Grief Sucks - Life After Loss

Letters of Healing: A Father’s Story

• Linda Carter • Season 1 • Episode 14

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Jason, a father who bravely shares his deeply personal journey of parenting special needs children and the heart-wrenching loss of his son. Through his candid storytelling, Jason reveals the challenges he faced in balancing family dynamics and a career, culminating in the life-altering choice to become a stay-at-home parent.

Jason also opens up about the raw reality of losing a loved one in the emergency room. Listeners are taken through the emotional whirlwind of such an experience—where societal expectations often dictate how men should handle grief—and the difficult decisions that follow, such as planning a funeral and choosing cremation. In sharing this part of his story, Jason sheds light on the immediate aftermath of loss and the often-overlooked emotional labor that comes with it, offering a perspective that is both enlightening and deeply human.

But there is hope and healing in community and creativity. Jason highlights the transformative power of writing letters to his late son, which connected him with a supportive network of parents. As he navigates the complexities of male grief and the pressure to remain stoic, he finds solace in creating a grief coloring book as a tribute to his son Zachary. This project invited others to contribute their own memories, fostering a tactile and meaningful way to process grief. Join us as we explore the significance of community and remembrance, and how Jason's journey offers a beacon of hope for those facing similar paths.

Letters To Zachary
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61552174684952
https://www.instagram.com/letters2zachary/

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to Grief Sucks Life After Loss, where we talk all things grief. Thanks for being with us today and we hope you enjoy this episode. Welcome, jason. Thanks for being here with me today.

Speaker 2:

Thank you so much for having me.

Speaker 1:

So you have quite the story to tell.

Speaker 2:

I've had a few trials and tribulations in my life.

Speaker 1:

I would say trials and tribulations in my life. I would say Unfortunately. Sometimes I feel like we go through those to create a different path to help others.

Speaker 2:

Sure certainly.

Speaker 1:

And I think that you are doing an amazing job doing that.

Speaker 2:

Well, thank you.

Speaker 1:

So would you like to share some of your story with us and kind of what you're doing as a result of that?

Speaker 2:

Sure, well, first of all, I'm a married father of two special needs kids. Both of those kids were born with several cognitive and physical disabilities. My son was also born with a rare condition. That's one in 40,000 births. At this point, my son was our first child and so he was kind of our introduction into the special needs world special needs life, if you will.

Speaker 2:

And then, after we had our son and we found out about all of his issues and we were learning about new issues that were popping up, my wife and I, we always wanted to have more than one child.

Speaker 2:

So you can imagine the kind of the family response when we said, even though we have this one child with a ton of medical issues, we're going to have another one. And you know the reason why we had another one, outside of just wanting another one. I had done a ton of research and so nothing told me that just because my son had all of these issues meant anything that my daughter was going to have any issues. At least for the first six months she was what we would call the normal child, just because, based on my son's developmental ability, she looked normal. Because, based on my son's developmental ability, she looked normal. But after we got her tested and seen some doctors, those doctors said well, we tend to agree that she might be delayed, you might want to start seeing a neurologist, and they listed a couple of different doctors, and it was from that point that we found out our daughter had several disabilities. And so, within about the first three years of marriage, we had two kids, both with multiple disabilities, some of which were rare.

Speaker 1:

As if marriage wasn't hard enough.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and now, granted, we got married. I say we got married, we got married later in the sense of later than the norm, not so much late, like we got married. I was in kind of my mid to late 20s. My wife was in her early 30s when we got married, so we were a little bit later and we knew that once we got married, at least for my wife, I knew the clock was ticking and we knew that we wanted to have kids. And like she jokingly gave me an ultimatum I want to have X number of kids by this age and I went OK, let's rock and roll. So, but that's kind of the back story.

Speaker 2:

So my profession by degree is education. I taught elementary school physical education for nine years. Education for nine years. My son was born. About my seventh year in education. I did have somebody that we knew well watch him, even with all of his medical issues, and so I taught two more years. And that last year I was in the school system.

Speaker 2:

The first six months of that year I was in and out of the hospital, so much that I'd literally burned through all my sick time, my personal time. I was having days without pay because we were in and out of the hospital. And so about January of that year I was teaching in a local elementary school and one day I just called my wife from my office and said hey, what are your thoughts about me staying at home? Cause it was always kind of decided that I was going to stay at home anyways, because even with me working I did all the physical medical procedures, and so it was kind of we always knew that whenever that day came, I was going to be the one to kind of leave the career and take care of the kids. And so, you know, we had the typical talk. She said well, if we're waiting till we're prepared, we'll never be prepared. And so that was a Wednesday of that week. By Friday my resignation was on my principal's desk and I was driving out that afternoon, leaving education and I left. And I left for 12 years In fact, my principal, when I went into the office, I said are you surprised?

Speaker 2:

She said no, I'm not really surprised, but I'm kind of surprised at the speed in which you did it. And I said I'm just one of those people that when I make a decision I don't kind of dilly dally around, I make the decision and I move on and so that's kind of how it started, to where I was, you know, a stay at home parent dealing with all the medical issues, and you know, I did all the physical medical procedures, I did all the specialist stays, I did all the hospital stays, I did all the, you know, school IEP meetings and everything associated with both of my kids. So that's kind of the back story, um, so that's kind of the backstory Um, two years ago, in January 28th of 2022, about three days before now. Granted, at this point, I'm pretty well versed in all of his medical issues that I'm familiar with and I know all the signs and the symptoms and what to do and how to do and what to look for and all that kind of thing.

