Some days working in healthcare is tough. Like when a patient gets a difficult diagnosis, or a family must make end-of-life decisions for a loved one, or someone suffers a traumatic injury that will change their life forever.
As healthcare providers, we try to help, but we also know some of the pain, both physical and mental, it’s completely unavoidable for those people, and it’s just hard to witness.
Fortunately, there is a very strong balancing factor and that is that people in healthcare get to make a difference for someone else every single day, we get to be the hand to hold, the shoulder to cry on, and we do have tools to alleviate a good chunk of the pain people experience.
To quote a favorite nursing theorist, Jean Watson, “We have the joy and privilege of caring for another person when they are at their most vulnerable.”
Those moments make the tough times worth it. But that making a difference isn’t just isolated to healthcare, there are things all of us can do to “… care for another person when they are at their most vulnerable.”
One of the ways I do that outside my job is I have the great privilege of serving on the Board of Directors for United Way of Odessa.
The last couple years have been so hard on everyone. The pandemic has cost us far more than lives, it has cost people their homes, their jobs, even, in some cases, their sanity. I have said this many, many times, and I believe it with all my being, that the COVID pandemic is the worst single event in my lifetime in terms of mass destruction across the planet at nearly every level.
Yet during this time of so much need, the United Way of Odessa is still here, still supporting its partner agencies, so they can do the great work they do for our community.
The agencies that United Way of Odessa supports serve the people who are always our most vulnerable, even in the best of times, so their work has been even more important in the last two years.
Unfortunately, because times are hard, donations to United Way have also suffered in the last two years, and we are not able to support these much-needed agencies in proportion to the increased needs of the last two years.
United Way of Odessa supports far more than just Odessa. They support eight counties in the Permian Basin: Loving, Winkler, Ector, Ward, Reeves, Pecos, Jeff Davis and Brewster counties.
These counties are some of the most remote and resource poor counties in our state, and many people in those eight counties need help that the United Way agencies provide.
In 2021-2022, United Way of Odessa supported funding for the Boys and Girls Club of Odessa, the Bynum School, Camp Fire West Texas, CASA of the Permian Basin, Catholic Charities, Centers for Children and Families, Crisis Center of West Texas, Family Promise of Odessa, Girl Scouts of the Desert Southwest, Harmony Home Children’s Advocacy Center, Meals on Wheels Odessa, Mission Center Adult Day Service, Odessa Christmas in Action, Odessa Day Nursery, Odessa Family Y, Odessa Links, Permian Basin Mission Center, S.H.A.R.E. and the Salvation Army.
The work these agencies do is incredibly impactful, and the donated financial resources are used very wisely by these agencies. For instance, a donation of $5/week to United Way of Odessa equates to 65 meals a year to a hungry person. A donation of $25/week provides 17 counseling sessions a year to someone in need, and a donation of $50/week provides 600 hours of 1:1 education for students.
One thing I hear as a concern when I talk to a few people about United Way that most donation dollars are spent outside or our area or not sent to those in need. That is absolutely a myth; 98.2% of all funds donated go to people in need, right here in the eight counties United Way of Odessa supports.
Others worry that funds will go to a supported organization that the donor does not agree with on a philosophical or moral level. If a donor chooses, they can specify exactly which of the supported agencies they want their dollars to go to.
In this season of giving, please consider donating to the United Way of Odessa. Your donation will give you an opportunity to “… care for people when they are at their most vulnerable.” If you are an employer, please consider sponsoring a workplace campaign. To donate or to speak to someone about arranging a workplace campaign, please contact the United Way of Odessa offices at 432-332-0941, or on their website at www.unitedwayodessa.org
