November 23, 2024 • 66 mins
What if the most heart-wrenching moments of your life could fuel a movement of healing and resilience? Jason Tuttle joins us to share his profound journey through parenthood, grief, and emotional expression. As a stay-at-home dad navigating the challenging world of special needs parenting, Jason's candid recounting of his son Zachary's unexpected passing offers listeners a raw and heartfelt perspective on loss. His Facebook blog, Letters to Zachary, has become a beacon of support, encouraging others to break free from societal norms that often silence men's grief.
We explore the complexities of raising children with rare conditions like Eagle Barrett syndrome. Jason walks us through the arduous path of hospital visits, medical interventions, and the emotional fortitude required to care for his children. His family's experiences shine a light on the broader challenges that families of special needs children face, from managing everyday routines to confronting life's most vulnerable moments. Through stories of resilience and love, we offer a window into the strength required to navigate this unique journey.
Join us as we discuss the growth of Jason's grief support community, which has reached audiences across 46 U.S. states and 18 countries. From sharing raw emotional letters to creating a safe space for men to express their grief, Jason's platform challenges traditional perceptions and provides vital resources for those navigating their own emotional journeys. This episode emphasizes the importance of open dialogue in healing and the power of community in transforming pain into purpose.
Connect with Jason:
Website: https://letterstozachary.com/
Facebook Page: Letters to Zachary
Instagram: Letters2Zachary
Tiktok: Letters2Zachary
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome back to the Against All Odds the Less Than
1% Chance Podcast with your host, Maria Aponte, where we will
hear stories of incrediblepeople thriving against all odds
, and my hope is that we can allsee how life is always
happening for us, even when weare the less than 1% chance.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Hey, hey, welcome back to Against All Odds, the
Less Than 1% Chance podcast withyour host, Maria Aponte.
I am so, so happy to have youback listening to this episode
because just you wait.
I was just reading theintroduction and my heart was
like, oh my gosh, this is goingto be so good because somebody
(00:41):
that is so in touch with theirfeelings and speaking up about
their feelings I feel like weall need a little bit of that in
our lives because we need tolearn how to be able to process
our own feelings and learn howto deal with those things.
So let me introduce you toJason Tuttle.
He is a parent of two kids withmultiple mental and physical
(01:03):
disabilities, some rare.
He is a stay at home dad for 12years until his son suddenly
and unexpectedly passed away,with issues related to his needs
, on January 28, 2022.
Since his son passed, hecreated a Facebook blog, Letters
to Zachary and a community thathelps deal with grief, and he
(01:25):
details it very raw andunfiltered and open to this.
Not okay to show feelings andit's not what they grow up with.
(01:50):
I know that for a long time, myson was told that he couldn't
cry from his other side of thefamily and I was like what?
You can cry all you want,You're open to crying and
feeling and having emotions.
I'm so so incredibly grateful,Jason.
Welcome to Against All Oddspodcast.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Well, thank you for having me.
It's a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Yeah, absolutely so.
Give us a little bit ofbackground.
I want to hear your story aboutyour kids and then what kind of
transpired from there.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Okay, I am a married father of two kids, been married
.
I think it's 21 years this year.
My wife's a couple of yearsolder than me.
We got married when I was 26.
And so she's your typical NewEngland family.
She grew up in kind of theMassachusetts, Connecticut,
Rhode Island area.
She was a cradle Catholic, Hermother's one of eight, Her
(02:47):
father's one of seven.
And I say all this becauseright after we got married we
waited about a year and hercomment to me was I want to have
four kids.
And I said let's have the firstone and then we'll talk.
And even me, growing up, I'vebeen in the South most of my
life, although I wasn't born inthe South, so I consider myself
(03:08):
Southern.
And so even I at the time wasjust like.
I figured we'd probably havetwo or three.
Kind of the traditional kind offamily dynamic is where I was
thinking.
But when she said that, I wasjust like let's have the first
one, let's see what happens.
Because at that point in time wedidn't think like twins or
(03:31):
multiples, ran in either side ofthe family and, lord, if we'd,
she'd have given birth and we'dhad twins or triplets, it had
been done at that point.
So at about a year in, wedecided that we wanted to have a
child.
She got pregnant rather quickly, to our surprise, and we went
through just the motions in thebeginning and it was ironically
(03:53):
it was her hairdresser that shewent to go get her hair done.
She hadn't told anybody, wehadn't taken a test, and it was
her hairdresser that went youlook green, are you pregnant?
And she went and took a testand sure enough, she was
pregnant.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Oh my gosh, that is awesome.
Hairdressers are pretty amazing.
They know us better than weknow us sometimes.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
So she calls me and tells me the information and I'm
excited and she I'll neverforget it she goes well, what if
we have a child that's got likemedical needs?
And my response was well, whatif we have a child that's got
like medical needs?
And my response was well, if wehave one with medical needs and
we're just going to have onewith medical needs?
I'm not I've never been a bigproponent of kind of the
alternate, alternative birthcontrol methods that are out
(04:38):
there that people might use inthat instance.
So she went through a pregnancy.
We got to that like week 20appointment, which all women
know is where you find out thesex of the child.
so she didn't want to knowbecause that was one of life's
last great surprises yeah Iwanted to know because I'm a
(05:00):
planner, I was painting thenursery and I really just didn't
want to paint in browns andyellows and greens and that kind
of thing.
So we got to the ultrasoundappointment and we playfully
went back and forth about whatwe wanted to do and the tech
said well, I'm getting to thepoint that I'm going to find out
the sex of the child.
Do you want to know?
(05:20):
And so we playfully go back andforth and in hindsight the tech
probably shouldn't have said itthe way she did, but she did.
She goes well, I found an issueand I need to know the sex of
the child.
And so we go okay, we want toknow you're having a boy?
Great, what's the issue?
She said well, I can't reallytell you the issue.
She said that's a kind of adoctor thing.
(05:42):
But I said well, why did youneed to know the sex of the
child?
And she goes well, if it's whatI think it is, it's rare in
boys and even rarer in girls.
So I needed to know the sex ofthe child, and so we said okay,
well, from that point forward westarted seeing a perinatologist
, which, if you don't know whata perinatologist is, it's
basically a high risk pregnancy.
(06:04):
Obgyn is what that doctor does.
They look at all the specificthings that could possibly
happen when there's a concernfor other issues.
So we started seeing thatdoctor every week up until my
wife's C-section, and what welearned in that process is you
run across two doctors.
You either run across a doctorthat doesn't want to tell you
(06:25):
anything for fear they're goingto get sued if they're wrong, or
you run across a doctor thatwants to tell you everything
under the sun so that they cancover themselves, so that you
don't sue them.
And I told the doctor.
I said, buddy, we don't knoweverything about medical science
.
If you say something and itdoesn't happen, or even if it
(06:46):
does happen, I'm not going tosue you.
So they told us a lot of reallymajor things of like this is our
first child, we've only beenmarried a year and we're here
and well, your son may only beborn with one kidney.
That one kidney looks like itmay sustain damage in utero,
which that did happen.
Your son may have areas ofmissing white matter in his
(07:09):
brain that did happen.
Your son may have hydrocephalus, which is water on the brain,
which is not a good thing, andhe may need a shunt to help
drain it.
Luckily that did not happen.
So they told us some prettymajor things that was going on.
That was just shocking usbecause up to the week 20 point,
(07:29):
we had no reason to believethere were any issues on either
side of the family forgenerations.
Nothing that wasn'tself-induced, if you will.
And so we get to the point wheremy wife's going into labor, and
so we take her to the hospital.
She gets induced for herC-section, like the typical
(07:51):
scenario for a C-section.
She has the child, they wrapour son up, they bring him over
to us, we see him for about 30seconds and then, for us, they
whisk him off to the NICU atthat hospital.
And then my wife had to go torecovery because the epidural
kind of made her not feel wellafter, which is pretty common.
And so I then went up to theNICU there and the doctor comes
(08:14):
up to me and goes well, your sonwas born with a rare condition
called Eagle Barrett syndrome.
And I went what, what is that?
And he said, well, what, whatis that?
And he said well, what's goingto happen is we'll have your son
overnight and then he's goingto get transported to the
children's hospital on the Northside of Atlanta, Cause I'm on
the Southwest side at this pointof Atlanta.
(08:37):
And so I said okay, and I said,well, will they take my son to
see my wife?
Cause she really didn't see him, and I said I'm not going to
let my son leave this hospital,for my wife actually has a
chance to see him.
And so he said yeah, thatshould be fine and the
children's hospital was great.
But to backtrack a little bit,eagle Barrett syndrome is a rare
(08:59):
condition.
It's one in 40,000 births.
They don't know the officialcause of it.
They know it's related tokidney issues, which my son was
only born with one kidney.
That one kidney did sustaindamage because your kidney is
basically a filter and what washappening was his kidney wasn't
(09:19):
filtering right, so fluid wasbacking up into the kidney is
what was happening.
So on the ultrasound,millimeters may not sound like a
lot, but when you see a blackspot that looks about that big
on a ultrasound thing and youmay think, well, 10 centimeters,
10 millimeters, isn't that big,but it's massive.
(09:40):
So the Eagle Barrett syndromeis related to kidney issues.
On top of that, thecharacteristics of the condition
are a child has an abnormallylarge bladder that has to be
given a catheter, which I had todo every four hours for about
the first five years of his life, because they don't get the
(10:01):
necessarily the sensation tohave to go.
And so I would have toconstantly feel his bladder area
to make sure it wasn't gettinglike rock hard, tight, like he
was getting too full On top ofthat if I didn't drain it.
