On A Mission To Make A Difference

Linda Roberts, wife, mother and incorrigible rescuer of Great Danes, could be mistaken for any other mother you might meet in the grocery store. Married for 28 years, Roberts moved to Vero Beach 17 years ago with her husband, Ron, raising four children in a home filled with personality and an abundance of love. An avid photographer, she can often be found shooting tucked-away corners of Vero Beach to post on her popular blog, Lime in the Coconut. 

What makes her happy is her job as a lactation consultant with the Florida Department of Health and the Indian River County Healthy Start Coalition. What makes her unique is her big heart. Roberts recently returned from a three-week humanitarian aid trip to northern Greece where she worked in refugee camps assisting pregnant and lactating mothers and their babies.

Since 2015, over 1 million sanctuary seekers fleeing war and violence have journeyed through Greece in search of safe havens for themselves and their children. To stem the flow, the European Union closed the gateway to Northern Europe along the Greek-Macedonian border, stranding an estimated 57,000 refugees in unsanitary squat camps, and prompting Greece’s prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, to call his country “a warehouse for souls.”

Although Roberts was aware of the crisis, the trip wasn’t even on her radar until she chanced on a National Public Radio report on Doctors Without Borders in Syria on her drive to work. “I had to pull over and stop the car,” she recalls. “It actually brought me to tears.”