Woolley Family Restoration Plan

[If you’d like to tell others about this, we welcome that - in any way you want (including social media). Thank you!]

 

 

 

 

The Woolley Family Restoration Plan

 

The Woolley Family - Dan and Christy, and kids Josh, Nate, and Sam - are seeking help to find healing and restoration from a significant traumatic experience in 2010, along with other traumas experienced in the years since (see a breakdown of the needs, outlined below).

 

The Woolley family have spent their lives in ministry. Dan has spent his career working for Christian non-profits like Kids Alive International and Compassion International, consulting for ministries like Life Network and Summit Ministries, and speaking at various ministry events. Christy has taught Bible and apologetics classes at church and homeschool co-ops, and both have volunteered in children’s ministry and Awana programs. Josh and Nate both serve as interns in their youth group, and Josh is preparing to go into pastoral ministry. Over the years, they have witnessed God’s incredible faithfulness, but also Satan’s efforts to attack them and pull them away from ministry.

 

Many of you may know Dan and Christy’s Haiti earthquake story (you can read about it below), which was also told in their book, Unshaken. They were so grateful for Dan’s rescue after 3 days of being buried under rubble, and for the new ministry opportunities that came after this incredible experience with God’s divine intervention. But after Dan’s rescue there were steps in trauma care and healing that did not happen, and the trauma has built up over the twelve years since. As new hardships came up, the residual trauma from Haiti magnified the impact of each stressor, often sending Dan and Christy into a psychological fight or flight mode.

The stress of the pandemic: health scares, lockdowns, everyone in masks - hard on everyone in different ways - accentuated trauma-related anxiety that had already been building for the family, and they found PTSD-related symptoms cropping up in new health and psychological challenges. Christy has developed multiple diagnosed and undiagnosed health issues in her digestive and endocrine systems for which they are struggling, with weekly tests and doctor visits, to find clarity and treatment options. These have been caused or compounded by prolonged adrenaline and cortisone levels brought on by stress. In many ways, her body is breaking down - and they still don't know how to stop it.

 

Finally, when Dan was hospitalized with COVID-19 pneumonia (two weeks in May 2021), doctors expressed grave concern about his declining health and Christy was not allowed to visit him in the hospital. PTSD came back in full force for Christy and Dan and the kids and put the family into crisis again.

 

Thankfully, once again God spared Dan and returned him to health. While Dan was still recovering in the hospital, he recognized that their family could no longer ignore their needs for restoration and healing, so he reached out to trusted advisors and friends to develop a plan to address these needs. Dan and Christy want to find healing and they believe God has plans for more ministry impact in their future, but Satan also tries to sideline people who try to serve God. They must be intentional with a time of regrouping and healing, building foundations for what God has in the next chapter of their lives and the lives of their children.

 

Parts of the Restoration Plan they developed require funds that Dan and Christy don’t have available, so we (Chad and Emily) have created this GoFundMe campaign to help raise the money needed, and also to bring attention to other ways people can help, including prayer.

 

Dan and his advisors have identified these needs, with these costs associated:

Thank you for your consideration and, whatever you decide, for your prayers!

For anyone who wants to contact them directly: [phone redacted], [email redacted]
3578 Hartsel Dr. Ste E303
Colorado Springs, CO 80920

Dan and Christy’s Haiti story (told by Dan)

 

In January 2010, I was gathering video resources for Compassion International in Port-au-Prince, Haiti when the earthquake struck. As I walked through the lobby of my hotel, the six-story building collapsed on top of me, and I was trapped for 3 days in the darkness. Severely injured, I tended my wounds the best I could, wrote goodbye notes to my family, and spent the hours talking with God and preparing for death.

 

My wife, Christy, back in Colorado Springs with our two boys at the time (6 and 3 yrs old), did not know if I was alive or dead for several days. She tried to hold onto hope, and reached out to God in faith, but she experienced great despair, especially as news accounts cast doubt on the possibilities of rescue. In her mind, she knew that my death was the most likely outcome, and she mourned that loss. But on the third morning, rescuers reached me and she got a call from the state department: I was alive, they said, but they weren’t sure they could get me out. She got on a plane to Miami, planning to arrive in Haiti with a news crew and stand on the rubble, digging alongside the rescuers until they reached me, but by the time she reached Miami, I had been medevaced out and she met me in the Miami hospital. My survival, and my rescue, was prayed for by tens of thousands, and was considered a miracle by many, including myself.

 

I had used an app on my iPhone, a new phenomenon in early 2010, to review first aid techniques to stay alive while I was trapped, and after my rescue, news of that pushed my story around the world’s media. I appeared on Larry King Live, Anderson Cooper, The Today Show, and in magazines from Wired to Der Speigel, all giving me an (often edited) opportunity to talk about God’s intervention and the role of faith in this crisis - but mostly in 2-minute segments. Recognizing that there was so much more to the story, to what God had done through my earthquake survival experience, I published a book with Zondervan and started on a speaking circuit. I was so grateful that God was taking this difficult experience in our lives and using it to touch so many people. By God’s grace, I spoke before hundreds of thousands, and through media touchpoints (news, radio, and tv - including several “I survived” type shows), my story reached millions.

 

But while all of this was happening, my family and I were facing new challenges. I had returned to my regular job at Compassion, and now had added new ministry responsibilities. We did not have clear options for therapy and had limited funds (the book income was very limited), so though we both suffered from PTSD and survivor’s guilt, we did not get therapeutic help that we needed. Some extended family and friend relationships were damaged, and existing dysfunction was revealed, through these stressful times, adding additional trauma. And there were many well-meaning but quite hurtful and unkind messages shared from folks in the Church who did not know how to speak into heartache, especially with Christy. Some of those messages still echo in our hearts today.

 

While I extended myself deeper into ministry, beyond my regular career, there were some steps to healing that we never took, and we didn’t heal. And at some point the survival testimony ministry mostly tapered off, and life just went on. New hurts and fears built upon old ones, and unresolved trauma festered.

 

Through the stress of 2020, the PTSD and the mess of past pain started bubbling up in a more significant way. Christy and I are now in counseling and a recovery group. We’re starting counseling for our boys who have each seen impacts of trauma in different ways. One is working through significant anxiety attacks. Christy is also dealing with significant medical issues that will require multiple surgeries; most of these are stress-related.

 

My recent hospitalization with COVID has given me a new view on our reality. In addition to accentuating and reactivating the PTSD for both of us, it gives me pause. I need to effectively lead my family back to a place of health -- how do I do that?

 

In this context, we have asked for help from friends and advisors to develop a plan to work towards healing some of these old wounds. We are grateful to friends in the Body of Christ who are helping us heal and get back on our feet for the next chapters of ministry and service in our lives. We are grateful for you, and any gift (including advising and prayer) you choose to share.

 

If you are interested in learning more of our story, we have copies of our book, Unshaken: Rising from the Ruins of Haiti's Hotel Montana, available here .