Speaker 2:

Well, three days before my son passed, you know, he came home, we fed him he ate like a horse and that night he threw up a little bit when we were brushing his teeth and we didn't think much about it and, like I told my wife, I said, well, maybe you hit his gag reflex and something was kind of in his system. It just came up. So we put him to bed and he was kind of in his system, it just came up. So we put him to bed and he was always a really good sleeper and that night he was up and down all night, which was unusual for him, and I told my wife the next morning. I said I'm going to keep him home, I'm going to let his teacher know. I said he might be coming down with what we think is a 24-hour virus, and he was in a self-contained classroom. So if he was contagious?

Speaker 2:

I didn't want to send him to school and have him spread it, and then him just get to school and then an hour later we have to go get them. So I just kept him home. And so that day I kept telling him I was just like, buddy, you can take a nap, you're not missing anything. Day's just going to be on the couch on his laptop getting some work done. It's okay, you're not missing anything. Dave's just going to be on the couch on his laptop getting some work done. It's okay, you're not missing anything.

Speaker 2:

And he absolutely refused to take a nap all day long. And so that evening I put him down when, like when I put his sister down which, like I would put his sister down and keep him up about another hour, just give some one-on-one time. And so that night I put him down for the same time as sister and he immediately got quiet and my wife and I just said well, he's probably exhausted. He's been up for probably 20 something hours. He's probably, you know, he's just it got dark in there. He fell asleep.

Speaker 2:

So the next morning I decided to keep him home it's a Friday at this point and I texted the teacher again, said, hey, I'm gonna keep him home again one more day. I said, said if he's not feeling well, I said at least I've got the weekend at this point to kind of help him get better and he'll be back on Monday. And she was great with it. I got his sister off to school and usually what would happen is when I'd go into their bedroom on the weekends they would both get really excited, like they'd bounce in their bed and be happy to see me and you know, like they kind of go nutty, if you will when I'd walk in the room.

Speaker 2:

And so I walk in there and he's he's just kind of looking at me, he's not really excited, I wouldn't say he's lethargic, but he's not moving a whole lot. And so I walk around to his right side and he's got this dark green streak of fluid coming out of his mouth. And I look at him and in my brain I go well, the other thing dark green in your body that would possibly come out is bile. And why is it coming out of his mouth? And I looked at my wife and I said this is not good. And I get him out of the bed and he's kind of floppy, like he can't hold himself up. And even this doesn't strike me just because there were a couple of times when he had really bad, like respiratory related illnesses, where he got eventually admitted I thought, well, maybe he's coming down with something and I need to take him to the hospital. So I bring him into the living room and I'd go through my protocol of like what I need to do and nothing's working. The signs I'm seeing are nothing that I've ever seen before and it was honestly just a hunch. I went you know, I'm going to take him up to the children's hospital, I said something's not right and I said I don't know what it is. So I get him in his chair and get him into our van and, like I'm on the Southwest side of Atlanta, the children's hospital is 60 miles north of me and it sounds like a lot. But in Atlanta 60 miles is not. I mean, atlanta, in quotation marks probably spans 125 to 150 miles across and that's just east to west, that's not north and south. And so I'd been driving this so many times from hospital stays and all that that. I could do it blindfolded. I've done it so many times.

Speaker 2:

And so I get on the interstate and I'm doing like 90 up the interstate because I don't know what's going on. And the whole way up he looks like he's. At the time I didn't realize it, but he looked like he was kind of falling asleep and waking back up. And I kept trying to keep them up because, like when you get a concussion, you don't want to fall asleep right afterwards because it could, it could create other damage by falling asleep. And I kept going buddy, stay with me, stay with me. And the whole way up he kept doing that and I got up to the children's hospital. I, you know, I got parked, I got him out of the van to get him in his wheelchair. Again, he was really floppy and this catches my attention and I go, something's really not right.

Speaker 2:

I get up into the ER and I skip the line and before I can get up to the nurse, the security guard comes up to me as if to say you need to get in line. And I look right at him and go. I don't think he's breathing. I need help immediately. And so the nurse hears me, she gets me, she says follow me. Now.

Speaker 2:

I've been in this hospital a hundred times and this is the first time I ever go to full run as fast as I can go back to an ER trauma room, because that's how serious this nurse is looking to me. So I get him in the trauma room. I instinctively get him out of his chair, I put him on the table and I back off in hopes that they'll let me stay in there, because he's nonverbal and I'm just like they don't know what's going on and he can't tell them. And so there's another trauma room right next to it that I kind of back off in and I let them do their thing. And so the ER doc comes up to me and goes explain to me to the minute how long he's been this way, and I tell her, and she goes off and barks orders. And then she comes back over to me and goes explain to me the scenario as to why you brought him up here.

Speaker 2:

And so I tell her, and they keep doing their thing. So I get them in there. They immediately intubate him, like put the tube in him to get air in his lungs, and they the first thing that they do that. Just that tells me something seriously wrong is they take this drill and like drill this, port directly into his knee no anesthetic, nothing. Now a normal person would probably come out of their skin because of how painful that would be. He didn't even flinch. And so after about 10 minutes they start chest compressions, they start doing CPR and as I'm watching this in my brain I'm thinking things are getting more serious, but it's not registering to me of how serious it is. So they do that for about five or 10 minutes and they're switching off doing it and I hear them get the paddles out.

