Pulse survivor Amanda Grau, shot four times at the nightclub six years ago, fought fear to chase a dream.
Addressing an audience gathered for a Pulse memorial ceremony, she recalled her struggle to recover physically and mentally.
“For almost a year after the shooting, I didn’t want to go anywhere or see anybody, but my mom and my family told me you can’t live a life in fear,” Grau said. “It made me realize that if I stayed inside all the time, afraid, that it was like I hadn’t truly survived at all.”
The evening ceremony at the Pulse Interim Memorial, live-streamed on Facebook, capped a day of remembrance programs that marked the passage of another year since Orlando’s darkest day and honored the 49 people killed at the nightclub, their families and the survivors of the attack.
People who tuned in to the Facebook stream heard Grau admit her mental health is “still in the healing process.”
Many commented with heart, hugs and rainbow emojis.
“I knew that I wanted to save people like the paramedics and EMTs who saved me,” said Grau, who went to paramedic school on a 49 Legacy Scholarship in honor of Cory Connell, an aspiring firefighter killed in the attack. “I wanted to put a light at the end of that tunnel.”
She said her ordeal taught her two big lessons: “You can’t live in fear and you can’t take life for granted.”
Earlier Sunday, local LGBTQ advocates and community leaders gathered at First United Methodist Church in downtown Orlando for an event that was part memorial service, part political rally and part drag show.
“Today is a hard day,” said Joél Junior Morales, foundation manager for The Contigo Fund, which organized the program. “We are gathering together because we know that being in community with each other makes our grief and pain a little bit easier to bear.”
But the spate of mass shootings around the U.S. “profoundly resonate with Orlando,” said Morales, who recently visited Uvalde, Texas, to offer the not-for-profit group’s help to the grieving families in the wake of the mass shooting at the town elementary school.
An 18-year-old gunman, armed with a legally purchased AR-15-style automatic rifle, killed two teachers and 19 mostly Latino schoolchildren, ages 9 to 11, at Robb Elementary School on May 24, two days before school was to be recessed for summer vacation.
The 2-1/2 hour program, titled “For Us, By Us: A Tribute to Those Surviving & Fighting for Change,” originally was scheduled for the Walt Disney Amphitheatre at Lake Eola Park, but was moved from the outdoor bandshell to an air-conditioned space at the First United Methodist Church.
The names of the 49 people killed at Pulse were read aloud in a solemn moment on the sixth anniversary of the tragedy.
Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer, among a handful of elected leaders who attended the program, told the audience of about 200 people that City Beautiful reacted with love rather than hate after the crime, and similar tributes poured in from all over the world.
“I actually had somewhat of an inkling that maybe (June 12, 2016) could be a transcendent day in our country, in the world,” he said, referring to attitudes towards LGBTQ people. “But President Trump was elected and we’ve gone in a somewhat different direction.”
Dyer praised the LGBTQ community for helping to make Orlando a city that welcomes everyone.
“But we will need to fight back against hatred in all forms as well as, quite honestly, repulsive legislation and vetoes that have come out of Tallahassee aimed at the very same communities that were touched by the Pulse tragedy,” he said, without mentioning specific bills or actions.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and the state’s GOP-led legislature have come under fire from LGBTQ advocates for the passage of a “Parental Rights in Education” bill critics dubbed “don’t say gay.” The law prohibits “classroom instruction” on sexual orientation or gender identity through grade 3, or in any grade in which it is not “age appropriate,” phrases the law doesn’t define.
DeSantis also vetoed from the state’s budget money intended for Zebra Coalition, an Orlando nonprofit that helps LGBTQ youth.
The roster of speakers included creators of not-for-profit groups, which emerged to fill gaps in mental health counseling and other services for Black and Hispanic LGBTQ people; Pulse survivors like Keinon Carter, who was critically wounded in the attack and now advocates for meaningful gun laws; and families of victims, including the parents of Deonka Deidra Drayton, Shepherd and Andrea Drayton, who established 3D Initiative in their home state of South Carolina.
But the event also mixed in drag performances by entertainers Ava DeAmor and Aurora Garavani Gucci to pump up the crowd.
The Contigo Fund, formed in the aftermath of the Pulse nightclub massacre, is described on its home page as an effort focused on helping to bring “meaningful, transformative and lasting change to Pulse-affected communities in Central Florida.”
It has provided more than $600,000 in grants to non-profits like Basically Wonderful, which provides peer-led spaces that are welcoming to queer and disabled communities; Bros in Convos, which seeks to empower queer individuals of color in Central Florida; and Dignity Power, whose mission includes fighting for criminal justice reform to ensure the LGBTQ community has equal representation.
All took the stage and a bow.
The audience also heard from Yasmin Flasterstein, the Latinx co-founder of another Contigo-supported organization, Peer Support Space, which provides mental-health resources and options for underserved LGBTQ+ people and communities of color.
She described her own personal struggles and urged anyone suffering to take care of themselves.
“There is hope,” Flasterstein said. “Eat well, get rest, reach out for support, engage in activities you enjoy, journal, cry your eyes out, scream. Do whatever is healing for you. And if you need help, reach out for help. There is nothing shameful about it. You are not alone.”
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