The reason why people geturinary tract infections because
the sediment in the liquidthere just sits there and that's
what causes the infection.
(10:22):
Yeah.
So I would have to give him acatheter for that.
The main characteristic of itis prune belly.
Well, it's Eagle Barrettsyndrome, but it's
affectionately known as prunebelly.
The main characteristic of thecondition was he was born
without any core abdominalmuscle.
He had none in his midsection.
(10:45):
Like I could lay him on thefloor and the only thing
protecting his organs was theskin and the fascia that held
the skin together.
Like I could put him on thefloor and I could literally,
from his outside, touch hislarge intestine, touch his lower
intestine, touch all the organsthat are right there.
And so he was.
He did have to wear aprotective covering for a while,
(11:08):
although later on down the roadwe did have a major kind of
reconstruction surgery thatreally helped out.
So he had no, no core abdominalmuscle.
He had normal lungs.
However, he had a diminishedlung capacity.
What I mean by that is likewhen you and I get like a
bronchitis or pneumonia, whenyou have the core abdominal
(11:31):
muscles, you've got that likefoundation that your system
presses on to give you kind ofsome force to push it out.
Well, he didn't have that.
So what we later found out wasif I didn't catch a respiratory
related illness fast enough.
Ultimately, I was taking him upto the hospital, we were going
to the ER, he was gettingadmitted and we were staying
(11:52):
seven to 12 days.
Every time that happened andthat happened probably every six
months for the first five yearsof his life is what happened.
So when we found out about allthat, we started seeing a
pulmonologist, and so at thatpoint, the protocol that I had
in my head was the moment Iheard that cough, that I knew
(12:14):
that he had, I put a Hill-Romvest machine around his
midsection which basically blowsin and out.
It beats on your chest toloosen things up.
Then I take an encephalator,which is basically an oxygen
mask that goes over your mouthand your nose.
It blows air in quickly andimmediately sucks it out.
So what it does is it gets itfrom your lungs and sucks it up
(12:36):
into your esophagus.
I then take a suction machinewith a tube in there and stick
it literally down his throat andsuction it out, and then after
that everybody knows what anebulizer is I give him a
breathing treatment through anebulizer, and that's what I did
every four hours every time hegot sick, until we had the
(12:56):
reconstruction surgery and atthat point he got well.
I was more proactive at thatpoint and he got.
I got better at noticing it.
So he his hospital stays atthat point drastically dropped,
but for at least that first fiveor six years that's what I did.
So all of those things is justthe Eagle Barrett syndrome.
(13:17):
On top of that, he was bornwith neurological delays.
What that meant was, eventhough when he passed away he
was 15 years old, he functionedat about four to six years old
his entire life.
On top of that he was nonverbal, he was epileptic.
So of the six different kindsof seizures he had two different
(13:40):
kinds of them.
He could walk with assistance,like me holding me holding him
but by himself he could not walk.
So he was essentiallywheelchair bound.
However, when I'd put him onthe floor he could army, crawl
fast as anything anywhere hewanted to go.
So mobility wasn't the biggestissue.
But like walking, yeah, he hadto have a wheelchair.
(14:01):
So the Eagle Barrett syndromeis completely separate from all
the other issues I just listed,and that does not even include
all the issues my daughter hadtwo years later.
Oh my gosh.
So that's the first up until mydaughter was born and we found
out about her issues.
(14:21):
That was probably theintroduction to the first three
years of marriage, the firstthree years of my kids the
special needs life, the hospitallife.
So that's what we did about thefirst three years, just
learning the ins and outs ofeverything.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Wow.
So I have to say thatcongratulations to a 21 year
marriage.
Thank you that congratulationsto a 21 year marriage.
Thank you, because that is alot of stress to put on a new
newlywed couple.
And and congratulations to youfor stepping up and and being
like no, I have to learn how tofigure this out and that that is
(15:00):
rare.
I was a single mom for manyyears and it's so it.
I found it so hard sometimes tolike pull, like I would always
explain everything to dad, butit was so difficult to for him
to step up and be like All right, well, she's having a.
(15:22):
My oldest was diagnosed with amental health disorder, like at
12 years old, and when she wouldhave her like big outburst, I
would call and he would be likeOkay, call me, call, let her
have her call me when she'scalmed down and you're like at
that point I think I got it,thanks, yeah.
So I commend you for being afather that stepped up to that
(15:47):
as well.
Again, coming just from a momthat kind of had to deal with
all of it herself, that is sucha blessing and, yeah, thank you
for well and we had talkedinitially in our marriage, I was
always the one that was goingto stay at home.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
I've been told all my life about how well I work with
kids, and a lot of it justcomes with the old adage kids
and animals can sense fear, yeah, and so the calmer you are
around those two entities, theeasier it is to work with them.
Now, that's to say with littlechildren.
When it comes to teenagers,that's a whole different ball
(16:26):
game.
So it was always me that wasgoing to stay at home.
In fact, my degrees in element,well, it's in physical
education, but I taughtelementary physical education
for nine years.
So I was always I joke withpeople the reason why I got into
elementary PE was because thatwas probably how my mind
(16:47):
operated, that's how I thought.
And when everything happened, Ijust I was teaching in a school
in the middle of a year and itwas just to the point that I was
out.
I'd used up all my personaltime, I'd used up my paid time
off, all my leave, and I wasworking essentially for free.
(17:09):
And so I called my wife one dayfrom work and I said we talked
about this.
I said do you want to do thisand she said well, it's the old
adage If you wait till you'reprepared for it, you're never
going to be prepared for it.
So I literally called her on aWednesday.
That Friday I had myresignation on my teacher's, on
my principal's desk, and westarted from that point and I
(17:31):
there was 12 years of it fromthat point is how it went.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Wow.
And so your daughter was born.
You said three years later,three years later, two years,
almost to the day, oh, wow, okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
And then she you said she also has her conditions.
She does, she has, she haseverything her brother did
except for the rare condition.
So she had severe neurologicaldelays.
Even though she's 16, shefunctions about four to six
years old.
She's nonverbal, she'sepileptic, she's in a wheelchair
, she can walk assisted butshe's got to have the wheelchair
(18:11):
.
In fact, between my two kids,of the six different kinds of
seizures, I've seen four of themin my house.
Wow, I've seen almost all ofthem in my house.
So you can imagine we had ourson and then two years later we
have our daughter and then aboutsix months after that we had an
OT in our house that wasassessing my son and she had an
(18:35):
intern with her and the main OTgoes do you mind if I let my
intern do the Peabody skillsassessment test on your daughter
as practice?
And I said, sure, I know whatthat test runs.
It's like a $700 test.
I went.
If you want to practice forfree, have at it.
I would love for you to do it,and so she does, and she gets
(18:58):
done with it and she goes.
What's, in my professionalopinion, that your daughter's
delayed Now?
I will admit at that point Idid not have the best reaction
to her when she said that,because I just had so much going
on for lack of better ways tosay it.
I looked at her and I literallysaid pack up your ass and get
out of my house is what I just.
(19:19):
I did not want to hear it atthat point.
It was just, it was one ofthose, it was a sucker punch.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Yeah, it's like overwhelming.
You're already overwhelmed withall of the things that you're
doing with your son and you'relike this our daughter, it's
good, it's all good.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
And then it's like it was it it, it and she was
considered the normal child, ifyou will.
And our pediatrician actuallyhas a child with needs, and so
we took our daughter in and saideverything that happened, and
(19:54):
her comment was I tend to agreewith occupational therapists,
you may want to have her startseeing a neurologist.
And she said the thing you haveto understand is if you're
basing your daughter'sdevelopment on your son, she's
going to appear normal I saidbut in reality she's actually
delayed, and so that's where theball started rolling for her
(20:18):
got it.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Yeah, that's so obviously from what I'm
gathering.
The four kids did not happen.
It was two, correct?
Speaker 3 (20:27):
No.
And right after we had our son,when we decided we were going
to have another, you can imaginethe flack we got from both
sides of the family saying well,you've got a child with all
these needs, why would you haveanother?
And at that point, when wedecided we were going to have
another, I had researched enoughto find out that just about
everywhere said even though yourson had a rare condition and
(20:49):
had all these issues, there's noguarantee that your daughter is
going to have any of it.
Yeah, little did I know lateron down the road she was going
to have just about all of it.
Yeah.
But so we went ahead and decidedthat we were going to have her,
and that's just how it went.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
Yeah, you actually had the best training to be,
able to care for your daughterbecause you grew and understood
and saw so much with your son.
It's funny how we get thesetools in our toolbox, of like we
never imagined that this isgoing to be something that we
(21:27):
need ever again, and you being ateacher, that in itself like
you were working with children,you were so good with them and
then to take on then thisresponsibility of your child and
their special needs and all ofthat.
It's funny how life prepares usand I wholeheartedly believe in
the saying that life happens foryou and all of that.
It's funny how life prepares usand I wholeheartedly believe in
the saying that life happensfor you and not to you.
(21:49):
And we just have to look at theperspectives, find the
blessings in those moments, andI feel this was exactly that
life happening for you andalthough it was hard and the
learning curve was there and allof the things it prepared you
for, now you giving the bestcase scenario to your daughter
and everything that you'veexperienced.
(22:10):
So can you walk us through?
I know this may be hard, but Iknow that you're open to talking
about it.
So what happened to your sonand what happened there?
Speaker 3 (22:24):
Okay.
So of my two kids, my son wasmore medically fragile than my
daughter.
Like, of all the hospital stays, he was in the hospital,
probably 95% of it.
We were always in the hospitalfor respiratory related illness
or a seizure, something to thateffect.