Speaker 2:

And so they put the paddles on and I hear you know, like on medical dramas, you hear clear and literally he lifts off the table like what you see on TV and I'm so used to looking at the monitor with, like the oxygen rate and the pulse and the respiratory rates and they shock them and it literally beeps once and goes right back to what it's doing and in my brain at this point, at this point I go, he's not coming back. Now it doesn't register in my brain but I go, he's not coming back From this point. They continue doing this work on him for 45 continuous minutes. It was the longest amount of time and I told them later. I said medical dramas don't do y'all justice. I said I knew y'all do what you could to try to bring him back.

Speaker 2:

But they worked for almost an hour trying to bring him back and so they shock him probably four or five more times and she eventually comes over to me and says you know, she, she uh pronounces them and I go over and have a moment instinctually and I come back over and from that point, like I call his his mother and call my mother, and you know I'll never forget the sounds they made over the phone, cause my wife at the time thought well, he's taking him up there, he's going to get admitted. We're going to have our typical seven to 12 day stay. You know he'll let me know what room he's in when I call. She didn't realize I was calling to tell him that her son was dead on the table and so you know we kind of went from there and that's kind of where the whole ball started and kind of the introduction to the whole grief experience is.

Speaker 1:

Sorry, not too many people can get to me.

Speaker 1:

You got to me, I know, I feel and I don't speak about it a lot, but I feel that ER experience and being the only one in that experience and I that ER experience, and being the only one in that experience and I thank God that I was the only one in that, because my kids were meeting me, thinking you know, we're just going to go in and see what's wrong with dad. And that's not what they walked into. And I remember feeling that, standing there like almost as soon as I knew that something was really wrong, that I just knew he wasn't coming back, and even while they were working on him, I'm just like it's for nothing. I just felt it deep in my heart that it wasn't going to happen. Yep.

Speaker 2:

And definitely and definitely later on down the road, my mother told me because my mother was the second call, just because she watched my son many times when he was younger to like give us a break and just because the special needs life for just general issues is tough, but when you've got rare conditions and multiple issues it can be very demanding. And, like my mother told me, after everything was said and done and we'd had the funeral, that kind of thing, she goes. You know, the day that you called me when he passed away. She said it had probably only been a few minutes after he passed, correct, and I said yes, like two. And she said you were eerily calm, like nothing had happened. Like she said you could hear the calmness in your voice when you talked to me, whereas I thought you'd have just been like blubbering, and I mean she didn't say it that way.

Speaker 1:

But it's weird. It's weird how that I guess, how you don't maybe have the reaction that you even think that you're going to have to, that You're just so I don't, I don't know, numb or just don't understand. You're not grasping what really just happened.

Speaker 2:

Well, and from a male perspective. You know, men are taught from a very early age at least early like teens, twenties, that kind of thing. We learned to compartmentalize things very quickly and in that moment, even though I wanted to lose for lack of, in that moment I wanted to lose my shit, but my thought process was I've got to keep it together to tell his mother, my mother I've got to ask about 50 questions here, in fact when the care team, like we were still in the room and the ER doc was just like we don't need this room anytime soon, she said no, you can't necessarily be here all day, but take your time. She said there's be plenty of time for his mother to come up, because she was coming up from where we were and that kind of thing. And so the care team came up to me and I looked right at her and I pointed at my son and I said this is going to sound cold and callous and I don't mean it to be. But I pointed to him and I said I will deal with him in a minute. I need to know some answers and I need to know him now.

Speaker 2:

And she goes well, what do you need to know. And she literally took a step back Cause I went what happens from here? Does he go to the morgue? Does he stay in here? If he goes to the morgue, at that point, does it? Do you do an autopsy? If you do, what's the protocol for doing an autopsy? If you don't do an autopsy, why aren't you doing an autopsy and what's what's the protocol for that If you don't? If you do do an autopsy, what's the turnaround time for it? If you don't do an autopsy, who do I need to contact to get him home to the funeral home that I need to get him to?

Speaker 2:

And I fired on and she literally she stepped back and she just had this look of almost you just asked me like nine questions, all rapid fire, and I said look, I said information will make me feel better at this point. And so she was just kind of like well, I'm gonna go talk to the coroner, see what his decision is. And so she comes back five minutes later and she said well, the coroner has decided that he's not going to do an autopsy. And I didn't mean it, I wasn't trying to be mean to her, but I literally looked at her and went why, why is he not going to do an autopsy? I said I want to know the protocol as to why he would or would not do an autopsy. I said because he was perfectly fine before. I said he woke up at nine o'clock this morning. I said it is 1045. He's dead on a table. You can't tell me that's normal and so.

Speaker 2:

And so she comes back and I mean she was great, I gave her all the credit in the world. She said well, typically in a children's hospital, the reason why they would do an autopsy is one if they were perfectly healthy and they came in and they died if it's drug related, abuse related or court related. And she said the reason why he's not going to do an autopsy on your son is because he has an extensive history of medical issues, several of which could have caused the situation that brought him here. And I said, okay, I am okay with that response. And I I it was more like I wanted to know what their thinking was, not so much as I was wanting to jump down her throat. It was well, what's the thought process here? Because even though he's got medical needs, it still was a total of maybe three hours since he was awake this morning until he passed away. And so she was. She was great.

