Crash Survivor Support: A Conversation with FSS Member Tina Ortiz
Crash Survivor Support Group: A conversation with FSS Member, Tina Ortiz
Milwaukee FSS member Tina Ortiz lost her leg in a crash. Tina shares the ways that she coped with the physical pain and emotional challenges of this sudden turn in her life. We will share questions, conversations, and group member perceptions of their own recoveries.
Please note: * This group is limited to crash survivors and/or their caregivers.
*We are meeting at 7:30 ET/4:30 PT, this month only!
📅 Dec. 17 | 7:30–8:30 pm ET | 4:30-5:30 pm PT RSVP HERE
Honoring Crash Anniversaries and Birthdays - December 2025
Birthday & Anniversary Support Group. Anniversaries and birthdays can be very challenging. These are times to be comforted by peers who have been through similar loss and heartbreak. Join this ongoing gathering in the month of your or your loved one’s anniversary and/or birthday to share stories and traditions, to comfort others, and receive comfort. This gathering will be facilitated by FSS support staff and open to anyone who has experienced a crash loss, or injury.
📅 Dec. 11 | 7–8 pm ET | 4-5 pm PT RSVP HERE
Peer Mentor Training - December 2025
FSS Peer Mentoring provides bereaved family members and those seriously injured, along with their caregivers, with a connection to a volunteer peer support mentor. Our FSS mentors are all individuals who have been through similar experiences and are dedicated to helping others survive these life-altering tragedies. If you feel ready to mentor a peer or are just curious about this program, please join us. Mentoring is a foundational program in the work to support our community.
📅 Dec 10 | 7–8 pm ET | 4-5 pm PT RSVP HERE
Food and Memory - Grief Support
The foods that delight, comfort, and bring us together are powerfully linked to memory. Cooking a loved one’s favorite meal can help us remember them. Sharing that meal with family and friends can create a sense of community and literally set the table for storytelling and comforting each other. We will share loved ones’ favorite foods and the meals that have carried meaning for your families.
📅 Dec 9 | 7–8 pm ET | 4-5 pm PT RSVP HERE
Stop Super Speeders Campaign Kickoff
Join us for a Stop Super Speeders campaign launch meeting on Friday, 12/5 at 12pm ET/9am PT to get the latest updates on potential state bills and strategize with fellow advocates.
Stop Super Speeders promotes the use of Intelligent Speed Assistance (ISA) technology to stop repeat and reckless drivers—“super speeders”—from exceeding safe speeds, including those who travel at extremely dangerous speeds.
Speeding killed nearly 12,000 people in 2023, and traditional penalties have failed to deter the small group of drivers responsible for a disproportionate share of deadly crashes. By supporting Stop Super Speeders state legislation, we aim to prevent dangerous speeding before it happens, reduce fatal crashes, and create safer streets for everyone.
Review the materials we have available to support you on our Stop Super Speeders webpage and members-only page.
📅 Friday, December 5, 2025 | 12:00–1:00 PM ET | 9:00 - 10:00 am PT RSVP HERE
Crash Survivor Support Group - November 2025
From physical pain to emotional trauma and lifestyle changes, the effects of crashes for survivors can be life-changing. Join peers for conversation and the support of those with shared experience. The economy, rhythm, and expressiveness of poetry can help us to tap into feelings about trauma, pain, and navigating the world after a crash injury. Join FSS member and writer, Michelle McLaren in a facilitated discussion. No poetry reading or writing experience required!
2025 Post-World Day of Remembrance Virtual Candle Light Vigil
Join Families for Safe Streets for our annual Post-WDOR Virtual Candlelight Vigil and slideshow. This event is open to all community members. We will share photos of loved ones lost to crashes and honor those injured. The gathering will include our memorial slideshow, readings, and a candle lighting ceremony.
Nov 18 | 7- 8 pm ET | 4-5 pm PT RSVP HERE
Crash Anniversaries & Birthdays
Anniversaries and birthdays can be very challenging. These are times to be comforted by peers who have been through similar loss and heartbreak. Join this ongoing gathering in the month of your or your loved one’s anniversary and/or birthday to share stories, traditions, to comfort others, and receive comfort. This gathering will be facilitated by FSS support staff and open to anyone who has a crash.