So my typical routine when myson was around was both of my
(22:46):
kids went to the same classroom.
They were there, were in aself-contained special education
classroom, like we got a liftbus that stopped stops literally
in front of our house.
So the typical routine was I'dget them both up in the morning,
we'd get them both dressed,we'd get things going, we'd get
them in their chairs.
We'd send them off to schoolTwo days before the actual event
(23:08):
that happened.
I did that morning.
Everything was fine.
I was a stay-at-home parent atthat point, went through my
normal day.
They came home and typically mynormal routine when they came
home would be I'd get them bothin, I'd get them out of their
chairs.
If I was giving them a baththat day, I'd go ahead and go
right in to give them both ofthem a bath and getting them
(23:30):
dressed in the lounge for alittle while and I'd give them
time to relax.
All that stuff Made dinner thatnight Made one of my son's
favorites.
He ate like a horse andtypically most nights what would
happen would be we'd put mydaughter to bed about 730 and
then we would keep my son upabout another hour.
I love my daughter, but she canbe intense at times, especially
(23:54):
now as a teenage girl, and sothere were days that my son
would look at me and go I need abreak.
He was nonverbal, but I gotreally good at reading his body
language and he was just like Ineed a break.
And I'm just like buddy, Iunderstand.
And so we would put my daughterto bed and then we would bring
my son into our bedroom and mywife and I would lay on the bed
(24:17):
on both sides and we'd watch TVtogether and just goof off with
them for about another hour.
So two days before we bringthem in there, everything's fine
.
My wife goes.
We have an electric toothbrushfor him, so we do that because
he's got sensory issues and helikes the vibration.
So she went to go brush histeeth and he threw up a little
bit.
We didn't think much about it,we just figured maybe we hit his
(24:41):
gag reflex and there wassomething in there and something
came out.
Didn't think twice about it,Put him to bed and that night he
was up and down literally allnight, which is unusual for him.
And so we get him.
I let him kind of sleep in, Itext his teacher, I say hey, I
think my son's got a 24 hour bug.
(25:03):
He's not feeling well.
I'm going to keep him homebecause I don't know if it's
contagious or not, so I don'tspread anything to the classroom
.
Okay, just let me know.
And so that day I get him upand I sit him in his favorite
chair and I tell him all daylong I go, buddy, you can take a
nap.
I know you're tired, I knowyou've been up and down all
(25:24):
night.
It's okay, he's just going tobe sitting on the couch on his
laptop getting some work done.
He absolutely refused to dothat.
It was hard feeding him.
He didn't really want to drinka whole lot.
That kind of caught myattention at that point, but not
really just because it was thefirst day.
If it had gone multiple days Imight've gone.
Something's really wrong here.
And so we get through the day.
(25:47):
And then that evening I told mywife, I put him to bed the same
time as his sister.
He immediately got quiet and wejust thought well, he's just
exhausted.
He was up and down.
He didn't nap any today.
So we get up the next morningand I, before we get my daughter
up, I text his teacher and gohey, I'm going to which.
(26:11):
That's Friday morning, I'm good.
I texted his teacher and saidhey, I'm going to keep my son
home another day.
It'll butt up into the weekendand then I'll give me two more
days for him to recover fromwhatever.
I think this is Okay, fine, Seeyou Monday.
Get my daughter off to schooland then about eight, 39 o'clock
that morning I walk into hisbedroom and typically when I
(26:32):
walk in there to wake him up,he'll be awake and he's excited
and he's bouncing in his bed andall that.
And I get in there and he's notreally excited.
He's awake and he turns hishead and looks at me.
He doesn't really bounce oranything.
I think, huh, maybe he's reallygetting sick.
And I walk over to his rightside and I noticed this dark
green streak coming out of hismouth and everything I've seen
(26:56):
from medical shows and all thatkind of stuff.
I went well, the only thingdark green that's in your body
is bile.
And why is bile coming out ofhis mouth?
I was just this is not good atall.
So I get him out of bed and he'sreally floppy, like he can't
hold himself up, like he'sreally sick, which that didn't
really strike me, because I hada time or two in the past where
(27:16):
that was the case, where we gotadmitted for like 10 days, and
so I thought, well, maybesomething's really going on, let
me really look at this.
So I get him out in the livingroom and I immediately go
through my mental medicalprotocol.
I feel everything out.
I like I cath him just to makesure it's not a bladder issue.
I barely get anything out forhim.
The only thing that strikes meis his midsection, who was
(27:42):
normally pretty pliable, Like Icould press on a little bit and
it'd be spongy.
It was rock hard, like cinderblock wall rock hard.
And I'm just like, Hmm, thissomething's not right here.
And I sit there and look at himfor just a minute and in my
head I'm playing things out.
And then I look at my wife andI go you know, it's something's
not right here.
(28:02):
I'm going to take him up to thehospital and I said I don't
know what it is, but I don'trecognize this and this is
concerning to me.
And so it was at that point.
It was just under ourassumption that we were going to
take him up to the ER.
They were going to look at him.
He's probably going to getadmitted for several days.
We'd come home.
It's the mindset we were in atthat point.
We were in at that point.
(28:26):
So I get him up, get him dressed, get him in his wheelchair, get
him in the van and I get on theinterstate.
I'm doing like 90, getting upthe interstate.
Now I live on the Southwestside of Atlanta and the hospital
we go to is on the Northeastside of Atlanta.
It's approximately 65 milesfrom us, which sounds like a lot
, but in Atlanta Atlanta is like150 miles across.
(28:47):
So doing 60 is nothing Likepeople in Atlanta say it takes.
It takes an hour just to get anhour from somewhere in here.
That's just how big Atlanta is.
And so I'm driving up theinterstate and I get into the
center of Atlanta and I take theinterstate that goes up to like
the state road I have to getoff to get to the hospital where
I just get on the North centerof Atlanta and I take the
interstate that goes up to likethe state road I have to get off
to get to the hospital where Ijust get on the north side of
(29:10):
Atlanta and on the road signthat lights up it says major
wreck, on all lanes blocked.
And in my head I don't show itto my son, but I'm just I'm
freaking out because it'sliterally 300 yards before the
exit I have to get off on likeit's.
We're dead stopped in the senseof like we're crawling, we're
(29:33):
not completely stopped and we'reslowly moving, kind of thing.
Now, in the process of megetting up there like I can see
him lift his midsection up likehe's uncomfortable.
And then I see him up thereLike I can see him lift his
midsection up like he'suncomfortable.
And then I see him like he lookslike he's dozing on and off and
like I'm snapping my fingers athim, going buddy, stay with me,
stay with me.
I don't know what's going on,Just stay with me, Stay awake.
(29:55):
Kind of like if you get aconcussion, you don't want to
fall asleep right after itbecause of just what could
happen.
And so after the fact, when Igo back and look on it, I'm
realizing that he's fading inand out of consciousness.
Is what is coming?
It's not he's falling asleep,it's whatever's affecting him is
really affecting him at thispoint.
So I finally get to the frontof the thing and I don't know if
(30:18):
the DOT worker flags me on, butI punch it, I floor it and I
could see him swearing at me inthe in the background Like he
doesn't know what's going on inmy van.
So I get up to the hospital, Iget him, I get up to the parking
deck, I get him out and he'sreally floppy, like to the point
.
I notice it and I'm just like,ooh, something's really not
right.
I get up into the ER and, likea lot of ERs, you've got a line
(30:43):
you've got to go through, and soI skipped the line to go to the
front desk and the securityguard comes over to me as if to
yell at me like you need to getin line.
And when he walks over to me Igo I don't think he's breathing,
I need help now.
And he immediately changes histone.
He snaps his fingers at thenurse at the front desk and I've
(31:08):
been in this hospital a hundredtimes and this is the first
time I have ever at a full runran into the ER back to a trauma
room as fast as we could getthere.
So we get them in the traumaroom.
I've been in a hospital enoughto know what kind of the almost
procedure is.
So I immediately unstrap himfrom his wheelchair, I take him
out, I put him on the tablethat's there, and I back out of
(31:29):
the way in hopes that they'lllet me stay in there because one
he's nonverbal and he can'ttalk to him and I know what's
going on to tell the doctorswhat's going on.
And so it just so happens thatthere's another trauma room with
a door to the side that's openand they're just like just stand
, you can stay, just stand rightthere, fine, no problem.
(31:50):
They immediately cut off all ofhis clothing and they
immediately start chestcompressions on them right there
.
And the one thing that caughtmy attention is no more than he
got put on the table.
They took this drill and Ilater found out it was some kind
of port they would put in liketo immediately get like
medications in them and theylike drill it into his knee.
(32:10):
Just most normal people,without any pain medication,
would have come off a tablebecause it would have been just
intensely painful.
He never flinched.
And so I back off into this room.
Like 30 people out of nowherecome in there, they start chest
compressions, they immediatelyintubate him, which is putting
(32:32):
the tube down his throat.
And so I'm off in this roomwatching from the side and the
head ER doc comes over to me andgoes to the down to the minute,
to the best of yourrecollection.
How long has he been this way?
And I told her and she goes,okay, she goes over and barks
orders at him and then she comesback and she goes explain to me
the symptoms and reasons as towhy you brought him up here like
(32:54):
this.
And I told her everything andshe went back and barked orders
at him.
They started doing some things.
Now, mind you, this whole timethey're doing chest compressions
and CPR on them At this point.
It's about 10 continuous minutesat this point and so they
continue to do it and then theydecide they're going to get the
paddles out.
(33:14):
Now, in olden times they werethe big people where they put
the gel on, they rub themtogether and they go clear kind
of thing.