Speaker 2:

And, you know, after the fact everybody asked me. They said, well, can you, you know, outside of losing your son, you know, was there anything that was really difficult? And I said, probably the most difficult thing I ever had to do was my wife had come up with her family and we spent about an hour and then we decided that we were going to drive home and I had to take all of his cutoff clothes, put it on his empty wheelchair and wheel that wheelchair through the hospital to the thing, put it in his van and drive 60 miles home. And dead silence. It was one. I mean, my wife and I talked a little bit on the way home, but it was more. We were. We were just stunned, like what just happened. And so, like you can see Zach written on the wall behind me this is his room and like where it says Zach, on the wall back there is his wheelchair. That's where I left it there almost three years ago. I have not moved it since.

Speaker 2:

Like I came into this room, I put his chair in here and, like the weight of the world, just like a Mack truck hit me, I just lost it at that point. And so I regained my composure, and at that point we went over to my parents' house and, like, my whole family was there and I walked in the door and my brothers and I, we have a relationship in the sense that we're friendly to each other, we love each other, but do we talk all the time? Not so much. And so I walked in and I sell my eldest brother and something about see him, and I literally I almost buckled. I mean I lost it. I don't know what it was about seeing him, and you know, I just I just uncontrolled it and I went into my parents' room and I tried to regain composure and everybody was sitting there and I mean, they understandably wanted to know, and so I was trying to tell them, but you know I'd get five or six words out and I'd get that kind of trembling you know you're about to lose it kind of feeling in your throat. And it took me forever to get through it. And so I finally got through it, and at that point it was about noon and so we went.

Speaker 2:

I think we went to the funeral home that day Good, bad or no, it was the next day. So we went to the funeral home the next day and, like everybody tells you, um, the worst day of your life happens and you have to make a thousand decisions. And so we went in there and the place we use was phenomenal. You know you hear these horror stories, but the place that we use was phenomenal. They never pressured us, they never said you have to do this, they just said here's how the you know we do package deals, you can add or take away from them or you can do kind of a la carte, that kind of thing. And again, I give them all the credit in the world. They were great.

Speaker 2:

So we get in there, they tell us everything and I said, well, can we take this information on?

Speaker 2:

I said, can we make an appointment for the next day? And I said we'll make a decision tomorrow. And he was great about it. And so we get in there the next day. And he said, well, the first question I've got to ask you are you going to bury or are you going to cremate? And we were originally going to do cremate, originally going to bury. But when he told us kind of what the cost was for him and the fact that the graveyard and the headstone, that was all separate. And I said and I asked him, I said well, what's kind of the ballpark for that? And when he told me, on top of what we were going to spend there, I went, I looked at my wife and I went, hmm, I went, I looked at my wife and I went, and then we got to talking about it and I said I looked at my wife and I said we have to understand if we bury him here, if we ever move, he's here.

Speaker 2:

So at least if we cremate him, we have an urn we can take him with us per se per se, and so it was at that point, outside of the fact that it wasn't much cheaper, but it was the cheaper of the options on that kind of end of life stuff. And so we decided that we were going to cremate, although the one side story of it all and I have a twisted sense of humor when when I'm dealing with a lot of emotion, I have a twisted sense of humor so we decided that we're going to cremate and the funeral director comes over to us and goes I'm required by federal law and I go stop. I said what does the US government want to know anything about why I'm cremating my son? And he looks at me and he goes I'm required by federal law to tell you that the state or form in which your loved one enters the crematorium is not the same state that they will come out of the crematorium.

Speaker 1:

He said I want to make he goes.

Speaker 2:

I want to make sure that you are fully aware that your loved one cannot go back to his or his or her original state Once they've entered the crematorium and literally I dead stop in there. I look up from this piece of paper and I go. Who the fuck thinks that they're, that they're gonna go? And he just looks at me and I said it's fire. Do they not know what fire does? He doesn't skip a beat and he doesn't say anything, but he gives me this look of like. You would be amazed at how many people get upset not realizing that.

Speaker 1:

Oh my goodness.

Speaker 2:

So he gives me this. We literally have to initial in eight spots on front and back of this page saying that we are fully aware. And I went. I literally looked at him and went. I know I might be lucid right now because of just my state of mind. I said this baffles my mind that people think that you throw a log into a fire and when it's done it's ash. It's the same concept. He just kind of smirks at me. I know why. He didn't say anything, but I almost wanted to go. When we get out of here, can you tell me the real story? Because I really want to know, you know kind of thing. So, but you know we went through that.

Speaker 2:

One of the happy moments that I had is when we had the viewing. I was shocked at how many people actually came out. I did not think we were going to have that many people go to the viewing because you know it was a lot of his teachers, a lot of his parapros. He'd been to several different schools, his special needs, so it just, in a good way, it shocked me how many people actually were there. And then, um, you know, the day of, like the service and all and all, um, yeah, at least over here, where we were at the family, like the family that had actually lost a loved one, they were on the left side of, like the, the aisle and and the. The reason why I comment on that was I, I, um, I came across a quote or something, and that might have been a saying, that said you'll never understand grief until you're that family sitting on the left side, and so that that always stuck with me and I went you're right, especially with it. Like we did two songs oh lord was a song my wife did, uh, the one is a popular one by rascal flotts, my wish she did with him. And then I've always been a fan of amazing grace and pentatonix came out with one that just floored me that I love so much, and we, and when that started playing, I just I, I couldn't contain it. I was just you know, you know, uh, but so that was February of 2022.

