HEALING HANDS FOUNDATION:
Wellness Advocates Serve
Carry the Future
Motivated to Do
As a mom of two, Cristal MunozLogothetis couldn’t get out of her head
the image of the Syrian toddler who
washed up on a Turkish beach after his
family attempted to flee their home to
seek asylum in Greece. Cristal decided
she had to do something about it.
Her husband’s family lives in Greece,
so Cristal set up an online campaign to
raise $2,500 and 100 baby carriers to
send there. Her plan was to have her
family give them out to the refugees
that had to carry their young children
with them on their miles-long journey.
In 72 hours, her campaign had gone viral.
Today, her campaign, called Carry the
Future, has had more than 6,000 carriers
donated and raised more than $100,000.
dōTERRA Wellness Advocate Tasha
Oakley from Lubbock, Texas, was invited
by a friend to get involved with Carry the
Future. A mother herself, Tasha was eager
to support the cause. After attending the
dōTERRA convention in 2012, Tasha
learned about the dōTERRA Healing
Hands Foundation™ and the company’s
mission to help those in need. She
decided to enlist support from dōTERRA
for Carry the Future. dōTERRA agreed to
match up to $1,000 raised for baby
carriers and to donate $500 of the
dōTERRA product of their choice to
benefit the Syrian refugees in Greece.
Restoring Hope in
Athens
Last November, Tasha was able to go
with a group of nine people to Athens
to deliver baby carriers to the refugees.
Each volunteer brought four 50-pound
suitcases filled with vacuum-sealed
carriers. Tasha says, “We met the refugees
at a port in Athens, and a lot of their faces
looked like they had lost all hope.” The
volunteers had learned a few phrases in
Arabic to tell the refugees that they were
giving them a free carrier from the United
States and then showed them how to use
it. A lot of people were skeptical at first
that they were going to be ripped off, but
once a few carriers were passed out and
the refugees saw that they really were
free, they became more receptive. Tasha
says, “After we fit them with a carrier,
they would walk off with a little glimmer
of hope in their eyes.”
Once in Athens, Tasha and her group
hardly slept. She says, “We always knew
that there was another ferry coming in
that could have up to 1,500 refugees on it
and 30 percent of those were going to be
children under the age of five. We knew
they could all get a carrier and how much
better their life would be once they had
it.” They were able to hand out about
200 carriers a day. Several more trips are
scheduled throughout the year, and a
group is forming in Greece that can receive
carriers that are mailed over as well.
The volunteers also try to bring some toys
and stuffed animals that they can hand
out to the children, since these families
have lost everything. In order to get into
the rubber rafts on the Turkish border, the
families are charged $1,000 a person and
are told they have to dump all of their
belongings into the ocean in order make
room for more people on the rafts. One
eight-year-old girl told Tasha she had
come home from school one day to find
her entire street reduced to rubble. Her
dad told her they would have to leave, so
the little girl walked over to where her
bedroom had been and found one toy,
and that was all she took with her.
Other families told stories of losing loved
ones when their rafts capsized on their
way across. Tasha also saw an eight-dayold baby with vernix caseosa still on her
skin because she hadn’t ever had her first
bath. Her mother had delivered her on the
side of the road and continued to walk for
miles postpartum. Tasha says, “They’re
humans; we’re humans. They’re just
people trying to start their lives over, and
we just need to help.”
Want to donate?
If you would like to support Carry the
Future and other Healing Hands Wellness
Advocate partner projects, go to
doterrahealinghands.com, click on
“Donate Now,” and use the convenient
PayPal tool to make your charitable
donation. You will automatically receive a
510(c)(3) donation receipt and 100
percent of your donation will be used to
support humanitarian relief efforts of the
dōTERRA Healing Hands Foundation.