Noah Galloway of Birmingham, Ala., never dreamed of entering the military — then history intervened.
“There’s a lot of military history in my family, and I didn’t want anything to do with any of it,” Galloway says in a video for Men’s Health. “September 11th happened, and I was twenty years old, I was physically fit, and I just saw it as something I needed to do.” In October 2001, he enlisted.
Then during December 2005, Sergeant Galloway was serving in the Infantry in Iraq in when his unit received orders that required driving a Humvee into an area known as “the Triangle of Death” in Yusufiah. Driving with the headlights off and night vision goggles on, they didn’t see a trip wire, which detonated a roadside bomb as they drove over it. The explosion blasted Galloway into a canal and led to the amputation of both his left arm and leg.
Personal turmoil soon followed. “I thought more than a few times that it would have been better if I’d have just died,” he says. “I’d have been looked at like a hero. But instead, here I am, I’ve had two of my limbs taken from me. I would drink every day, but then I would go out in public and I was fine. There was this other side of me that I was just really hiding. I finally decided this has got to stop.”
Galloway joined a gym, began working out extensively and changed his diet. “Everything in my life started to improve,” he says.
The father of three now works as a personal trainer specializing in helping disabled vets, and he doesn’t let his clients get away with their excuses for not excelling. “Whatever it is that you tell me that you can’t do, we can find something to get it done,” he says. “I’ve had nothing but people try to help me. The least I can do is try to help anyone that’s in need around me.”
Most recently, Men’s Health named Galloway its “Ultimate Men’s Health Guy,” picking him from among the 1,246 contenders who entered the magazine’s first-ever contest and placing him on the November cover. Galloway won the reader’s choice poll of three finalists — finishing with more than 60,000 votes.
We bet that his inspiring story will motivate some couch potatoes to lace up their sneakers.
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MORE: A No-Brainer Job for Ex Drill Sergeants: Motivating the Rest of Us
Tag: Birmingham
Why This Pastor Continues to Feed the Homeless, Even After the Police Told Him to Stop
Millions of people across the country (about 1 in 6) do not have enough money for a meal. But twice a month for the last six years, Rick Wood, a pastor at The Lord’s House of Prayer in Oneonta, Alabama, has made sure the stomachs in his own community did not go hungry by handing out free hot dogs and bottled water to those in need.
That is, until he was literally stopped by the food police.
As ThinkProgress reports, last month local police stopped Wood due to the city’s food truck law, which meant the pastor had to acquire a pricey permit (that can cost up to $500) in order to continue giving out food. The exact wording of the city ordinance states (per AL.com): “No person or business entity, including religious or charitable organization, shall operate a mobile food vehicle and/or pushcart upon the public rights-of-way within the city without a permit.” Reports say that the law was enacted after local restaurants complained that food trucks were affecting business.
MORE: A Man, His Van and a Mission to Help the Homeless
Wood told ABC 33/40 he wasn’t at all happy with the government’s decision. “I’m just so totally shocked that the city is turning their back on the homeless like this,” he said. “It’s like they want to chase them out of the city. And the homeless can’t help the position they’re in. They need help.”
As ThinkProgress reports, Birmingham’s homeless numbers have gone down in recent years but there are still 1,469 people in the area who do not have a roof over their heads. Wood, who has the Bible verse “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink” etched onto the side of his truck, is not giving up his mission to help feed the hungry. According to a online fundraiser, Wood has already obtained the permit to continue in his good works.
How to Teach Kids about Food Beyond the Grocery Store
Most kids in American schools think that food just comes from the grocery store. So a new curriculum for first and second graders gives teachers and students an opportunity to talk about the more complex reality. Jones Valley Teaching Farm, an urban farm in Birmingham, Alabama, uses the curriculum on-site and in schools, teaching students about everything from planting seeds to marketing produce. The farm also partners with Southern Foodways Alliance at the University of Mississippi to tell the stories of people working in the food industry across the south. A version of the kit for older students is now in the works to make the curriculum available to more schools.