Speaker 2:

And to get into kind of what I'm doing now, I've always been a big proponent of therapy. I'm sure not many men say that, but I have always been. I believe that we go through seasons of just needing some mental help, assistance and, honestly, about two weeks before he actually passed, I literally called my counselor and said hey, I think I've kind of run through a season I don't think I've got enough to talk about for an hour. I said you've helped me through. You know what I initially came to see you for. I said I'll keep you on speed dial. Should I need you, you know, I'll get on your waiting list, kind of thing. She said okay, and then when everything happened, I called her up and I said hey, I need an emergency session. When everything happened, I called her up and I said hey, I need an emergency session. I said you will understand when we talk, I said it's not something I want to talk about over the phone. And so we get in there and at this point I'm going once a week just because of everything going on, and about my fifth or sixth week going, she goes.

Speaker 2:

Have you ever thought about journaling your feelings? It wasn't that I didn't want to, it was just I didn't think I was that great of a writer at that point which now that I look back, there's a lot of irony in the statement that I made and I literally looked at her and went. I said you know, I don't know if that's my thing. And she goes well, you don't have to do it right now. She goes, put it on the back burner or on the side table, so to speak. She said the reason why I'm asking you to do it is it's more of a mindfulness activity, it's so you can get your feelings out. She said you don't have to share it with anybody. She said if you write it out, you can burn it, you can shred it, you can do whatever you want, you don't have to share it. And I said okay, and and so that literally kind of proverbially sat on my side table for eight or nine months after the fact.

Speaker 2:

And then one day I'm watching a Facebook reel and something in one of the reels it was either a medical scene or something that my son liked, I forget what it was.

Speaker 2:

I watched it and, man, it gut punched me and I just start bawling.

Speaker 2:

At this point and it was at that point I opened a Word document and, in proper Oxford English style letter form, I write a letter as if I'm writing a letter to my son, to the house, and I just verbally vomit on a page, like to the point that if I feel like I need to write an F-bomb because that's the emotion that I just verbally vomit on a page, like to the point that if I feel like I need to write an F-bomb, because that's the emotion that I'm feeling, that's what I'm writing.

Speaker 2:

And I do this a couple of times a day for weeks at this point, just to get the feelings out, and I'm saving them on my computer and for some reason, I saved, saved them to this day. I don't remember, I don't know why I ever saved them. Uh, I think I was originally just going to delete them, but I kept them for some reason. And so, um, I do this for several weeks and I get on Facebook and like for I search for a group, because we know there's a group for everything on Facebook and there's one for grief.

Speaker 2:

Yep, and so I actually find a group called Parents who Lost a Special Needs Child, which I was shocked to find because that's such a finite niche part of grief.

Speaker 2:

I just ran across it and I got to know the admin a woman very well In fact I admin the group for a while and I said one day. I said do you mind if I post one of my my journal entries? And her immediate response was yes, we get no man ever deciding that they want to share their feelings. We would love for you to have it. And I said, okay. So you know, I've I've got weeks to go through and I pick one that's this kind of raw.

Speaker 2:

And right before I post it I go in my head. I'm thinking I said well, even though this is a noble idea and I may get a lot of positive, I have to mentally prepare myself for the fact I might get negative. And am I in a mental space that I can handle it? Because I don't want someone to say something negative for whatever reason and me to just fly off a handle, because you know this is personal to me and you know in my fashion, I think about it for literally two minutes and I just went screw it, I'm just going to post it anyway. The hell with what they think. It's how I feel, it doesn't matter what they think. And so I copy and paste it in the group and I literally put a disclaimer and I said I write in a very raw, transparent way If you are close to the loss of your loved one and this is going to trigger you, scroll on. I said, because I am not sugarcoating this, I will not sugarcoat this. I said I believe that the world needs to see the good, the bad and the ugly of grief in real time, not what we see on TV. And so I said so if this is going to bother you, scroll on. I am warning you now and I think I said something to the effect if you come at me because you don't like what I stated, I said the full force of my grief is going to come back at you. And I said let me tell you. I said I will not hold. I said when you read this letter, you'll know that I will not hold back. So I do that and I and I wait, and it takes a while, and then the comments just start coming in. I get these massively positive responses. A lot of the mothers and the girlfriends and the wives, and you name it are all making these just great comments.

Speaker 2:

You know, I, I had, I had one woman. She goes you know, you just joined this group. We've never talked, We've never met, we've we, you know, we've never had a conversation. She said I've never told anybody how I feel, deep down. And she goes your letter right now hits word for word how I feel.

Speaker 2:

And I said well, I really appreciate that I can write something that resonates with you. I said this is inspiration from my son and just my, what people would call bluntness, if you will. And I said I appreciate, you know that you can take something away from this. And so I keep writing letters in there and every time I do it I'm getting the same response. And after about five or six weeks, finally about the like fifth or sixth week, I go, you know, I think I might have something here. Six weeks, finally, about the fifth or sixth week, I go, you know, I think I might have something here.

Speaker 2:

And probably like for you, before doing your podcast, you probably had people go well, have you ever thought about writing a book? Have you thought about doing a podcast? And so I'm getting all these comments and I said, well, I appreciate the comments, but in the moment that they were saying that, I said I don't know if I'm in the right headspace to do that at this point. I said I might somewhere down the road. I said but right now, that's just a lot for me to handle right now.

Speaker 2:

And so finally someone comes and goes what have you ever thought about doing a Facebook page? And I said well, what do you mean by that? They said I said you can make a page Like, let's say, your favorite you know restaurant has a page. And she said you don't have to create any more content, you basically just can copy and paste if you don't want to create newer content than what you're already doing. And I said well, you know I could do that.

