Brain Food Garden Project Contact Information: brainfoodgp@gmail.com

“Urban Gardening and Scientific Research for Life, Health and Mental Acuity”

“What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal.”

-Dr. Viktor Frankl-

Prospective sight for Brain food Garden Project’s Todd Petriscak Memorial Garden

Todd Petriscak Memorial Garden

May 11, 1960-January 25, 2016Starting on May 2016 in an announcement made to commemorate Mental Health Awareness month. The first garden that we eventually build formerly known as our “pilot garden” will be named in memory of Founder and Executive Director Sean Brennan’s wonderfully loving and supportive friend Todd Petriscak who lost his on going battle with bipolar on Jan. 25, 2016.

Todd and Sean both met and became fast friends while under excellent psychiatric care in an inpatient unit at Metropolitan Community Hospital. Todd became one of Brain Food Garden Projects' earliest champions. His support and council ultimately contributed to the concept of making Brain Food Garden Project a Peer lead organization and Sean’s going back to school to become a NYS certified Peer Advocate.Todd’s passion and understanding for Science also lead to our Phase 4 goal of raising money for future scientific research on the role the food we eat directly correlates with our mental health.

Todd continues to be missed every day.

Brain Food Garden ProjectA Peer for Peer Program

Brain Food Garden Project is a peer managed program employing New York certified peers

Brain Food Garden Project is guided by the peer core values of treating everyone with: Kindness, Dignity, Respect and Patience

Brain Food Garden ProjectCore Philosophy

Brain Food Garden Project believes that gardening and eating healthier are just two more wellness tools peers can utilize for their recovery.

Brain Food Garden Project practices and promotes GRATITUDE through gardening as a core value and wellness tool and believes it is the foundation upon which the Todd Petriscak Memorial Garden and our future gardens will be built

Giving Thanks

Refreshing the Spirit

Appreciating Little Things

Thinking Positively

Identifying Goodness

Treasuring Each MomentUniting in Kindness

Delighting in Laughter

Expressing Joy

Our Mission:1. To create and grow urban rooftop vegetable gardens by peers for peers

on free unused space in NYC hospitals as a tool for recovery and to advance and expand this idea across the country as well as abroad

2. To educate peers on healthier eating habits through a myriad of peer to peer programming and group participation as well as through assisting in all aspects of cultivating the gardens from germination, growth, tending and the harvest

3. To promote eating seasonally through the utilization of the garden’s fruits and vegetables. By taking the product from the garden and creating a hospital community market. As well as providing a free CSA to peers in the mental health community to promote adding more fruits and vegetables to their daily diets.

4. To create an outpatient volunteer program inviting former peers to return to the hospitals to maximize the therapeutic benefits of continuing to cultivate the rooftop gardens after discharge

5. To financially assist and promote research programs that work to better understand and discover new insights on how food directly affects mental hygiene

1.) To create and grow urban rooftop vegetable gardens by peers for peers on free unused space in NYC hospitals as a tool for recovery and to advance and expand this idea across the country as well as abroad

Objectives: To establish healthy long-

term working relationships with business sponsors and donors for our first pilot garden

First planting and ribbon cutting on Brain Food Garden Project’s prospective Todd Petriscak Memorial Garden at Metropolitan Community Hospital in the spring of 2018

Metropolitan Community Hospital― potential site of pilot garden.

2.) To educate peers on healthier eating habits through a myriad of peer to peer programming and group participation as well as through assisting in all aspects of cultivating the gardens from germination, growth, tending and the harvest

Objectives: To facilitate weekly certified

Peer Advocate lead group sessions in in-patient units where peers and facilitators begin to have a fun and informative discussion on the role food plays on their mental health

To offer peers reaching higher levels of recovery the opportunity to go off unit to the hospital garden and participate in seasonal gardening groups

Learning about the role food plays in mental health and learning about all aspects of the hospital garden.

3.) To promote eating seasonally through the utilization of the garden’s fruits and vegetables. By taking the product from the garden and creating a hospital community market. As well as providing a low cost CSA to peers in the mental health community to promote adding more fruits and vegetables to their daily diets.

Objectives:

Changing the dialogue of food within the hjospitals surrounding neighborhood by offering free fresh fruits and vegetables through two distinct and creative programs

By starting a hospital community market with the fresh fruits and vegetables grown at the hospital garden

To create low cost CSA program specifically for the mental health community providing fruits and vegetables grown in the hospital gardens

4.) To create an outpatient volunteer experience allowing former peers to return to the hospitals to maximize the therapeutic benefits of continuing to cultivate the rooftop gardens after discharge

Objectives: Coordinating with outside

agencies and creating a warm environment where patients feel a desire to return to the hospital to benefit from continuing to work on what they have already cultivated in our community garden

To be a reminder to patients that they are never alone, that their life does have meaning and that they have a peer support system to turn to no matter what their circumstances

Peers that leave the hospital will always know they have a program that belongs to them and that they are not alone.

Brain Food Garden Project: Phase 2Changing the Hospital Food System

Objectives: Working with hospitals to

create a more healthy and healing food system to fuel the bodies and minds of hospital consumers.

Working with hospital food vendors to connect with local farmers to supply the freshest most seasonal produce to hospital consumers.

Cultivate and foster a sustainable dialogue within the hospital system to create more whole food/plant based menus

Brain Food Garden Project: Phase 3Develop Community Gardens

Objectives: Many peers after reaching a

certain milestone in their recovery find it activating or unproductive to continue seeking mental health services in the hospital environment. Creating secondary community gardens outside the hospital will allow for peers to continue being Brain Food Garden Farmers and cultivating food for themselves and their community

Developing city space into community vegetable gardens to further feed the peer community while allowing them to use gardening as a wellness tool

Brain Food Garden Project: Phase 4Helping Our Returning Military Service Members

Objectives: To work with other

organizations in providing resources for returning service members willing to start their own green business by opening fruit stands in underserved communities

Providing produce from Brain Food Garden Project hospital gardens, allowing returning service members to earn a living for their families while continuing to serve their communities

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) will continue to be a major battle fought by our men and woman who served us so proudly. Many of these brave men and woman may never be able to work full-time jobs again.

Brain Food Garden Project: Phase 5Promoting Scientific Research

Objectives: To provide grant money to

scientists that have an interest in performing medical research focused on understanding the role food plays in mental health.

To work with outside organizations to provide the most impactful and accurate findings regarding food consumption and mental health in a timely and accurate fashion.

Correlating the Science Behind the food we eat and mental health

Findings SheetFrom a study conducted at the University of Melbourne, Australia of 1,046 women 20-93 years of age using the Cancer Council Victoria dietary questionnaire: A traditional or whole foods diet

characterized by vegetables, fruit, whole grains and high-quality meat and fish may help prevent mental illness—specifically, depression and anxiety.

Woman consuming a traditional diet were more than 30% less likely to have major depression…however woman consuming a Western diet were 50% more likely to increase their chances of depression.

Dr. Jacka states: “ My feeling is that the negative impact of the processed food industry is really going to make itself felt [in terms of the physical and mental health] on the younger generation.”

From: Medscape Medical NewsJanuary 15, 2010Dr. Felice Jacka, PhDhttp://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/715239