Well, now it's like pads theyput on you.
It almost looks like an Xboxsitting to the side and they
press a button.
So they put it on them and theyyell clear and they hit it and,
just like the medical drama, heliterally lifts off the table.
(33:36):
I see him just convulsedbecause it shocks you back to
life and so I see that.
But I'm watching the monitor onthe screen because I've watched
it so many times for breathingrate and oxygen rates and it
literally goes boop and goesright back to what it's doing.
And even though at that pointwe were about 15 minutes in and
(33:57):
they work for 30 more minutesafter that, I looked at that and
instinctually in my head I wenthe's not coming back.
I just I knew and the emotion ofit didn't hit me in the moment
just because I was so focused onwatching what they were doing
and just listening to theverbiage of what they were
(34:17):
saying, just so if I needed torecall it later I could remember
it kind of thing.
And so they, throughout thiswhole process, they shock him
probably four or five times.
And right after the fourth timethe head ER doc comes over to
me and goes we could shock himagain.
But she said I think theresult's going to be the same.
(34:38):
Would you like us to shock himagain?
And I said well, I know a lotabout his medical issues, but
this is out of my wheelhouse.
If you think it'sprofessionally necessary, go for
it.
And so they do.
And nothing happens.
And she immediately pronouncesthem, right then and there.
And so, as you can imagine, Iturn and I go and have a moment
(34:58):
in the room I'm in and I regaincomposure and in my head I'm
just like at this moment I'vejust got to compartmentalize
this, because so I then my wifewas working at home for a major
company remotely, and I calledher and I to this day we'll
never forget the sound she madewhen she thought we were going
(35:21):
up there for just a generalillness and I had to tell son
was dead on a table, and then Ithen had to.
I called my mother, who watchedthem for years, and said the
same thing.
I'll never forget the responseshe made.
Now she later, my mother later,came back and told me she goes.
The one thing that struck me inthat moment was you were eerily
(35:42):
calm, like almost stoicallycalm, and you had just lost your
son.
And I said well, I had to be inthat moment because one I had
to remain strong, if you will,because I had to tell Jennifer,
I had to tell you, I had to talkto all the care team people, I
had to figure out what was goingon, what the next steps were,
(36:03):
and so in like action, mode,going on what the next steps
were, and I so you were in likeaction mode?
Speaker 2 (36:06):
Yeah, I was Like I have to just I have to keep my
head down and do the things thatI know I need to get done
before anything can come out.
Speaker 3 (36:14):
Yep.
And so I'm sitting there, Iregained my composure, the care
team that she offers hercondolences and I look right at
her and I go this is going tosound cold and callous and I
don't mean it to be, but I haveto be this way in this moment.
And I pointed my son, I said Iwill deal with this in a minute.
I need to know answers toseveral questions.
(36:37):
And she goes okay, what areyour questions?
And I rapid fire off about 10questions, like she literally
takes a step back.
I go what happens from here?
How long will he be in thisroom?
When will he go to the morgue?
When will the coroner see him?
Will you do an autopsy?
(36:57):
If you do do an autopsy, what'sthe turnaround time?
If you don't do an autopsy,what's the protocol for doing
one and for not doing one?
Who do I need to contact for,like for a funeral home so I can
get them home, kind of thing?
And I just rapid fire all theand again she like literally
takes a step back and she goeswell, the first thing we're
going to do is I'm going to talkto the coroner.
(37:18):
I'm going to see what hisdecision is on, if he's going to
do an autopsy or not.
Okay, fine.
So she comes back and she goes.
The coroner's decided he's notgoing to do an autopsy.
And I didn't mean to come offas rude, but I literally went
why?
Why is he not going to do anautopsy?
And I said because I want toknow the protocol as to why you
decide you would or would not doan autopsy.
(37:38):
And so she goes.
Well, in a children's hospital,she said there's typically
three or four reasons why wewould.
If your son or daughter wasperfectly healthy, they came in
here for something like this anddied, they would do an autopsy
to figure out what it was, ifit's criminally related, if it's
drug related or if it's abuserelated.
(37:59):
Those would be the four reasons.
She said but because your sonhas an extensive history in this
hospital for all of his medicalissues, he's just going to
attribute it to one of hismedically related issues.
And I said OK, that's fine.
And so the team that was therewas great.
(38:19):
She was just like we don't needthis room anytime soon, spend
as much time as you want.
I said well, his mother'scoming up.
Her parents are driving her up.
She said fine, you can be.
She said it can't necessarilybe all day, but you can.
If you need a couple of hours,you can be in here, fine.
And so I do that and my wifecomes up and we spend probably
(38:39):
about another hour there.
And, like I tell people outsideof watching my son take his last
breath and watching him die, Isaid one of the hardest moments
I had was after we decided wewere going to go home.
I had to get all of his cut offclothing, put it in his empty
wheelchair and walk that emptywheelchair through the hospital
(39:00):
to the parking deck, put it inthe van and drive 65 miles home
in dead silence.
I said that was the hardestdrive my wife and I ever had to
make.
And then, at that point, mydaughter, with her delays.
She didn't necessarily like shedidn't know, she was at school
(39:24):
and so when she came home shehad no idea, like all she knew
was when I took my son to thehospital, I left with him, I
came home with him, and so nowshe's home and she's looking at
me like where's zachary?
And I did it in the mostsimplistic terms I could, for
even though I don't think sheunderstood, and I told her what
happened.
(39:44):
And, yes, my daughter did grievein her own way.
Was it like crying or anything?
Not necessarily, but you couldtell behavior wise like the
absence and the loss wasaffecting her.
So for the longest time I feltlike she was angry with me, and
rightfully so.
I took him to the hospital butI didn't bring him home and I
(40:08):
constantly told her I said, girl, if daddy could have brought
him home, daddy would havebrought him home.
So we dealt with that and wedid the whole funeral process.
And it's true what they say youdeal with the worst possible
moment in your life and now youhave to make a thousand
decisions.
So I will say I have a weirdsense of humor when it comes to
(40:31):
stress and all that.
So we go into the funeral homethe first day.
We get information.
The second day we come back andwe make decisions.
We decide we're going to havethem cremated because it wasn't
cheap.
But the cheaper of the twooptions?
And so we.
So we said we're going to havehim cremated.
And the funeral director comesover to us and he goes.
I'm required by federal law andI went stop.
(40:53):
I said what does the USgovernment want to know anything
about my son's cremation?
And he goes right back into aspill.
He goes I'm required by federallaw to tell you that the state
in which your loved one entersthe crematorium is not the exact
same state that your loved onewill leave the crematorium.
And I looked at him and Istopped for a second and I lit
(41:17):
in front of him my in-laws andmy wife.
I went who in the F thinks thatyou can start the process of
cremation and then come back tothe original state?
I said do they not understand?
It's very hot fire and hedoesn't say anything to me, but
he gives me this look of youwould be amazed as to the
(41:38):
responses.
And I went.
I literally looked at when I amdumbfounded that someone would
think that.
And not only was, it was adouble-sided sheet and we
literally had to initial ineight places saying that we
understood fully what thecremation process was.
And I went I am dumbfounded.
(41:59):
So that was leading up actuallyof, and then afterwards, and
then we started that beginningphase of, like everybody said,
this is our new life is how thatwent wow, for those just
listening, I lost my and notwatching the video.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
I lost it a bit, um, because I couldn't imagine and
and oh my gosh, my heart, beforewe started recording I said my
condolences because just readingyour intro, but I couldn't
imagine.
And how do you then go fromthere?
(42:41):
How do you make that your newnormal?
Speaker 3 (42:45):
Well, in the beginning, many of us in the
grief community, you almostdon't.
You resist it, you fight it.
The traditional male responseis anger.
You suppress it, you keepyourself busy is honestly what a
lot of us do Now.
Even between my wife and I, wegrieve completely differently.
(43:08):
She's a little more quiet andunto herself and she has her
moments, whereas I'm open.
There were many times rightafterwards, sitting on the couch
as I was on my laptop, I justit just hit me like a Mack truck
and I just lost it just rightin front of everybody.
Now am I out that?
Am I that way in public?
No, am I that way at home?
(43:29):
More so at home than I am outin public.
So, at least in the beginning,it's just like the stages of
grief.
You really get into that wholedenial that I can't believe this
is real, I can't believethey're gone, I can't believe
just grasping mortality,grasping the fact that the time
is really finite and that youonly have a certain amount of it
(43:53):
and nobody knows how much timeyou have of it.
And so that's the beginningstages of what you mentally deal
with.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
Yeah, I've seen mortality in my doorstep a
number of times.
I've had cancer four times.
I woke up from a surgery andthe doctor had to take a deep
breath of like a sigh of relief.
So I know, that from a personalperspective, but it's just so
(44:32):
hard to even think there's solittle and I am trying to
compose myself in this moment.
Speaker 3 (44:37):
It is moment, it is the weird, like in the beginning
, outside of just the generalsadness from loss, like the day
that we can't.
The day that it happened wecame home and I walked into his
room here and had to put hiswheelchair in which, if you see
by the name in the background,that's where I put his
wheelchair that day.
It has not moved since yeah andso I walked in here and it just
(44:57):
like it hit me like a Mack truckat that moment and I like,
through the funeral home theygive you a fill in the blank
kind of thing so they can do theobituary, and like I had a
really hard time with that CauseI'm just like one.
How do I write an obituary fora child that's lived 15 years,
which I don't think it's been?
(45:18):
I've lived 47 years now and Idon't think that's a full life
at this point.
How can I write one for 15years and then like the other
things, is it's amazing?