Speaker 2:

And so I started doing that and, like everybody, I got my tip. I had 10 or 20 followers family, friends, that kind of thing and one day I got this wild hair and I started reaching out to all what I would consider the big names in the grief community. And I just said, hey, my name is so-and-so, I've got a page on here. I think I have something here and I'd just like to know some pointers like what direction it worked out for you? What direction did you try? And it just it wasn't that great. And literally everybody that I contacted was phenomenal. They were just like well, if you're going to write a book, you're going to want to create a website at some point. You're going to want to do A, b and C. If you're going to do a podcast, you're probably still going to want to do a website, but you're going to also want to do D, e and F and so, and so I employed all those kinds of points and when I did that, I started getting like 20 and 30 followers a day, I mean sorry.

Speaker 2:

I hear I'm getting background music.

Speaker 1:

I know my son. My son's trying to get him. Normally he's quiet, but every now and then he lets it go.

Speaker 2:

That's fine, and so long story short, this month marks a year that I've been doing it. I'm right at about 1200 followers. I've got followers and they come to the page in 26 countries and just about every US state. Wow, and I only say that just because if someone would have told me a year ago that I would have that and I'd be doing podcasts and talking to you, I'd have looked at them and said you're crazy, you're out of your mind.

Speaker 2:

I get that which is the page on Facebook and my website, because I wanted to be instead of complaining about it.

Speaker 2:

I wanted to be an example and I tell people all the time I said I'm not perfect at it, I make mistakes all the time. In fact, in the first couple of months there were some statements I made on my page that made me put my foot in my mouth that I lost followers over, and you know, I mean, you live and you learn that kind of thing. But I wanted to be an example, no matter how good or bad I was at it, and that is, you know, like I've told my wife several times. I said I really think the selling point of Letters to Zachary outside of it being grief and a man because apparently I'm a unicorn doing it from what people tell me is the fact that I don't hold back, I don't sugarcoat it, I'm very transparent. When I'm having an effed up day, I will say I'm having an effed up day, that kind of thing, and I think people resonate with that.

Speaker 1:

They do, and I think it's important, regardless of how we're sharing, to be our true self, because the people that are like us resonate to that and sometimes you know, people share and put it to a more professional level and it's harder for people to resonate sometimes with, I guess, that way of doing things.

Speaker 2:

Oh yeah, definitely. You know I'm on my page for those that may want to go to it. I've got in letter form, I've gotten prose and poetry style, I've got meme form and like I've even got like I will like on Facebook you can share something on your page, but like right right above it and like I'll share something from someone else's page. And I'm really ADD about giving them credit for their original work. So like I'll give them credit for their work and then I then I will come back and like write my commentary of what they've written, just from the male perspective on there is typically what I'll do and it's not to bash what they're doing, it's just to show up from a kind of a different lens is how I do it. So that's a lot of what my page is on there.

Speaker 2:

The other reason why I do it is because one of the pretty consistent comments I get in this entire year I've been doing this has been we lost our child X number of months or maybe a year ago and my husband's not opening up. What do I need to do? And I'll go. Well, I have some things that I can tell you that I know would work with me. Will it work with your husband. It's possible, I said, but I'm not going to say yes, it's going to work a hundred percent of the time, like if you married an old, crusty like marine veteran that may not want to open up what I'm telling you may or may not work. You know that's been the war you know, this may not work, you know.

Speaker 2:

And so I did that because, like I originally did the page for men and then I, then I opened it up to anybody that had lost, like a loved one, and then I finally it's going to sound weird to say this, but I then opened it up to women, and what I mean by that is to say, for those women that don't have a kind of an idea of how a man grieves, at least I can give them some perspective and they can take that back to whoever their significant other is and maybe use it to help with whatever their situation is. And so, like I say, I try to help empower them to understand kind of where the male mind is coming from, so that when they're talking with their husbands or their siblings that are men, they've got kind of an idea of kind of how to direct the conversation.

Speaker 1:

And I love that, because I have a lot of men in my life that were particularly affected from my husband's death. But they don't open up about that and I know that three years later they're still hurting badly and their significant others don't know how to approach that or how to help that situation.

Speaker 2:

Well, and I even came up with what I call the male grief constitution, which is kind of 10 points that I've kind of thought out through my head, of things that I think would work with me.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

To help women understand kind of the male point of view. Some of the things that women have to understand is just there. It's not good or bad, it's just different. There are things that men have to deal with societally that women don't necessarily have to deal with. For example, women are brought up to be more emotional. It's okay to be emotional, it's okay to open up that kind of stereotype, if you will.

Speaker 2:

Men are taught. Well, I'm 48, so I'm Generation X. I was taught the whole tape it up and walk it off, rub some dirt on it kind of generation. And even though it kind of slowly started with my generation, it's gotten much better now. You know, I learned all my life that. You know, even like one of the times when I played football in high school, I had a coach that always come up and go, are you hurt or are you injured, because there's a difference, and so that's kind of the mentality a lot of men live with when it comes to just life. And so men are taught you know we're the providers or the protectors of the family. We're here to make sure the family is safe and provided with, even if that comes with emotion.

Speaker 2:

You know I'm not saying that as a negative. 99.9% of men would have it that way. They would. You know if it means to almost the detriment of me. I would rather my wife, my son, my daughter be happy and successful, and all that even if it's on my back trying to do it. I mean, a lot of men they like that, they thrive in that. But on the other end you kind of get what we're getting, where a lot of men are closed minded when it comes to emotion and don't want to open up.

