ABOUT
"Barton Brooks's compassionate heart and leadership brings hope to some of the darkest corners of the world.
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I admire all his hard work and especially enjoyed seeing the positive difference he's making in Africa."
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– Laura Bush: First Lady of the United States of America
Barton Brooks
It's been twenty years since I started "Guerrilla Aid," back when I was a young man with a heart full of fire. I wanted to put my mark on the world and do a bit of good, but unfortunately, was knocked off my game with a life-altering accident in Uganda.
I could never make peace with the fact that I was no longer able to do what I loved, and always felt like I'd left too much on the table to never try again. So with a bit of courage, I decided to step forward and get back out in the world, and as fate would have it, it worked.
Now I'm back out doing what I love - being a bridge between those with needs, and those that can help, and having an adventure along the way. Even though it's a bit different now (with all the aches and pains that come with a broken up body in its 50's), I'm happy to say that the fire of my youth has returned!
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I've realized that it's never too late to pick up an old dream, and you're never too broken to be brave.​ So, even if I'm not quite as effective as I once was, I'm out here in the arena, doing the best that I can. No more trying to prove anything to myself or anyone else, just out in the world making connections, learning if I can help, and then seeing what we can all do together.
The Backstory: How it all began - and ended...
I maintained an itinerant existence most of my early life - setting up home in Europe, Asia, New York and LA - but never stayed anywhere longer than a year. I was either running from my life or searching for it, and could never tell you why at the time. I was just an unmoored college dropout, going from job to job, never feeling like I made sense in the world.
During a moment of frustration, I saw a news program where Angelina Jolie was talking about Cambodia, and I bought a plane ticket that night. It seemed about as far away from my life as I could go - both in distance and reality, and it turns out, my whole life was about to change.
I got to Cambodia, and while there, I met a group of monks near Temple Bayon taking care of some orphaned boys. We struck up a quick friendship, played a little soccer, and took a few pictures. It was a simple moment that brought me so much joy, that decided I wanted to help that little community. I got home, started raising money, and six months later was back in Cambodia - with money, supplies, and soccer balls, just trying to make life a bit easier for those monks and those kids.
***This picture was taken that first day, and changed my entire life.
That simple event blossomed into a small non-profit organization focused on immediate global aid, where I'd travel around the world and email youtube videos with requests like, "I need $7 for a beehive, will you help?" It took off dramatically, and I began to create change everywhere I went.
This was long before GoFundMe or social media, so at the time it was quite a novel approach. I gave cows to the Maasai in Kenya, planted trees in Mozambique, worked with an orphanage in Nepal, built floating libraries in Laos, schools in Cambodia, and facilitated projects in Burma, India, Uganda, and elsewhere.
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My approach was fast and fluid, and I got attention very quickly. I got a call to come to the White House where I was asked to create something in Africa and Asia for First Lady Laura Bush. I went on to join her at the United Nations, greet her in Senegal, organize a trip to southeast Asia, and see her in Utah. She was always gracious and kind.
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Then came the lovely folks at Oprah, who wanted to highlight my work on oprah.com as I ran around the world doing "guerrilla aid." We then signed a TV deal on OWN for a show about my work.
Traveling and posting for Oprah was remarkable, because her readers would pitch in to help me build clean water wells, chicken coops, and community projects. Thousands of people were being helped, and I'd finally become the man I'd always wanted to be.
In March of 2009, on Friday the 13th, I was hit by a truck on my motorcycle in Uganda. My femur was shattered, I had a broken shoulder, cracked skull, broken arms, knees torn from the ligaments, and was left for dead on the side of the road. A taxi drove by, and I was folded up and put in the back seat, with my leg on the floorboards turned backwards. I went in and out of consciousness for the hour long drive to Kisoro, before I was stabilized at a small local hospital. A few days later, I was put on a Medevac flight to Kampala for emergency procedures, before home to NY for months of reconstructive surgeries.
After seven surgeries, and months of rehab, I made it back to Uganda on crutches later that year - determined to keep going. Upgraded to just a knee brace, I ran to Haiti after the earthquake, calling in to Gayle King's radio show to talk about efforts on the ground. With her followers, we rebuilt the first school in the entire country! I was finally back on track!
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But my leg was feeling a bit wonky in Haiti, so before I moved on to South America, I went home to NYC for a quick doctor visit. I learned that my femur was rebuilt incorrectly, catastrophically so, and in order to minimize further damage, my leg had to be rebroken immediately. There would be years of surgeries and rehab to follow.
I shed countless tears as I checked back in to the hospital, to begin the process again.​​
My life on the road was over, and everything disappeared - funding dried up, projects languished, the Oprah TV deal was cancelled, and the effects of PTSD overtook my mental health. I retreated to my home in Woodstock, a completely different person than I was a year earlier. I went from running around the world and making a big difference, to now just a melancholy man wandering his yard, tending to his chickens and watching the deer.​
With the loss of my sense of self, I tried for years to take control of my mental health, and failed. I got to a point where I nearly ended it all - feeling like the real me was already dead, so why not just make it official?
When I was getting things in order, and weeks away from ending my life, I was introduced to a man named Bessel van der Kolk, and he agreed to be my trauma therapist. He wrote "The Body Keeps the Score" and while working with him, I began the slow journey back to myself. It seemed like the light came back on, and I completely immersed myself into podcasts and books of people that inspired me - Jay Shetty (Think Like a Monk), Brene Brown (Rising Strong), Michelle Obama (Becoming), and Mel Robbins, and I spent hours a day working back to my carefree, optimistic, and adventurous mind, and I started to feel like myself again. But with all that regrowth, what was I supposed to do now?
One evening during a session with Bessel, he made the comment that he didn't think I was done with the aid work, and thought I could return to the old adventurous me. I began to wonder if he was right. Was there any way to reconnect with my past? How would I return? Was it even possible?​ I mean, God, I was now in my fifties and so much slower, with a titanium femur that made me limp when I'm tired - who would believe in me now?​​
But I pushed through that self-defeating talk, and one afternoon found a bit of bravery. I called former supporters, donors, sponsors, and friends, telling them I wanted to try again, and shockingly, they all still believed I could.
It seemed the only thing standing in my way, was me.
So long story longer, I'm back on the road, and it's better than I could have ever imagined (well, except for the slipped disc, torn rotator cuffs, surgeries in Bangkok, and the rabies scare... But, I've never been more at peace with my place in the world.
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**​Last thing - even though this trip has been remarkable, I really miss my best friend Buffy, my pet chicken...
