My husband is dead.  My Johnny is gone.  Please come back… Damnit John, don’t do this to me!

The emotions are all over the place, and I am having a hard time sitting still.  I cannot sleep at night because I am so angry; then I wake up and am lost.

It doesn’t take much for me to burst into tears, and it doesn’t matter where I am… at home, in the bank or grocery store, in our antique shop.  The sobs come unbidden and without warning.

I am heartbroken.  For me, and for the husband I loved beyond description.  I am crying as I write this.

He was a wonderful, kind, funny, brilliant, grumpy, annoying, thoughtful, talented, humble, and loving man. He was also tortured by physical pain and ailments, and emotional doubts.

He was the best.  He is gone.

I can’t let him slip off into the night… John was larger than life, and so must be his legacy.

Thus, The Warrior Project.

It’s still all in my head right now, but I’ve been sketching it out.  The Warrior Project is intended for those who fall through the big gaping chasms in our society’s ability to address psychic and physical pain… for those people who die tragically and unexpectedly… and about whom everyone says, “I had no idea….”

I will not allow John’s death to be a statistic, like too many others who have gone before him and who will needlessly die in the future.  If nothing else, I will continue to rage to the gods and the universe my anger, my desolation, my heartbreak.  We MUST learn how to address pain in all of its various incarnations.  We MUST learn how to prevent such tragedies, to keep them from destroying lives and ripping the souls out of those left behind.

To see what I wish to do in Johnny’s honor, I hope you will read the sections under the cover photo above:

• Home – What is The Warrior Project?
• About – A Tribute to John Kelly Snyder
• Funding The Warrior Project
• Questions & Answers

If you are able to help in any fashion bring this project to fruition, please contact me.

In the meantime, love those around you as well and as often as you can.  And be kind to the rest.

Thank you.
Linda Snyder

In memory of my beloved husband John Kelly Snyder… 20 Sept 1956 – 21 Oct 2016.

The Warrior Project is a warm, welcoming drop-in center for those living with extreme emotional and/or physical pain coupled with hopelessness, and a resource for families and friends fearing for the life of, or grieving the loss of, the person they love so much.

My Johnny was a true warrior, fighting demons no one else could see.  I thought he was the strongest man in the world, and perhaps he was, but tragically, the demons got the better of him.

The name of this project is in no way intended to be reflective of, or piggy back off, Wounded Warriors which serves those wounded after September 11, 20o1.  Like too many others, John was a warrior long before then.

Fair winds and following seas, Husband.