Speaker 2:

The other two things I won't go through all of them, but the other two things I typically will tell women and I say this and I've gotten backlash from a lot of women online when I say this, and I say it's not personal, I'm not attacking women, but what I try to tell women is you have to listen, to listen and not listen to respond. And I said if you expect a man to listen to your entire thought and then respond when you're upset about something in a relationship or something in a different area, then we expect the same. And, as someone who's been married 21 years and we've had our arguments like any marriage has had, if my wife were to say something and I would interrupt her and never let her finish. I would never hear the end of it. And I've had times where I've done that and I didn't hear the end of it. And so what I tell women is what you expect you should give. I said it's not a personal thing, I'm not attacking you, but if you want your man to open up, you have to be willing to listen for them, to get their thought out, because if you don't, in a man's mind're gonna, they're gonna give you a couple of tries and then after like the baseball analogy three strikes and you're out. That may be more or less than that. Once they get to that point where it's that cutoff line, they're gonna go. Well, why am I gonna try to do when you're always interrupting? Or?

Speaker 2:

A lot of sentiment for men is they will say how they're feeling and then the female significant other will take what they're feeling, turn it around as they're feeling and throw it back at. Them is what they'll do. And I will say it's happened to me. I will say I've heard it from other men. That is very irritating. Just because I'm having a moment of frustration or emotion doesn't mean it's attacking you. It doesn't mean anything else other than the fact that this is what my emotion is, and if you don't let me get it out to say it, then it's going to get to a point where I'm just going to go. Well, she doesn't want to hear it. I'm just not going to say it. I'll compartmentalize it, I will move on.

Speaker 2:

The last thing that I will say for the other side per se is men have learned very quickly and throughout their dating life, and all that is why am I going to say something if it's going to get thrown back at me? Or if I open up and I'm vulnerable, I know that at some point there's a possibility when we get into an argument, it's going to get thrown back in my face and I'd rather not deal with that. And so those are probably the three biggest things I try to tell women. Now, I'm polite when I say it to them, but I say those are the three big ones. I said because men are all about respect and trust, those are the two big ones.

Speaker 2:

I said you can't have one without the other. And I said if you break one, then it's hard getting the other. And men are very simple creatures. I admit I've been one all my life and so it doesn't take a whole lot to make us happy. And I just you know, I try to say that and just say, look, all I'm telling you is listen, let him get it out. If he brings it to you and it's serious enough to him, let him get it out. If he brings it to you and it's serious enough to him, let him get it out. I said, if you blow it off or roll your eyes or think or even say, really you're having an issue, that's your problem, he's going to take that as a strike and eventually, if you say it enough, you're not going to hear from him again. So it's what I try to tell people.

Speaker 1:

Very good advice and very helpful as well, because I think as a woman, sometimes we don't think about things like that, but it is harder for men to speak on their feelings, and especially when it comes to a death or grieving anything really. So when that does come to us, we need to think about how we're going to react and how we're going to perceive that, so that we do it cautiously, so that it's a safe space for everybody.

Speaker 2:

For one thing, you know, when it comes to society and all that, yeah, we're taught to compartmentalize, we're taught to kind of bury feelings and we're there to get whatever the job is done. We're there to. You know, whatever you consider macho and manly to get done. That's what we're kind of taught to do. That's what we're kind of taught to do. But what we're also taught is the woman's feelings come first, almost at all expense. And what I mean by that is or the example I give is when I've said it online I've literally had women go. No, it's not that way. And I go.

Speaker 2:

Really, I said on the street I live there's probably 50 houses. I said I bet I can go into any one of those houses. I can go into their kitchen or their bathroom maybe. And I said I guarantee you at least one of those houses. You'll walk in there and there'll be a placard on there that says happy wife, happy life. And I said 99.9% want happy wife. There's nothing wrong with that. But what that subconsciously says is, if you're not happy, nobody's happy. And if there's any room left there, there might be just a little bit of room for us to say what we feel, that kind of thing, and then that's when you got to start factoring everything else I was saying into kind of the equation, and so again, I don't say that it's a bad thing.

Speaker 2:

Almost 100 of men want that. That's kind of what we're geared to do, but you have to understand it kind of from that context do you um?

Speaker 1:

you made a coloring book I did.

Speaker 2:

Oh, the goal of letters to zachary outside of sharing my emotions and being an example was I always wanted to create a legacy for my son and I didn't know how I was going to do that. At one point I was just like I want to make something, like I'm very tactile and learning, I'm very hands-on and I knew I always wanted something I could hold in my hands.

Speaker 2:

And so earlier this year I came across a publisher in one of the podcasting groups and we got to talking and I said at that point I was almost about a thousand followers. I said, look, I've got X number of followers. I want to do something like I can hold my hands. And I knew it wasn't going to be an actual book just because I knew the expense that was going into like writing a book. And I told her I said, look, at this point I don't have the funds to start writing a book, because it can get into the thousands of dollars to write a book. And so we got to brainstorming and she goes well, have you ever thought about a coloring book? She said the expense would be much less and then you could market it to a probably a more vast audience. And I thought, well, that's unusual, and you know I've always been kind of a little right of normal anyways. And so I said, yeah, let's run with that. And so the simplistic way I can explain it is through the publisher's website.

Speaker 2:

We created kind of a mock website for me, we put a survey on there and all the people I conversed with in the grief community I said hey, if you would like to be a part of a grief coloring book, go to this website, fill out the survey and so basically, what that survey asked was who your loved one was. You know kind of when they passed where you're from. And then it asked them to write attributes that were positive about their loved one. You know favorite things, favorite sayings, maybe a favorite sentence or two, just things about them. And then when that got sent off, it would go to the publishers and the illustrators and what they would do is they would compile all of their information and make a full page coloring book page based on the information that they submitted.

