Love Cry
Help Our Injured Veterans To Rediscover A Life Filled With Passion, Purpose, And Pleasure
Join The Love Cry 28 Day Challenge
Can you even begin to comprehend what a life without intimacy would be like? Just imagine never really connecting with someone special again or experiencing another touch, embrace, or kiss… Unfortunately, this is the silent battle many of our wounded warriors face when they return home. And it’s time for someone to speak up. That’s why we’re initiating a dialogue for this taboo topic.
The Love Cry 28 Day Challenge is an interactive movement designed to support the mission of “Making Love After Making War," a documentary that tells the stories of injured vets who have won the battle for love after returning home.
The challenge is a dare for those who are brave enough to get emotionally vulnerable on camera. Show up and show out. The more outrageous your cry, the better.
Simply get on screen and declare your love for someone. It can be a lover, friend, relative… Heck, you can even profess your love for yourself. It’s up to you whether you perform the cry sitting down, dancing in the street, shouting from the top of a building, sipping a latte, or lounging in a library. Make it your own. Who knows. You might reconnect with an old flame or get a proposal out the deal. ;)
If you’re ready for combat, the rules of engagement are listed below:
- Get on camera and boldly profess your undying love for someone or something
- Make your love cry anywhere between 30 seconds and 3 minutes
- Only dedicate your love cry to one person at a time
- Nominate 3 or more people you would like to participate in the challenge by stating their name(s) on camera and tagging them.
- The nominee has the option to perform the challenge or forfeit by donating a minimum of $10 to the “Making Love After Making War” project.
- Encourage donations to the project even if you participate in the challenge
- Donate Today
- End your love cry with this signature phrase:
- “Donate to help our injured vets with making love after making war.”
- Share your video using #LoveCry
<<I’m ready to get closer to the one I love.>>
About the film
About the Issues
LOVE AFTER WAR: Saving Love, Saving Lives is a moving 57 minute documentary that introduces viewers to veterans and their partners who candidly share how they won the battle to restore emotional closeness and physical intimacy after surviving catastrophic combat-related injuries. The inspiring film also features insights from experts in the field of sexuality and disability.
About the Filmmakers
Dr. Mitchell Tepper, Director/Producer/Writer
Dr. Mitchell Tepper is a sexologist who has been living a full life with spinal cord injury for nearly 40 years. He has long been personally and professionally dedicated to ending the silence around sexuality and disabilities. Dr. Tepper has been working with wounded veterans since speaking at the Road to Recovery Conference for wounded veterans in 2006. Through spearheading the Wounded Troops and Partners: Supporting Intimate Relationships Conference in Washington DC in 2008, he was successful in getting the issue of sexual health and intimacy for wounded warriors on the national radar. He assisted the Bob Woodruff Foundation in organizing their High Impact Collaboration Conference, From Injury to Intimacy, in 2014. He has been instrumental in the implementation of couple's retreats within the VA system and in training members of the Sexual Health and Intimacy Workgroup at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. Dr. Tepper has published peer reviewed articles in medical and sexual health journals on comprehensive sexual health care for catastrophically injured warriors.
Dr. Mark Schoen, Director/Producer
Dr. Schoen produced many of the popular, early sex therapy films, wrote the children’s book, Bellybuttons Are Navels and produced the award winning film of the same title. In 1998, The Sinclair Institute hired Dr. Schoen as Director of Sex Education. From 1998 – 2006 he produced more than thirty films that are currently in distribution including the best selling revision of The Better Sex Video Series. In 2007 Dr Schoen started working as an independent producer. Since then he produced and directed Betty Dodson: Her Life of Sex and Art that won Best Feature Documentary at FilmOut, San Diego (2008) and won The American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors and Therapists Best Film Award (2009), produced the award-winning documentary Trans (2012), and produced the documentary Game Face (2015).
Joanne Caputo, Collaborating Writer/Director
Caputo began independent filmmaking with a children’s video, Ballerina, Ballerina! (1995), recommended by Sesame St. Magazine. Her first documentary, On A Roll: Family, Disability and the American Dream, was broadcast by PBS Independent Lens, where it won the 2005 Audience Award (www.pbs.org/onaroll) and was recommended by The New York Times, Anti-Defamation League, National Organization on Disability and others. On A Roll represented the USA at numerous international disability film festivals and was selected for PBS international programming (True Stories: Life in the USA) through 2017. Caputo is also the author of Margaret Garner, an American slavery story that she is adapting to a television series with co-writer Michael Ivey. www.joannecaputo.com.
Antonio Garcia, DP and Editor of Pilot Interview
Antonio is a filmmaker at Georgia State University who has had three films shown at the Cannes International Film Festival.
Accolades
The pilot interview for Love After War was chosen to be screened at the annual conference of the American Association for Sexuality Educators, Counselors and Therapists. Here's their reactions to the film represented in a word cloud:
Are you or someone you know a disabled veteran or caregiver? Your story is extremely important.
Have a question or a suggestion about the project? Please contact us!