Wednesday, October 7, 2026
Gun Violence Awareness Month has arrived, and an organization that supports people through the grief process after facing loss and trauma hosted a Wear Orange event in Eisenhower Park, featuring several speakers who are part of anti-gun violence organizations.
The nonprofit Life After Loss A.N.D.R.E. were joined on June 6 by several groups, including Everytown Survivor Network; the Nassau County District Attorney’s Office, with its Victims Services Unit; Moms Demand Action; Students Demand Action; and March for Our Lives.
Attendees, which numbered in the dozens at the June 6 event, were encouraged to wear orange, the color for gun violence prevention, since it’s traditionally a color worn by hunters to protect themselves by making themselves visible in the woods.
Stephanie Draine and George Graydon Sr. founded Life After Loss A.N.D.R.E. — which stands for Ability-Navigate-Depression-Recovery-Empowerment — in honor of their son, Andre Graydon, who died from gun violence in January of 2014.
In the United States, 125 people are lost to gun violence each day. Several survivors who spoke at the June 6 event expressed their personal experiences of losing loved ones to gun violence. They pleaded for stronger laws, more awareness, increased support for survivors, and bolstered funding to aid their cause.
“It’s a challenge to have to wear a beautiful color as orange to represent what is a dreary cause,” said Oresa Napper-Williams, founder of Not Another Child, a peer-support organization that helps families impacted by violence. “It is a challenge for survivors, and those that have lost their children, to even plan events like this. So I do want to give honor to Stephanie and Life After Loss for creating this space and this place so that people could come today and pay homage to their loved ones.”
Napper-Williams, who lost her son Andrelle Napper to gun violence in 2006, emphasized that survivor organizations are also there to support the loved ones of those who have died from gun violence too.
“We’re trying to create events, we’re trying to create spaces, for mothers, for fathers, for siblings, to give everyone a space and a place to grieve,” Napper-Williams said. “Because everyone grieves differently.”
She stressed the need for investment in these organizations.
“Survivors offer a continuum of services,” Napper-Williams said. “We don’t meet you at the hospital, and then come to the funeral, and then call you back years later or run into you on the street. We are there for you — for memorials, for transition days, for birthdays. But it takes support to buy balloons, to buy candles, to get off of Zoom with support sessions, to get a space and have food, to be able to offer that fellowship and give a hug.”
Draine emphasized the tremendous impact that gun violence has had on her family.
“While the world celebrated new beginnings on January 1st, 2014, we mourned an end,” Draine said. “The end of a life filled with light, promise and potential … But a bullet doesn’t just take a life, it tears through generations. It stole a father’s pride, shattered a mother’s soul, and broke our family into pieces that would never quite fit the same again … George, Andre’s father, carries his grief quietly. You may not see it, but it’s there — in every breath he takes and every moment that should have included Andre.”
Draine spoke about the need to safely store firearms as an important part of preventing gun violence, as well as getting illegal guns off the streets.
“Educating families to speak with the person they’re taking their kids to, to ask questions,” Draine said. “It’s okay to ask, ‘Is there a gun in the house? Is it securely stored?’ So having an event like this, we’re raising awareness and speaking on those issues.”
James Hodge, another speaker at the event, lost a nephew, Tyrenzo Brown, to gun violence in 2014.
“You think you can deal with it, but it’s very hard to be a survivor — going through the memories and the birthdays,” Hodge said.
Hodge also emphasized how important it is for survivors to receive the proper support.
“So finding out how is the next person getting through the tragedy that they went through,” Hodge said. “So constantly speaking, and doing counseling, and working with other survivors, us coming together to just really love on one another.”
He also stressed the vital role that gun laws play. “To let people know, no matter what party you’re in, that you have to work on legislation that will help eradicate gun violence and any form of violence,” Hodge said.
Kian Cooper, a social worker from Long Beach with degrees from Stony Brook University and Queens College, works as a substance abuse counselor and is pursuing a degree in public administration.
“Before all of the credentials and accomplishments of my life, I am one who has suffered a traumatic loss, when my father’s life was taken the morning of my grammar school graduation,” Cooper said. “It was at that time that I realized that trauma had affected me on all three levels — acute, chronic and complex.”
Max Mendelsohn and Téa Shouldice, from March for Our Lives, a student-led network that gained momentum following the school shooting at Marjory Stoneman High School in Parkland, Florida in 2018, addressed the current state of gun violence in the community.
“While New York has strong laws of our own, it’s not enough,” Mendelsohn said. “In an average year, 870 people die and 2,607 people are injured by guns in New York, according to the CDC.”
Many people who attended the event to listen to speakers were personally affected by gun violence — either as survivors or because they’d lost a loved one.
“Keep awareness going,” Krystal Watts, one survivor in the crowd, said. “Don’t lose faith. And don’t lose hope. Don’t lose the strength to go on and carry the names for the victims that have been lost.”
To learn more about Life After Loss A.N.D.R.E. and its work, visit LifeAfterLossAndre.com. Letters and packages can be sent to P.O. Box 1277, North Baldwin.