My son lived 15 years and it's15 years is brought to what?
Speaker 1 (45:34):
Six paragraphs is what an obituary is how do you
do that?
Speaker 3 (45:39):
So I had a really tough time with like some of
those things.
The procedural stuff is whatreally got to me because I was
the one doing them.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Yeah, yeah.
After my dad passed away it wasI felt like I had to pause my
grief and I had to cancel allthe credit cards, change the
bills into my mom's name, likeall of the things that, like we
don't think about that have tobe done and go and do the whole.
(46:13):
One is going to be thecelebration of life.
One is like, what are we doing?
I remember having to just like,all right, no crying right now,
I just like no feeling rightnow.
I just need to do and that ishard for someone to do for a
(46:34):
parent or a loved one I just Ican't, I couldn't imagine having
to do that for my child, any ofmy children, and so I I commend
you for your strength and forbeing able to get through that
that.
What a blessing it is.
(46:54):
I know it sounds weird, butwhat a blessing to be able to
say, all right, hold all thethings and here we go, this is
what we need to do.
So how do you help others now?
Because you did create a blog.
Letters to Zachary, correct?
Speaker 3 (47:12):
Correct and how has that helped you and how do you
help others?
Well, I'm a researcher and, like, when things happen, I'll get
on social media and, as we allknow, you can find a group for
anything on Facebook.
So after my son had passed, Ijust started searching grief
(47:34):
groups and I actually found asmall one that was actually the
loss of a special needs child,which I was actually surprised
that I found it, and so I gotinto that group and I got to
know the administrator of it.
In fact, I'm now anadministrator with her on the
group of that small group and soI got to know her really well
(47:54):
and after posting in there oneday I said I've started
journaling per my counselor andI said I'd like to share it.
Do you mind if I share it?
And she goes sure, I'd love foryou to share it.
She said we don't typically geta whole lot of men sharing
things like this, which, forthose of you that don't know
most of these groups, especiallygroup groups, it's like 95%
(48:16):
women, there may be 5% men andof that 5% you might have half a
percent.
that actually is there on aregular basis that actually
converses with people.
So I get in there and I post myfirst letter and I preface it
with I've written these.
In the moment I do notsugarcoat, I'm unfiltered.
(48:37):
It's raw If you can't take, youknow, raw, sometimes vulgar,
filled emotion, because I wrotethese right when I was having a
moment Scroll on I said becauseI'm just, I'm not going to
sugarcoat it, people need to seethe good, the bad and the ugly
(48:57):
of grief to get a real pictureof it.
And so I posted it and no morethan I posted.
I got a huge response in thisgroup and I've never been one to
toot my own horn, so to speak,but like I had a woman come
comment say I've never toldanybody my deepest feelings as
it relates to grief, and thisletter right here has said
(49:18):
exactly how I feel to the letter.
And I said, well, I appreciateit.
I said this has been inspiredby my son and I said I'm glad
I've written something that willresonate with you Outside of
the fact of to this day I'vestill gotten.
People have always said youhave just the greatest analogies
.
You can make complex thingssimple based on the analogies
(49:43):
that you write with them.
And I said, well, I doappreciate it.
I said, if only my firstprincipal could see my writing
now, because she used to hate,she hated my correspondence,
absolutely hated it with apassion.
So I did that several moretimes and got the same response.
I got several more responsesjust like that, and so I had
(50:05):
people say, well, have you everthought about doing a book?
Well, at the time I didn't haveenough material, so it's just
like I don't know if my braincan handle that right now.
Have you ever thought aboutdoing a podcast?
I definitely know my braincan't handle that right now.
And so several options came upand someone said, well, have you
ever thought about doing like aFacebook page?
(50:26):
You can list yourself as ablogger.
And she said, well, at leastyou could copy and paste what
you're doing.
I said, well, I could do that.
And, as a side note, I createdthe page honestly, out of spite,
because I could never find anymen in any of these groups.
Now, it wasn't going to beexactly like mine, but I at
least want someone in theballpark and I could never find
(50:47):
any men that would share, maybeto the point I was willing to
share.
So I made this page initiallycatered to just men.
So I create this page and,typically, like the normal way
you start one, we had 10 or 20followers, that kind of thing.
And so one day I got a wild hairand I thought, well, I'm going
(51:09):
to start emailing some of thewhat I would consider the big
names in grief and just ask themhey, my name is so-and-so, I'm
starting this page.
Can you give me some pointerson things that work for you,
things that didn't work for youbased on the direction I want to
go?
And all of them were phenomenal.
What do you need help with?
(51:41):
And so I got a lot of reallybig names in the grief community
that said sure, if you're goingto do this, you may want to do
a, b and c.
If you don't want to do thisand you go this way, you might
want to do these three thingsand which I used a lot of those
and like my page now iscompletely different than what
it was in the beginning yeah soI started doing that, posting my
letters and all that stuff.
I started doing all of that andafter about the first month I
(52:05):
started getting a lot offollowers, like it was.
It was getting to be like 70and 80 followers a month.
It was starting to blow up onme and typically I get a couple
hundred and then it wouldplateau and get a couple hundred
, plateau.
That's how it's been the wholetime.
And when I was getting thatresponse in my brain I was going
(52:26):
well, maybe I have somethinghere.
And I was just like I don'tknow how I'm going to do it, but
I need to keep building on it,to continue just getting the
following.
And like my wife said, why areyou so obsessed about at least
getting to a thousand followers?
I said because at least when Iget to a thousand followers, the
probability that they willshare it to.
(52:47):
If one person from all of thosethousand followers shares it to
one person of all thosethousands of followers, think of
the exponential growth thatwill happen.
And then I said then, like, ifI try to get media to jump in on
it, to like, share it in themedia until you hit about a
thousand followers, a lot ofthem will be just like you're
(53:08):
not quite big enough, like I hada local news reporter I
contacted and that was basicallyher comment Cause I'd caught.
I had about 600 followers atthat point and she didn't come
out and say it, but that was herresponse was maybe we'll come
back later, as if I could do astory, but you may be gone
(53:28):
tomorrow.
So as of today, I'm at 1,015followers.
I have representation in 46 ofthe 50 US states and I'm in 18
countries as the representation.
I have original content in theform of letters, poetry or prose
(53:50):
, like I quote, tweet a lot ofgrief stuff and give commentary
on it from my perspective.
I have video form.
I have memes.
You name it.
If I can think of a media formto do, that's what I put.
Video form I have memes.
You name it If I can think of amedia form to do.
(54:11):
That's what I put on there.
So again.
But it started off for men tosay, hey, this is a safe space
for you to comment, to feelvulnerable.
I'm not going to judge you.
In fact, the rules I've listedin there I've point blank said
if you're coming in here bashinganybody, male or female, on how
they're feeling, you willimmediately get removed.
Yeah, this is not the place forthat, so it started for that.
However, I did have several bignames say it's great that
(54:33):
you're doing for men, but ifyou're trying to get a massive
audience cause, there's somepages on Facebook that have
10,000 followers, 20,000, 50,000.
If you're trying to get tothose numbers, you're going to
have to open it up.
So I did so.
Even though it's initially formen, I have since opened it up
for anybody grievingspecifically women and at least
(54:55):
from the woman's perspective,the response I give them is from
the woman's perspective.
The response I give them is I'mhere to give you a perspective
into the male mind into how wegrieve, what's expected, how we
do it, and then, like I'm here,like I've had several women come
up to me and say we lost ourchild X number of months ago or
(55:17):
a year ago.
He's not opening up.
What do I need to do?
And I'll go.
Well, I don't know if these are100% work, but here's some
pointers I think that shouldhelp.
And so, like I actually came upwith, what did I call it?
It was the 10 commandments ofmale grief is what I came up
with?
Just different things to say towomen.
(55:37):
Here's what we deal with,here's how we deal with it,
here's how I feel like you canhelp, and so that's how the
pages evolved.
Speaker 2 (55:47):
That's amazing.
I have a friend of mine thatthey lost their child.
He was, I want to say, likemonths old and obviously we as
women we grieve very differentlythan men and her husband was
(56:08):
internalizing it all and endedup, I think earlier this year,
going to like and it was calleda rehab but it wasn't for
substance abuse, it was like foremotions and like, and
thankfully is doing so muchbetter.
But that was one of the thingsthat I mentioned to her.
I was like, how has he evenprocessed, like, the grief of
(56:31):
losing a child?
Like I know how you'veprocessed it and how, and you're
very open and vocal and you goto different counselors and all
of that, but what is he doing?
That's probably where thedisconnect is, um, between you
two, because there's such adifference in, like, the way
(56:53):
you're processing, in the waythat he's processing, that
there's no communication inbetween.
And yeah, she said that afterthat, he it was.
It's been like night and day interms of their relationship and
it's I it's such a difficultemotion to deal with in general
because it's like sometimes youwant to laugh, sometimes you
(57:14):
want to cry and sometimes youwant to just remember the happy
memories and sometimes, like weall grieve so differently.
I have three kids that have lostmy ex-boyfriend, which was
their stepdad for six years.
He passed away and that wasdifficult and each of them
grieved so differently andthere's no manual on how to deal
(57:37):
with.
Well, number one tell kids thata loved one has passed.
And number two, how to helpthem process it.
And I've experienced that withwhen he passed and when my dad
passed.
That was like their secondfather and it was the same.
Like they all processdifferently and they all, like,
(57:59):
still grieve it so differently.
And so it's just, it's sodifferent for everyone and it's
not a linear.
There's an illustration outthere that, oh, these are the
grief stages or whatever, andthen it's like this, all these
squiggly lines, that isperfectly what it illustrates,
because there's no like setsteps to grieving, you just
(58:25):
allow the.
