Badua Family Assistance

Hello, my name is Rich Helchowski and I wanted to reach out to you all about my US Merchant Marine Academy plebe year roommate, Freddy Badua, 1986 3rd Company B Split. Fred came to Kings Point from Hawaii and spent pretty much every holiday with my family as it was often too far to fly home and I was a beloved Long Islander. Throughout the years I’ve kept up with Fred and his family even though we spoke infrequently. Freddy is one of the most religious, caring, compassionate, and humble guys I know.

In November of this year his wife Jennifer asked for prayers as Fred had suffered back-to-back strokes. He had spent the month of October in the hospital and had recently been released back home. He has extreme difficulty speaking and walking, and is struggling with his memory. He is improving, but it will be a long road to recovery.

I spoke with Jennifer who informed me that she and their youngest son Demetrius have been taking care of Freddy full-time. She also shared with me that their oldest son Joshua, has recently become severely disabled. He's 29 and has Autism. He had been high functioning, able to communicate well, and was excellent with numbers and sports stats. This Summer he developed Catatonia, a rare psychiatric disorder that leaves a person unable to speak. Its victims understand nothing, and walk around pacing in a zombie-like state. Joshua was hospitalized at Harborview in Washington State for nearly 3 months while being treated with Electro-convulsive therapy to the brain. He has been making significant progress with this therapy and Fred and Jennifer are hopeful he will eventually be back to normal.

Jennifer is a nurse and has been working while trying to be a full time care giver to both Fred and Joshua. Their second son Demetrius is also working full time helping support his family. Their savings are dwindling and Jennifer is tired.

I wanted to help them and thought that by setting up a GoFundMe page our Kings Point family could help to ease the Badua’s financial burden.