By: Madison Fugate

 

It’s a rule of thumb here in the mountains that if they send you back home with fresh food on your way out the door, they’re most generally some of the very best of folks. After a very gracious and welcoming tour, that’s exactly the case for the driven and devoted staff at the Red River Wellness and Training Center located at the end of Pecks Creek Road with an address of 3276 Pecks Creek Road, Stanton, Kentucky. After visiting their scenic and tremendously peaceful location in the heart of the mountains here in Powell County, they made sure you were changed for the better by time you left their facility. Working together, the very educated and trained staff there have very powerful goals in mind for the overall well-being of the citizens here in Powell County.

The staff at the Red River Wellness Center are committed to providing an experience that is intended to be life-changing moving forward with specific goals in mind to make you feel better as a whole through the exploration of more healthy options and treatments as for your diet and exercise routines. The center also dedicates a large focus toward the education of simply making better lifestyle choices and creating a path to recovery through healthier choices to help treat health issues such as diabetes, high-blood pressure, mental health and nearly every health condition you can imagine from there. The director, Narlon Edwards, was able to relay several instances throughout his career in sharing these healthier opportunities and providing proper education behind nutrition and the human body where he was able to witness lives change for the better and those same lives no longer have to battle diseases and illnesses so vigorously day to day.

There are ultimately two main approaches offered at the wellness center that Mr. Edwards relies on to create his successes through the lifestyle choices of others. You have the option between a 10 day commitment to his recommendations in dietary and lifestyle changes, and will receive very thorough instruction and education as to how to go about these healthier alternatives than what you may be used to previously. Edwards shared that for those enrolled in their programs in the past they have frequently made home visits to educate you on cooking skills and even offered assistance in grocery stores to assist in demonstrating healthier alternatives than what you’re used to before the program. You are assigned a health coach as well throughout this educational process. “We’ve seen so many lives transform just in the ten days,” Edwards claimed. The 10 day course typically costs $300, and their are certain discount opportunities for those who may qualify, for instance a $500 opportunity for couples. This program includes a juicing cleanse to retrain your body from past negative lifestyle choices and then from there includes the proper meal choices your body needs to thrive. This program also occasionally works closely with the Powell County Extension Office in order to create their best efforts to be easily accessible to the community and offer a better way of living to as many as possible here in Powell county.

The second approach is an 18 day stay at the Red River Wellness Center that is located at the end of Pecks Creek, as previously mentioned. This is a more thorough and dedicated commitment that would ultimately have you feeling like a new and overall far more healthier individual at the end of it. This option is of course more costly, so it’s recommended to those who have the time and finances to commit to a new you. There is an abundance of opportunities included at your stay including massage therapy, a healthcare professional available virtually for mental health related needs, the best possible nutritional and delicious meals, and much more where that comes from. To summarize the experience simply touring the facility lightly, it’s an eye-opener in itself.

Director, Narlon Edwards, claimed he has been committed to sharing this way of life and educating as many as possible since as early as 1996. Before making the transition to Eastern Kentucky, Edwards worked as a director in a similar, but more developed entity in California where he was also able to witness several lives remarkably change for the better. He has also helped organize other entities similar all over the world, in places such as Georgia and Romania. Edwards also shared his understanding that most generally healthier options are not as prevalent throughout rural communities and there are very limited opportunities at local grocery stores, etc. It’s also this understanding that helps fuel Edward’s hope and desire for making a large impact on the community here in Powell County and to help make the citizenship here a more healthy one. He and the other staff at the wellness center plan to open a restaurant and bakery with some of their delicious and nutritious goods inside the building located just beside Stanton Ace Hardware to the public on October 4th as well, the name of the restaurant will be Red River Kitchen and Bakery.

In order to accomplish all that they do, the wellness center is located on over 436 acres of rural land. There is a farmer, Robert Phillips, who harvests and maintains the crops they use for meal preparations there. The Red River Wellness Center is a non-profit Christian based organization that also contributes to a lot of needs being met throughout the community. The staff dedicate and set aside time each Thursday to go out into the community and deliver simple surveys that inquire if you may have a need they can help with health wise or if there may be need for repair around their home. Either way, their common goal in mind is to better the community,  achieve a better quality of life, bring awareness and educate as many as possible on how they might create healthier lifestyles and in return better treat certain diseases and health conditions.