What to Know Before and After Sharing Your Story in Public: Tools & Best Practices for Crash Victims
Join Families for Safe Streets to learn best practices to help diminish trauma, anxiety or overwhelm before/during/after story sharing for World Day of Remembrance. Sharing your story in front of others whom you don’t know can be very difficult, especially when those hearing your story include lawmakers, public officials, and others who have the power to enact the change you seek. Together, we will practice skills to help prepare you for story sharing, create focus and calm during storytelling, and recover afterwards.
Peer Mentor Training - oCTOBER 2025
FSS Peer Mentoring provides bereaved family members or those seriously injured and their caregivers with a connection to a volunteer peer support mentor. Our FSS mentors are all individuals who have been through similar experiences and are dedicated to helping others survive these life-altering tragedies. Join the training to learn more and become a mentor.
Book Club
Join us to read and reflect on Improvement, by Joan Silber, winner of the National Book Critics Circle and PEN/Faulkner Awards. Told through the characters' interconnected stories, the novel centers on a tragic car crash and the far-reaching effects it has on those directly and more subtly changed by this event. The book delves into the consequences of choices, the search for meaning, and the possibility of growth and change.
We will meet just once, for 90 minutes. We encourage reading the entire book, but please join the discussion even if you are not able to complete it.
FSS Book Club is facilitated by FSS member, author, and writing instructor, Rebecca Sonkin.
Improvement can be purchased through Amazon or at Bookshop.org.
📅 Oct 23 | 🕖 7–8:30 pm ET (4 -5:30 pm PT) | RSVP HERE
Crash Anniversary & Birthday Support Group
Birthday & Anniversary Support Group. Anniversaries and birthdays can be very challenging. These are times to be comforted by peers who have been through similar loss and heartbreak. Join this ongoing gathering in the month of your or your loved one’s anniversary and/or birthday to share stories, traditions, to comfort others and receive comfort.
Monthly Journaling Together Support Group
Research has shown journaling to help improve physical and psychological health by calming the brain's fear center, reducing chronic stress, and enhancing coping skills. Regularly writing about crash-related loss and injury can provide a structured, routine way to navigate life-altering events.
Crash Survivor Support Group
Crash survivors offer a powerful and unique perspective that can fuel advocacy and bring profound change.. Join FSS crash survivor and community leader Kate Brockwehl for a facilitated discussion.
Journaling Together Support Group
Journaling can help us to process traumatic injury and loss by providing a safe space to express complex emotions, organize thoughts, and gain perspective. Research has shown journaling to help improve physical and psychological health by calming the brain's fear center, reducing chronic stress, and enhancing coping skills. Regularly writing about crash-related loss and injury can provide a structured, routine way to navigate life-altering events.
We will write silently but together for most of the session, and will offer prompts for those who want them. We will leave time to say hello to each other and share insights.
📅 Sept 25 | 🕖 7:30-8:30 pm ET (4-5 pm PT) | RSVP HERE
Birthdays & Anniversary Support Group
Anniversaries and birthdays can be very challenging. These are times to be comforted by peers who have been through similar loss and heartbreak. Join this ongoing gathering in the month of your or your loved one’s anniversary and/or birthday to share stories, traditions, to comfort others and receive comfort.
Crash Survivor Support Group
Somatic therapist Elizabeth DeLaBarre guides crash survivors through a practice called Holistic Biomechanics - using sensory awareness to center the nervous system and promote the body's ability to balance itself.
Holistic biomechanics can address many of the psychological and physical effects of crash-related injuries, from anxiety and depression, to chronic pain.
NOTE: Elizabeth DeLaBarre, a crash survivor herself, has practiced Somatic Therapy and now focuses on Holistic Biomechanics, which has helped her to address her own extensive pain.
Peer Mentor Training
FSS Peer Mentoring provides bereaved family members or those seriously injured and their caregivers with a connection to a volunteer peer support mentor.
Birthday and Anniversary support group
Anniversaries and birthdays can be very challenging. These are times to be comforted by peers who have been through similar loss and heartbreak. Join this ongoing gathering in the month of your or your loved one’s anniversary and/or birthday to share stories, traditions, to comfort others, and receive comfort. This gathering will be facilitated by FSS support staff and open to anyone who has a crash anniversary or birthday in the given month.
Register here to receive the Zoom link
Crash Survivor Support
From physical pain to emotional trauma and lifestyle changes, the effects of crashes for survivors can be life-changing. Join peers for conversation and the support of those with shared experience. Monthly conversation facilitated by the FSS Support Team.
