Meeting Our Founder: The Inspiring Work of Dr. Lara
In the quiet beauty of Australia’s Atherton Tablelands, a remarkable story unfolds — one that bridges continents, generations, and the full spectrum of human resilience. Lara Gillespie (known professionally as Lara Wieland, and affectionately called “Dr. Lara” by her patients) is a rural generalist doctor, humanitarian, and the founder of Only Passing Thru (OPT) — a charity delivering medical and humanitarian aid where it’s needed most. Her driving force? A deep sense of duty rooted in the legacy of her Ukrainian grandfather, Nikodym Pliczkowsky.
A Legacy Rooted in Strength and Service
Lara grew up on stories — vivid, urgent, spoken in Ukrainian over the dinner table. Her grandfather Nikodym, a survivor of the Holodomor and a key figure in Australia’s Ukrainian diaspora, filled her childhood with accounts of Cossack courage, Soviet oppression, and the stubborn survival of a people who refused to be erased. As a teenager and university student, Lara recorded these stories on a battered old tape recorder. (She still has them.)
“You are a Cossack girl,” Nikodym would tell her. He wasn’t wrong.
These weren’t just family stories — they were a blueprint for how to live: with resilience, justice, and a commitment to those who have been overlooked. As Lara grew into her roles as doctor, advocate, and charity leader, she carried that blueprint everywhere she went.
A Lifelong Commitment to the Underserved
Her medical career quickly confirmed what she already sensed: she was drawn to the places others found too hard, and the people others found too complicated. For nearly 20 years, Lara worked in Kowanyama — a remote Indigenous community in Cape York, Queensland — where she became not just a respected doctor, but an “Aunty” to many. Drive down any street in Kowanyama with Lara today and the shouts of recognition tell you everything about the relationships she built.
Her approach was simple and quietly radical: listen first, judge never. One patient, written off by others as a “hopeless, trouble-making drunk,” became — through trust, time, and counselling — a wonderful parent and grandparent. “If I had not taken the time to learn their history,” Lara reflects, “I may have also just seen them as others did.”
She learned that healing is never just clinical. “Our lives are made up of a thousand shades of grey and brown,” she says. “Black and white do not exist.” Her Christian faith has been the undercurrent through it all — the thing that keeps her pressing on when the work feels impossible, and the reminder that every person she serves, from Cape York to Kherson, is infinitely worthy of care./
Inspired by Ukraine’s Resilience
When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, the stories her grandfather had told decades ago suddenly felt devastatingly present. In 2023, Lara travelled to Ukraine with colleague Professor Whitehall — not just to provide medical aid, but to honour a legacy she had carried her whole life.
What she found in the war-torn villages of the Kherson region echoed what she had learned in remote Australia: the importance of bearing witness, the healing power of listening, and the truth that trauma requires more than medicine.
“I have worked in remote communities for decades and have seen and experienced things many have not,” she wrote. “But nothing had prepared me for this.”
And yet — even amid the devastation, she found the extraordinary. In Bilohirka, she sat with farming couples who had survived occupation, listening to their stories while artillery rumbled in the distance. In Stanislav, she treated elderly patients with shrapnel wounds who still wanted to tell her what they had seen. A farmer walked her through his once-productive land — carefully, along tracks thought to be mine-free — because he wanted her to witness the destruction with her own eyes.
She did. She bore witness. She came home changed, and more determined.
Lara’s time in Ukraine deepened both her understanding of her heritage and her sense of mission. From churches to local NGOs, she saw communities refusing to be broken — defying chaos with courage, compassion, and a resilience that is, frankly, humbling to observe from the outside.
The Work Continues
These experiences gave shape to everything that Only Passing Thru (OPT) does. Through partnerships with Ukrainian NGOs — most notably the Christian Medical Association of Ukraine (CMA) — OPT delivers life-saving medical aid while raising awareness in Australia about Ukraine’s ongoing struggle.
“Their approach resonated with everything I’d learned about healing,” Lara explains. “They understand that medical care isn’t just about treating symptoms — it’s about seeing each person as inherently valuable. That’s not just their ethos, it’s actually part of their mission statement.”
OPT also has supported development work in remote Bangladesh and continues the founding community projects in Kowanyama that began years ago — a thread of sustained commitment that runs through everything Lara does.
For nearly two decades, she and her husband Ron have opened their home to boys from Kowanyama, providing educational opportunities while maintaining real, living connections to the community. This is not charity from a distance. It is showing up, year after year.
“I was not going to be the struggling doctor who came here as a last resort and left when things got tough,” she says. “I was going to be here by choice.”
That same conviction drives her work in Ukraine — and it’s why Lara has also spent years editing her grandfather’s historical novel, Under Black Banners, bridging past and present in one more act of love and service. All proceeds go directly to humanitarian aid in Ukraine.
A Living Legacy
Every dollar donated to OPT goes directly to the cause. No wages, no overhead — a rarity that reflects Lara’s integrity and the integrity of the organisation she built.
The most sustaining support OPT receives often comes in small, regular amounts — $5, $10, $20 a month. It doesn’t sound like much. But in Lara’s world, consistency is everything. “It’s the relationship, it’s the commitment, it’s being there for the long haul that makes all the difference.” (Sound familiar? It’s the same thing she’s been saying since Kowanyama.)
If you’re inspired by this work — by what it means to truly show up for people in their most desperate moments — we’d love to have you with us. Donations can be directed to the area of your choice.
All donations over $2 are tax deductible.
Join the journey. Support OPT at www.passingthrough.net/donating