Speaker 2:

So, like I told them, I said, let's say, you want to emphasize a specific thing. I said when you're writing in that survey, make note that this is a. You want to emphasize a specific thing? I said when you're writing in that survey, make note that this is a. You want to emphasize this? I said because these illustrators don't know who you are. Yeah, so if you want something centralized in there, you need to let them know. And so, after many months of work, we have letters to zachary the coloring book right there and let me see if I can find one real quick, like, for example, this is one of the person's pages and then on the other side was kind of writing about them. As you can see, they listed who they were, where they're from, that kind of thing, and it just listed some positive attributes about them.

Speaker 1:

That is awesome.

Speaker 2:

And so I did that because, like this didn't cost anything for them. I just wanted their input. And I said, look, the only cost for you is going to be if you I said if you get selected to be in. There was just about everybody did. I said it will cost you, whatever it is, to buy the book. I said the coloring books's $14.99. I said it's not in today's standards, it's not that expensive.

Speaker 2:

And I said what this coloring book does is it gives a. It's basically a memorial. It's an active and interactive memorial that will literally outlast all of us. And I said not only will it be, I said now, granted my namesakes on the book. And I said, yeah, I'll have a little more in there, because I'm the one that kind of came up with the publisher to create it. But I said this is all of our coloring book, this is. This is something that you can hold on to. You know, if you're having a rough moment, you can go back to this. The last reason for it is is, you know, I still have my daughter. So I thought, well, how can I explain death and grief to my daughter? Now I'm a little different, because my daughter has developmental delays, so I have to make it very simplistic for her to get it.

Speaker 2:

But as I'm thinking about this, I go well, let's say I'm a family, I've got children that don't have medical disabilities. How can I bridge the gap for, like a mother or a father, to talk with the remaining sibling or siblings that are there to kind of dumb down or simplify such complex topics? And so now this coloring book doesn't actually go over the topics, but what it does is, like me, writing is kind of a mindfulness activity. It's a distraction, so that it gives the parent time to kind of think of ways, while they're coloring, to explain these topics. What it does. So, yes, it's for the child, but it's more to kind of give the adult kind of a leg up while they're kind of distracted coloring. You know, like I would be like, well, how am I going to explain this while they're coloring? Doing this, I'm brainstorming as I as as I'm trying to figure out how to talk to them, and so that's kind of the other way that I marketed it, if you will.

Speaker 1:

Nope, I love it and I like to color. So, before we finish up, will you tell us about Zachary? What kind of boy was he? What did he like, what did he think?

Speaker 2:

My son, when he he passed, was 15 years old. Uh, although with with the mustache he was the teenage mustache, he was growing, he, he looked like he was 20. You know, he, even though he had his developmental latest, he was very much a people person. He never met a stranger. He loved his special olympics bowling. He loved swimming, he, he loved his hypotherapy, which is horseback riding therapy.

Speaker 2:

He was addicted to the weather channel, like, like I could leave the, the actual weather channel on for 18 hours a day and he'd be happy. In fact, at one point we I live in atlanta and the actual filming studios is in north atl and so we actually went. I got a tour up there and he, he, like we met some of the on-air personalities that he had watched on TV. They, they just happened to be there when we were there at that moment and so he loved that. I mean he, he, he was very friendly, very loving, the most laid back child you would ever meet.

Speaker 2:

I mean, he, like, one of the things I had to do for his rare condition was I, early on in his life, I had to give him a catheter to help him go to the bathroom and, like we had done it so much. There were times like I would lay him on the floor and he just put his hands behind his head and look at me like well, let's get the show on the road. And I mean like I'd insert in the area down there and I mean most normal folks would go. What are you doing with that, catherine? Why are you going in that area?

Speaker 1:

but he wouldn't even flinch, just because that was just what life was so but yeah, he was very much a people person thank you for sharing about him and your whole experience. And I love that you are advocating for men and helping women understand the men in this situation, because I think that's very important.

Speaker 2:

Sure.

Speaker 1:

Is there anything else you would like to add?

Speaker 2:

men is. It's ironic of the two genders. Men do not like being told what to do, but yet when it comes to emotion, they let everybody and their brother tell them what to do. I just I find a whole lot of irony in that and I go what I said who cares what anybody else thinks about what you're feeling, what you're dealing with? Vulnerability does not equal weakness by any stretch of the imagination, is what I would tell men out there. And then you know. Last but not least, I would say anybody that's interested in the coloring book, you can go to letters to zacharycom. That's got all my social media where you can get to it. It's got where you can get the coloring book. It's got other media appearances and just things about my son, that kind kind of thing on there. For those that are interested, because I've got the Facebook page, I've got a Facebook group, I'm on Instagram, tiktok, facebook and I think I even have my LinkedIn on there.

Speaker 1:

And I'll link it all in the notes as well, so everybody has access to that. Okay, I appreciate you sharing.

Speaker 2:

Thank you so much for having me. Thank you, we'll talk to you later, okay.

Speaker 1:

Bye, bye. We hope you enjoyed our conversation today. If you would like to join us on Facebook, you can find us at Grief Sucks Life After Loss on Facebook, and if you would like to share your story with us, you can email us at grief sucks life after loss, gmailcom. We look forward to seeing you again.