Register to receive the Zoom link
Write your 6-word memoir: 7 pm ET, 4 pm PT
Six-Word Memoir writing is a powerful and creative way to express experiences like trauma, grief, and the way events shape and change us. Together we will talk about this unique form, and write memoirs of our own. You don't need to be 'a writer' -- just someone willing to explore the words that can reflect how you're feeling.
Register to receive the Zoom link
Peer Mentor Training
FSS Peer Mentoring provides bereaved family members or those seriously injured and their caregivers with a connection to a volunteer peer support mentor. Our FSS mentors are all individuals who have been through similar experiences and are dedicated to helping others survive these life-altering tragedies. Join the training to learn more and become a mentor.
Register here to receive the Zoom link
Sibling Support Gathering: 4 pm PT, and 7 pm ET
Losing a sibling is about the loss of the past, present, and future, and those who were witnesses to your life as you grew up. Bereaved siblings are too often the forgotten mourners. Gather with others who have experienced this loss. We welcome our members to co-design what this sibling support meetings looks like, please feel free to send any ideas for conversation to aly@familiesforsafestreets.org.
Register to receive the Zoom link
Starts: 4 pm PT/ 5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET
Rock Painting: 7 pm ET, 4 pm PT
Artistic expression can ease stress and help to process difficult emotions around traumatic experiences, loss, and unexpected change. Rock painting provides an opportunity to reflect on life-altering injury or loss. Rocks can be placed around your home or garden, or set out in the world for others to see. * All members welcome - including those who have lost a loved one or experienced injury due to a crash. * No experience necessary *
Register to receive the Zoom link.
Starts: 4 pm PT/ 5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET
Birthday Anniversary Support: 7 pm ET, 4 pm PT
Anniversaries and birthdays can be very challenging. These are times to be comforted by peers who have been through similar loss and heartbreak. Join this ongoing gathering in the month of your or your loved one’s anniversary and/or birthday to share stories, traditions, to comfort others and receive comfort. This gathering will be facilitated by FSS support staff and open to anyone who has a crash anniversary or birthday in the given month.
Register to receive the Zoom link
Starts: 4 pm PT/ 5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET
July 2025 Member Meet & Greet
Join us our new monthly Families for Safe Streets Meet & Greet, where we are building a deeper community of advocates who come together to heal from the trauma of traffic violence, fight for a Safe System Approach and organize to save lives!
Starts at 4 pm PT/5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET
Peer Mentor Training: 7 pm ET, 4 pm PT
FSS Peer Mentoring provides bereaved family members or those seriously injured and their caregivers with a connection to a volunteer peer support mentor. Our FSS mentors are all individuals who have been through similar experiences and are dedicated to helping others survive these life-altering tragedies. Join the training to learn more and become a mentor.
Register here to learn more and become a mentor.
Starts: 4 pm PT/ 5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET
Monthly Survivor Support Group: 7 pm ET, 4pm PT
From physical pain to emotional trauma and lifestyle changes, the effects of crashes for survivors can be life-changing. Join peers for conversation and the support of those with shared experience. Monthly conversation facilitated by the FSS Support Team.
Register to receive the Zoom link
Starts: 4 pm PT/ 5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET
Peer Mentor Training: 7 pm ET, 4 pm PT
FSS Peer Mentoring provides bereaved family members or those seriously injured and their caregivers with a connection to a volunteer peer support mentor. Our FSS mentors are all individuals who have been through similar experiences and are dedicated to helping others survive these life-altering tragedies. Join the training to learn more and become a mentor.
Register here to learn more and become a mentor.
Starts: 4 pm PT/ 5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET
#StopSuperSpeeders: Policy Maker and Advocates Workshop
Join Families for Safe Streets, state legislators, civic and agency leaders who are at the forefront of the effort to #StopSuperSpeeders for an in-depth workshop on how to promote this life-saving policy idea in your state and your community. This hands-on workshop will be designed for both policy makers who are in the weeds and for advocates who want to encourage change. Please join us and get involved in this game changing campaign to prevent unnecessary injuries and road deaths.
Monthly Survivor Support Group
From physical pain to emotional trauma and lifestyle changes, the effects of crashes for survivors can be life-changing. Join peers for conversation and the support of those with shared experience. Monthly conversation facilitated by the FSS Support Team.
Register to receive the Zoom link
Starts: 4 pm PT/ 5 pm MT/ 6 pm CT/ 7 pm ET