It's like all the things, allof the things, and it could be
different things.
Sometimes you want to rememberthe good times and sometimes
you're like, oh, it's so pissedbecause, like, why did you leave
so quickly?
Yeah, that is amazing.
I will put all of theinformation on the show notes
(58:45):
for Letters to Zachary so thatwe hopefully increase your
following as well.
I think it's very needed.
What limiting beliefs orroadblocks did you have to
overcome in order to get towhere you are today?
Blocks, did you?
Speaker 3 (59:00):
have to overcome in order to get to where you are
today.
Well, one thing I tried tostress to the female population,
if you will there are a lot ofsocietal things that we have to
overcome just as a gender, and Ireally try to point out I'm not
saying it's better or worsethan the other side, but like
(59:20):
I'm old enough of a generationwhere I was part of the tape it
up and walk it off, rub somedirt on it generation.
Are you hurt or are you injured?
And yes, there's a difference.
I'm old enough to be a part ofthat generation, and so I was
always taught men are thefoundation, we're strong, we're
(59:41):
protectors, we're problemsolvers, that kind of thing.
That's the thing that we do.
Sure, you can get emotional, butit's a limited time that you
can be emotional and then youjust got to suck it up and walk
it off.
That's just how it was.
And so when you're programmedwith that all your life and all
of a sudden this moment comes in.
(01:00:02):
I tell people all the time Isaid when you hit some of these
stressful moments, you go backto what you know, when you don't
have an answer, and that's whata lot of us men know, we know.
Well, I got to compartmentalizethis I'll have a moment later,
if I ever get to it and so I tryto tell women that y'all have
(01:00:25):
to help create an environmentwhere it's trusting and safe and
I hate to use the word safespace, I know that's a key
phrase these days.
Speaker 2 (01:00:36):
Yeah, where they feel comfortable.
Yeah, where they feelcomfortable, where you feel
comfortable.
Speaker 3 (01:00:47):
And the two other short things I'll say is men
have been taught from birth thatthe woman's emotion comes first
period.
It's just.
That's just what we've beentaught, and 99% of us don't mind
that.
I'm not saying there's aproblem with that, but it has
been instilled in us.
Of the two people that aregoing to get emotional, it's
going to be the woman.
She has first dibs, firstrights to it.
Okay, fine, that's great andwonderful.
But we're programmed to say,hey, you do this and I'll do
(01:01:12):
everything else.
While you're emotional, there'snothing in there, at least in
the beginning, to say, hey, youcan have time to deal with
whatever you're dealing with.
And so we have to overcome thathurdle.
That we've been taught at leastI was taught all my life.
And then the last thing I wouldtell women is a lot of men, the
reason why they don't open upbecause at some point they have
(01:01:35):
told someone that they cared forit has been remembered at a
later date and has been thrownback in their face specifically
in an argument or something tohurt them.
And I always use this examplejokingly, as a stereotype, if
you will.
I said, as men you always hear,well, women will remember the
(01:01:55):
most finite detail, like Iremember, in January 23rd of
2021 at 4.30 PM, that you saidthis to me at this moment, and
it may not so much be the casethese days, I don't know.
That's what I always grew upknowing, and so those are the
(01:02:16):
three big things that men arejust battling just to get to the
point of opening up, and sothat right, there is an uphill
battle, not including the otherthings that men have to deal
with yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 2 (01:02:29):
What daily habits or rituals do you say helped you
reach to where you are now?
Speaker 3 (01:02:35):
the journaling.
Honestly, the irony of it allis, when my counselor suggested
it, my response was I don't knowif that's my thing, I don't
know how great of a writer I am.
Just because it helped me getit off my chest, because I'm one
of those ones that would justsit on me.
My mind would play it around athousand times, and so at least
in the beginning I could write aWord document or print it out,
(01:02:58):
and I could either save it for alater date or if, if need be, I
could just throw it in the fireand burn it just to get it out.
That that was probably thebiggest thing yeah, that's
amazing and I agree.
Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
I just came to the conclusion with my therapist,
like last time I saw her thatbecause I I believe journaling,
I think that it is amazing.
And when you said, throw it upin the fire, that's where I need
.
Because when I was younger, mymom found my journal and read
(01:03:32):
through it.
I felt like that was an unsafeplace for me and so I haven't
gone back to journaling and Iwas so.
That helped me so much beforewhen I was in my teenage years,
and I even tell my kids that nowjournal, even if you have to
burn it, I'll help you burn itafterwards, like I'm not, I
won't have to read it, just getit out.
(01:03:54):
And as you said that I'm like,yeah, because it feels there's
something that feels safe aboutI can get it all out and then
get rid of it, so no one everhas to see that or whatever.
So, yeah, I definitely secondthat.
Anything else that you want totell our listeners today.
Speaker 3 (01:04:17):
To men specifically our listeners today, to men
specifically, it's ironic to methat a gender that does not like
being told what to do at allfalls into this category.
When it comes to emotions,whether it's grief or anything
else where they fall into, whereeverybody and their brother's
telling them what to do on howto express themselves, and I go
(01:04:39):
for a gender that doesn't likebeing told what to do on how to
express themselves, and I go fora gender that doesn't like
being told what to do, thatwants to have control of things.
You are certainly bending overbackwards to let them control
how you express yourself.
Why are you concerned aboutwhat anybody else thinks,
especially online?
I would tell them do you knowhow many ignorant opinions there
(01:05:01):
are online?
Why are you concerned aboutthem?
They're behind a keyboard.
How are they going to changeyour life in any form or fashion
just because they typesomething?
In yeah absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
I love that.
Well, thank you so much, jason.
I so appreciate it, and myheart is seriously completely
with you and your family,because it doesn't matter how
many years have passed, but Idon't think it ever becomes
easier.
We just learn how to live withit, and so I'm sending you guys
(01:05:37):
all so much love.
I hope you listeners got somuch out of today and send this
to somebody that you feel needsit.
Whatever type of journey griefjourney they're on, it is so
important, it is so, soimportant, and I will put again
all of Jason's information inthe show notes.
(01:05:57):
So please go follow, share it.
I think that it's somethingthat we as society need, but I
really truly feel like men needthis in their lives, because it
is so tough to give that spacefor the men to be sensitive and
be in their feelings.
Sensitive and be in theirfeelings.
(01:06:17):
But I definitely, I know it'sneeded, so please share.
Thank you, listeners so much.
I hope you have an amazing restof your day.
Peace out, love your life.
Bye.
Welcome back to the Against All Odds the Less Than
1% Chance Podcast with your host, Maria Aponte, where we will
hear stories of incrediblepeople thriving against all odds
, and my hope is that we can allsee how life is always
happening for us, even when weare the less than 1% chance.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Hey, hey, welcome back to Against All Odds, the
Less Than 1% Chance podcast withyour host, Maria Aponte.
I am so, so happy to have youback listening to this episode
because just you wait.
I was just reading theintroduction and my heart was
like, oh my gosh, this is goingto be so good because somebody
(00:41):
that is so in touch with theirfeelings and speaking up about
their feelings I feel like weall need a little bit of that in
our lives because we need tolearn how to be able to process
our own feelings and learn howto deal with those things.
So let me introduce you toJason Tuttle.
He is a parent of two kids withmultiple mental and physical
(01:03):
disabilities, some rare.
He is a stay at home dad for 12years until his son suddenly
and unexpectedly passed away,with issues related to his needs
, on January 28, 2022.
Since his son passed, hecreated a Facebook blog, Letters
to Zachary and a community thathelps deal with grief, and he
(01:25):
details it very raw andunfiltered and open to this.
Not okay to show feelings andit's not what they grow up with.
(01:50):
I know that for a long time, myson was told that he couldn't
cry from his other side of thefamily and I was like what?
You can cry all you want,You're open to crying and
feeling and having emotions.
I'm so so incredibly grateful,Jason.
Welcome to Against All Oddspodcast.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Well, thank you for having me.
It's a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Yeah, absolutely so.
Give us a little bit ofbackground.
I want to hear your story aboutyour kids and then what kind of
transpired from there.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Okay, I am a married father of two kids, been married
.
I think it's 21 years this year.
My wife's a couple of yearsolder than me.
We got married when I was 26.
And so she's your typical NewEngland family.
She grew up in kind of theMassachusetts, Connecticut,
Rhode Island area.
She was a cradle Catholic, Hermother's one of eight, Her
(02:47):
father's one of seven.
And I say all this becauseright after we got married we
waited about a year and hercomment to me was I want to have
four kids.
And I said let's have the firstone and then we'll talk.
And even me, growing up, I'vebeen in the South most of my
life, although I wasn't born inthe South, so I consider myself
(03:08):
Southern.
And so even I at the time wasjust like.
I figured we'd probably havetwo or three.
Kind of the traditional kind offamily dynamic is where I was
thinking.
But when she said that, I wasjust like let's have the first
one, let's see what happens.
Because at that point in time wedidn't think like twins or
(03:31):
multiples, ran in either side ofthe family and, lord, if we'd,
she'd have given birth and we'dhad twins or triplets, it had
been done at that point.
So at about a year in, wedecided that we wanted to have a
child.
She got pregnant rather quickly, to our surprise, and we went
through just the motions in thebeginning and it was ironically
(03:53):
it was her hairdresser that shewent to go get her hair done.
She hadn't told anybody, wehadn't taken a test, and it was
her hairdresser that went youlook green, are you pregnant?
And she went and took a testand sure enough, she was
pregnant.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Oh my gosh, that is awesome.
