagwati
Anu is a former Marine Corps Captain and SWAN’s first Executive Director.
After leaving the Marine Corps in 2004, I was emotionally wounded and physically broken from multiple injuries. Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, I didn’t think I had anything left in me. Practicing and teaching yoga to veterans helped save my life.
After fighting conventional pill-popping treatments, I felt that I had nothing to lose by trying things my own way. When I hit rock bottom, I threw myself into a yoga teacher training program. I had not imagined that my combination of injuries, emotional pain and hardheadedness would be such a challenge. Yoga taught me many new things about myself. It turned out that in order to move beyond my pain, I had to change old habits that had been deeply ingrained by military service.
Multiple knee and shoulder injuries meant I simply could not do things normal people could. I could no longer muscle my way forward, come hell or high water, because my body simply wouldn’t allow it. In being denied the physical control I had been so used to as a Marine, other softer sides of me exposed themselves. The vulnerable parts that the Marine Corps did its best to squeeze out of me were the parts I least wanted to explore — the parts that were preventing me from healing. read more
Gloria Steinem Joins our Team
Dear Friends of SWAN,
I am writing to share some exciting news! The iconic Gloria Steinem has joined SWAN’s Campaign to “Defend Equality”. Ms. Steinem is a member of SWAN’s Advisory Board and a long-time supporter of our work. Our “Defend Equality” matching campaign gives SWAN an opportunity to double your donations, up to $25,000.
With your support, SWAN’S policy team will build on the successes experienced this year. In what has been described as one of the most contentious sessions of Congress in history, SWAN has generated interest, increased awareness, and helped introduce bi-partisan and bi-cameral legislation that moved advocacy issues to the fore and resulted in constructive reforms of both the Department of Defense and Department of Veterans Affairs. Additionally, SWAN will continue its campaign to educate the public about the discriminatory issues that affect service members and provide direct services to wounded veterans, service members and their families. SWAN will also pursue litigation to advance the rights of sexual violence survivors in accessing judicial redress and veterans’ benefits. read more