When Brandon Peacock set out to get his hair cut at a barber shop in Ottawa three summers ago, it was a walk that would change his life forever.

He was shot three times in a drive-by shooting and nearly died. “I remember laying on the ground asking myself, ‘If you die right now, are you proud of the legacy you’ve left the world?’ At the time, the answer was no,” Peacock recalls. “After that moment, I knew dying was no longer an option because I needed to push through, so I could change the lives of others with this new gift I’d been given.”

That new gift of life manifested itself in Hit The Ground Running, a charity Peacock co-founded. Alongside sharing tragic, yet inspiring, stories, HTGR solicits public donations to cover physiotherapy, psychotherapy and other medical expenses that trauma survivors cannot afford.

Among the people the charity has helped is a grantee who’d been told by doctors he would be paralyzed forever. It provided funds for 15 months of physio, and today he’s walking again. Peacock says the ultimate success for HTGR would mean no trauma survivor having to fight for the bare minimum insurance coverage or other assistance.

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Do you know someone who goes above and beyond? We’d love to hear about them. Send nominations to drivenbygood@caasco.ca and they could be our featured Localer in an upcoming issue.