Hairdressers are pretty amazing.
They know us better than weknow us sometimes.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
So she calls me and tells me the information and I'm
excited and she I'll neverforget it she goes well, what if
we have a child that's got likemedical needs?
And my response was well, whatif we have a child that's got
like medical needs?
And my response was well, if wehave one with medical needs and
we're just going to have onewith medical needs?
I'm not I've never been a bigproponent of kind of the
alternate, alternative birthcontrol methods that are out
(04:38):
there that people might use inthat instance.
So she went through a pregnancy.
We got to that like week 20appointment, which all women
know is where you find out thesex of the child.
so she didn't want to knowbecause that was one of life's
last great surprises yeah Iwanted to know because I'm a
(05:00):
planner, I was painting thenursery and I really just didn't
want to paint in browns andyellows and greens and that kind
of thing.
So we got to the ultrasoundappointment and we playfully
went back and forth about whatwe wanted to do and the tech
said well, I'm getting to thepoint that I'm going to find out
the sex of the child.
Do you want to know?
(05:20):
And so we playfully go back andforth and in hindsight the tech
probably shouldn't have said itthe way she did, but she did.
She goes well, I found an issueand I need to know the sex of
the child.
And so we go okay, we want toknow you're having a boy?
Great, what's the issue?
She said well, I can't reallytell you the issue.
She said that's a kind of adoctor thing.
(05:42):
But I said well, why did youneed to know the sex of the
child?
And she goes well, if it's whatI think it is, it's rare in
boys and even rarer in girls.
So I needed to know the sex ofthe child, and so we said okay,
well, from that point forward westarted seeing a perinatologist
, which, if you don't know whata perinatologist is, it's
basically a high risk pregnancy.
(06:04):
Obgyn is what that doctor does.
They look at all the specificthings that could possibly
happen when there's a concernfor other issues.
So we started seeing thatdoctor every week up until my
wife's C-section, and what welearned in that process is you
run across two doctors.
You either run across a doctorthat doesn't want to tell you
(06:25):
anything for fear they're goingto get sued if they're wrong, or
you run across a doctor thatwants to tell you everything
under the sun so that they cancover themselves, so that you
don't sue them.
And I told the doctor.
I said, buddy, we don't knoweverything about medical science
.
If you say something and itdoesn't happen, or even if it
(06:46):
does happen, I'm not going tosue you.
So they told us a lot of reallymajor things of like this is our
first child, we've only beenmarried a year and we're here
and well, your son may only beborn with one kidney.
That one kidney looks like itmay sustain damage in utero,
which that did happen.
Your son may have areas ofmissing white matter in his
(07:09):
brain that did happen.
Your son may have hydrocephalus, which is water on the brain,
which is not a good thing, andhe may need a shunt to help
drain it.
Luckily that did not happen.
So they told us some prettymajor things that was going on.
That was just shocking usbecause up to the week 20 point,
(07:29):
we had no reason to believethere were any issues on either
side of the family forgenerations.
Nothing that wasn'tself-induced, if you will.
And so we get to the point wheremy wife's going into labor, and
so we take her to the hospital.
She gets induced for herC-section, like the typical
(07:51):
scenario for a C-section.
She has the child, they wrapour son up, they bring him over
to us, we see him for about 30seconds and then, for us, they
whisk him off to the NICU atthat hospital.
And then my wife had to go torecovery because the epidural
kind of made her not feel wellafter, which is pretty common.
And so I then went up to theNICU there and the doctor comes
(08:14):
up to me and goes well, your sonwas born with a rare condition
called Eagle Barrett syndrome.
And I went what, what is that?
And he said, well, what, whatis that?
And he said well, what's goingto happen is we'll have your son
overnight and then he's goingto get transported to the
children's hospital on the Northside of Atlanta, Cause I'm on
the Southwest side at this pointof Atlanta.
(08:37):
And so I said okay, and I said,well, will they take my son to
see my wife?
Cause she really didn't see him, and I said I'm not going to
let my son leave this hospital,for my wife actually has a
chance to see him.
And so he said yeah, thatshould be fine and the
children's hospital was great.
But to backtrack a little bit,eagle Barrett syndrome is a rare
(08:59):
condition.
It's one in 40,000 births.
They don't know the officialcause of it.
They know it's related tokidney issues, which my son was
only born with one kidney.
That one kidney did sustaindamage because your kidney is
basically a filter and what washappening was his kidney wasn't
(09:19):
filtering right, so fluid wasbacking up into the kidney is
what was happening.
So on the ultrasound,millimeters may not sound like a
lot, but when you see a blackspot that looks about that big
on a ultrasound thing and youmay think, well, 10 centimeters,
10 millimeters, isn't that big,but it's massive.
(09:40):
So the Eagle Barrett syndromeis related to kidney issues.
On top of that, thecharacteristics of the condition
are a child has an abnormallylarge bladder that has to be
given a catheter, which I had todo every four hours for about
the first five years of his life, because they don't get the
(10:01):
necessarily the sensation tohave to go.
And so I would have toconstantly feel his bladder area
to make sure it wasn't gettinglike rock hard, tight, like he
was getting too full On top ofthat if I didn't drain it.
The reason why people geturinary tract infections because
the sediment in the liquidthere just sits there and that's
what causes the infection.
(10:22):
Yeah.
So I would have to give him acatheter for that.
The main characteristic of itis prune belly.
Well, it's Eagle Barrettsyndrome, but it's
affectionately known as prunebelly.
The main characteristic of thecondition was he was born
without any core abdominalmuscle.
He had none in his midsection.
(10:45):
Like I could lay him on thefloor and the only thing
protecting his organs was theskin and the fascia that held
the skin together.
Like I could put him on thefloor and I could literally,
from his outside, touch hislarge intestine, touch his lower
intestine, touch all the organsthat are right there.
And so he was.
He did have to wear aprotective covering for a while,
(11:08):
although later on down the roadwe did have a major kind of
reconstruction surgery thatreally helped out.
So he had no, no core abdominalmuscle.
He had normal lungs.
However, he had a diminishedlung capacity.
What I mean by that is likewhen you and I get like a
bronchitis or pneumonia, whenyou have the core abdominal
(11:31):
muscles, you've got that likefoundation that your system
presses on to give you kind ofsome force to push it out.
Well, he didn't have that.
So what we later found out wasif I didn't catch a respiratory
related illness fast enough.
Ultimately, I was taking him upto the hospital, we were going
to the ER, he was gettingadmitted and we were staying
(11:52):
seven to 12 days.
Every time that happened andthat happened probably every six
months for the first five yearsof his life is what happened.
So when we found out about allthat, we started seeing a
pulmonologist, and so at thatpoint, the protocol that I had
in my head was the moment Iheard that cough, that I knew
(12:14):
that he had, I put a Hill-Romvest machine around his
midsection which basically blowsin and out.
It beats on your chest toloosen things up.
Then I take an encephalator,which is basically an oxygen
mask that goes over your mouthand your nose.
It blows air in quickly andimmediately sucks it out.
So what it does is it gets itfrom your lungs and sucks it up
(12:36):
into your esophagus.
I then take a suction machinewith a tube in there and stick
it literally down his throat andsuction it out, and then after
that everybody knows what anebulizer is I give him a
breathing treatment through anebulizer, and that's what I did
every four hours every time hegot sick, until we had the
(12:56):
reconstruction surgery and atthat point he got well.
I was more proactive at thatpoint and he got.
I got better at noticing it.
So he his hospital stays atthat point drastically dropped,
but for at least that first fiveor six years that's what I did.
So all of those things is justthe Eagle Barrett syndrome.
(13:17):
On top of that, he was bornwith neurological delays.
What that meant was, eventhough when he passed away he
was 15 years old, he functionedat about four to six years old
his entire life.
On top of that he was nonverbal, he was epileptic.
So of the six different kindsof seizures he had two different
(13:40):
kinds of them.
He could walk with assistance,like me holding me holding him
but by himself he could not walk.
So he was essentiallywheelchair bound.
However, when I'd put him onthe floor he could army, crawl
fast as anything anywhere hewanted to go.
So mobility wasn't the biggestissue.
But like walking, yeah, he hadto have a wheelchair.
(14:01):
So the Eagle Barrett syndromeis completely separate from all
the other issues I just listed,and that does not even include
all the issues my daughter hadtwo years later.
Oh my gosh.
So that's the first up until mydaughter was born and we found
out about her issues.
(14:21):
That was probably theintroduction to the first three
years of marriage, the firstthree years of my kids the
special needs life, the hospitallife.
So that's what we did about thefirst three years, just
learning the ins and outs ofeverything.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Wow.
So I have to say thatcongratulations to a 21 year
marriage.
Thank you that congratulationsto a 21 year marriage.
Thank you, because that is alot of stress to put on a new
newlywed couple.
And and congratulations to youfor stepping up and and being
like no, I have to learn how tofigure this out and that that is
(15:00):
rare.
I was a single mom for manyyears and it's so it.
I found it so hard sometimes tolike pull, like I would always
explain everything to dad, butit was so difficult to for him
to step up and be like All right, well, she's having a.
(15:22):
My oldest was diagnosed with amental health disorder, like at
12 years old, and when she wouldhave her like big outburst, I
would call and he would be likeOkay, call me, call, let her
have her call me when she'scalmed down and you're like at
that point I think I got it,thanks, yeah.
So I commend you for being afather that stepped up to that
(15:47):
as well.
