Wounded Soldier’s Wedding Wish Granted by Nonprofit
Church ceremony delayed by mine explosion in Iraq
PEMBROKE PINES, FL, February 28, 2011 – Hope For The Warriors® is proud to grant A Warrior’s Wish® to a deserving combat wounded veteran. The Wish recipient is SPC Hugo Gonzalez, USA, (Ret.) who resides with his wife and three young girls in Pembroke Pines, FL. His Wish, to marry his faithful wife in a church ceremony, came more than six years after being wounded in Iraq. Hope For The Warriors® is a national, nonprofit organization that supports wounded U.S. service members, their families and families of the fallen.
Gonzalez was engaged to be married when he deployed to Iraq in 2004. Due to extensive injuries caused by a mine explosion, he was unable to marry his fiancé in the traditional church ceremony they desired. Instead, they married quickly in a civil ceremony while he was in rehabilitation at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. They now have three children: four-year-old twin girls and one three-year-old daughter. Happily devoted to each other and to their children, his Wish was to give his supportive wife a traditional church wedding.
A Warrior’s Wish® supports the long-term goal of hope beyond recovery. These Wishes fulfill a desire for a better quality of life or support a quest for life-gratifying endeavors. Knowing that Wishes can come true directly affects service members’ spirits in addition to the families and communities that support them.
Hope For The Warriors® proudly granted this Wish to Gonzalez and his family. Friends of the family collected money to pay for their airfare. Hope For The Warriors® paid for the reception, floral arrangements, groom’s tuxedo and more. Although this Wish was granted to the service member, Gonzalez asked for the Wish as a gift to his loving wife.
“We have to understand that when the soldier goes to war, the family also goes to war,” Gonzalez said. “We also have to realize that when the soldier gets wounded, the family also gets wounded.”
“Hugo’s faith and devotion has been an inspiration to our entire staff,” Mirka Young, Hope For The Warriors®, A Warrior’s Wish® coordinator said. “It was a pleasure to grant this Wish to a soldier who sacrificed so much for his country.”
The mission of Hope For The Warriors® (www.hopeforthewarriors.org) is to enhance quality of life for U.S. service members and their families nationwide who have been adversely affected by injuries or death in the line of duty. Hope For The Warriors® actively seeks to ensure that the sacrifices of wounded and fallen warriors and their families are never forgotten nor their needs unmet.