Again, coming just from a momthat kind of had to deal with
all of it herself, that is sucha blessing and, yeah, thank you
for well and we had talkedinitially in our marriage, I was
always the one that was goingto stay at home.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
I've been told all my life about how well I work with
kids, and a lot of it justcomes with the old adage kids
and animals can sense fear, yeah, and so the calmer you are
around those two entities, theeasier it is to work with them.
Now, that's to say with littlechildren.
When it comes to teenagers,that's a whole different ball
(16:26):
game.
So it was always me that wasgoing to stay at home.
In fact, my degrees in element,well, it's in physical
education, but I taughtelementary physical education
for nine years.
So I was always I joke withpeople the reason why I got into
elementary PE was because thatwas probably how my mind
(16:47):
operated, that's how I thought.
And when everything happened, Ijust I was teaching in a school
in the middle of a year and itwas just to the point that I was
out.
I'd used up all my personaltime, I'd used up my paid time
off, all my leave, and I wasworking essentially for free.
(17:09):
And so I called my wife one dayfrom work and I said we talked
about this.
I said do you want to do thisand she said well, it's the old
adage If you wait till you'reprepared for it, you're never
going to be prepared for it.
So I literally called her on aWednesday.
That Friday I had myresignation on my teacher's, on
my principal's desk, and westarted from that point and I
(17:31):
there was 12 years of it fromthat point is how it went.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Wow.
And so your daughter was born.
You said three years later,three years later, two years,
almost to the day, oh, wow, okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
And then she you said she also has her conditions.
She does, she has, she haseverything her brother did
except for the rare condition.
So she had severe neurologicaldelays.
Even though she's 16, shefunctions about four to six
years old.
She's nonverbal, she'sepileptic, she's in a wheelchair
, she can walk assisted butshe's got to have the wheelchair
(18:11):
.
In fact, between my two kids,of the six different kinds of
seizures, I've seen four of themin my house.
Wow, I've seen almost all ofthem in my house.
So you can imagine we had ourson and then two years later we
have our daughter and then aboutsix months after that we had an
OT in our house that wasassessing my son and she had an
(18:35):
intern with her and the main OTgoes do you mind if I let my
intern do the Peabody skillsassessment test on your daughter
as practice?
And I said, sure, I know whatthat test runs.
It's like a $700 test.
I went.
If you want to practice forfree, have at it.
I would love for you to do it,and so she does, and she gets
(18:58):
done with it and she goes.
What's, in my professionalopinion, that your daughter's
delayed Now?
I will admit at that point Idid not have the best reaction
to her when she said that,because I just had so much going
on for lack of better ways tosay it.
I looked at her and I literallysaid pack up your ass and get
out of my house is what I just.
(19:19):
I did not want to hear it atthat point.
It was just, it was one ofthose, it was a sucker punch.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Yeah, it's like overwhelming.
You're already overwhelmed withall of the things that you're
doing with your son and you'relike this our daughter, it's
good, it's all good.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
And then it's like it was it it, it and she was
considered the normal child, ifyou will.
And our pediatrician actuallyhas a child with needs, and so
we took our daughter in and saideverything that happened, and
(19:54):
her comment was I tend to agreewith occupational therapists,
you may want to have her startseeing a neurologist.
And she said the thing you haveto understand is if you're
basing your daughter'sdevelopment on your son, she's
going to appear normal I saidbut in reality she's actually
delayed, and so that's where theball started rolling for her
(20:18):
got it.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Yeah, that's so obviously from what I'm
gathering.
The four kids did not happen.
It was two, correct?
Speaker 3 (20:27):
No.
And right after we had our son,when we decided we were going
to have another, you can imaginethe flack we got from both
sides of the family saying well,you've got a child with all
these needs, why would you haveanother?
And at that point, when wedecided we were going to have
another, I had researched enoughto find out that just about
everywhere said even though yourson had a rare condition and
(20:49):
had all these issues, there's noguarantee that your daughter is
going to have any of it.
Yeah, little did I know lateron down the road she was going
to have just about all of it.
Yeah.
But so we went ahead and decidedthat we were going to have her,
and that's just how it went.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
Yeah, you actually had the best training to be,
able to care for your daughterbecause you grew and understood
and saw so much with your son.
It's funny how we get thesetools in our toolbox, of like we
never imagined that this isgoing to be something that we
(21:27):
need ever again, and you being ateacher, that in itself like
you were working with children,you were so good with them and
then to take on then thisresponsibility of your child and
their special needs and all ofthat.
It's funny how life prepares usand I wholeheartedly believe in
the saying that life happens foryou and all of that.
It's funny how life prepares usand I wholeheartedly believe in
the saying that life happensfor you and not to you.
(21:49):
And we just have to look at theperspectives, find the
blessings in those moments, andI feel this was exactly that
life happening for you andalthough it was hard and the
learning curve was there and allof the things it prepared you
for, now you giving the bestcase scenario to your daughter
and everything that you'veexperienced.
(22:10):
So can you walk us through?
I know this may be hard, but Iknow that you're open to talking
about it.
So what happened to your sonand what happened there?
Speaker 3 (22:24):
Okay.
So of my two kids, my son wasmore medically fragile than my
daughter.
Like, of all the hospital stays, he was in the hospital,
probably 95% of it.
We were always in the hospitalfor respiratory related illness
or a seizure, something to thateffect.
So my typical routine when myson was around was both of my
(22:46):
kids went to the same classroom.
They were there, were in aself-contained special education
classroom, like we got a liftbus that stopped stops literally
in front of our house.
So the typical routine was I'dget them both up in the morning,
we'd get them both dressed,we'd get things going, we'd get
them in their chairs.
We'd send them off to schoolTwo days before the actual event
(23:08):
that happened.
I did that morning.
Everything was fine.
I was a stay-at-home parent atthat point, went through my
normal day.
They came home and typically mynormal routine when they came
home would be I'd get them bothin, I'd get them out of their
chairs.
If I was giving them a baththat day, I'd go ahead and go
right in to give them both ofthem a bath and getting them
(23:30):
dressed in the lounge for alittle while and I'd give them
time to relax.
All that stuff Made dinner thatnight Made one of my son's
favorites.
He ate like a horse andtypically most nights what would
happen would be we'd put mydaughter to bed about 730 and
then we would keep my son upabout another hour.
I love my daughter, but she canbe intense at times, especially
(23:54):
now as a teenage girl, and sothere were days that my son
would look at me and go I need abreak.
He was nonverbal, but I gotreally good at reading his body
language and he was just like Ineed a break.
And I'm just like buddy, Iunderstand.
And so we would put my daughterto bed and then we would bring
my son into our bedroom and mywife and I would lay on the bed
(24:17):
on both sides and we'd watch TVtogether and just goof off with
them for about another hour.
So two days before we bringthem in there, everything's fine
.
My wife goes.
We have an electric toothbrushfor him, so we do that because
he's got sensory issues and helikes the vibration.
So she went to go brush histeeth and he threw up a little
bit.
We didn't think much about it,we just figured maybe we hit his
(24:41):
gag reflex and there wassomething in there and something
came out.
Didn't think twice about it,Put him to bed and that night he
was up and down literally allnight, which is unusual for him.
And so we get him.
I let him kind of sleep in, Itext his teacher, I say hey, I
think my son's got a 24 hour bug.
(25:03):
He's not feeling well.
I'm going to keep him homebecause I don't know if it's
contagious or not, so I don'tspread anything to the classroom
.
Okay, just let me know.
And so that day I get him upand I sit him in his favorite
chair and I tell him all daylong I go, buddy, you can take a
nap.
I know you're tired, I knowyou've been up and down all
(25:24):
night.
It's okay, he's just going tobe sitting on the couch on his
laptop getting some work done.
He absolutely refused to dothat.
It was hard feeding him.
He didn't really want to drinka whole lot.
That kind of caught myattention at that point, but not
really just because it was thefirst day.
If it had gone multiple days Imight've gone.
Something's really wrong here.
And so we get through the day.
(25:47):
And then that evening I told mywife, I put him to bed the same
time as his sister.
He immediately got quiet and wejust thought well, he's just
exhausted.
He was up and down.
He didn't nap any today.
So we get up the next morningand I, before we get my daughter
up, I text his teacher and gohey, I'm going to which.
(26:11):
That's Friday morning, I'm good.
I texted his teacher and saidhey, I'm going to keep my son
home another day.
It'll butt up into the weekendand then I'll give me two more
days for him to recover fromwhatever.
I think this is Okay, fine, Seeyou Monday.
Get my daughter off to schooland then about eight, 39 o'clock
that morning I walk into hisbedroom and typically when I
(26:32):
walk in there to wake him up,he'll be awake and he's excited
and he's bouncing in his bed andall that.
And I get in there and he's notreally excited.
He's awake and he turns hishead and looks at me.
He doesn't really bounce oranything.
I think, huh, maybe he's reallygetting sick.
And I walk over to his rightside and I noticed this dark
green streak coming out of hismouth and everything I've seen
(26:56):
from medical shows and all thatkind of stuff.
I went well, the only thingdark green that's in your body
is bile.
And why is bile coming out ofhis mouth?
I was just this is not good atall.
So I get him out of bed and he'sreally floppy, like he can't
hold himself up, like he'sreally sick, which that didn't
really strike me, because I hada time or two in the past where
(27:16):
that was the case, where we gotadmitted for like 10 days, and
so I thought, well, maybesomething's really going on, let
me really look at this.
So I get him out in the livingroom and I immediately go
through my mental medicalprotocol.
I feel everything out.
I like I cath him just to makesure it's not a bladder issue.
I barely get anything out forhim.
The only thing that strikes meis his midsection, who was
(27:42):
normally pretty pliable, Like Icould press on a little bit and
it'd be spongy.
It was rock hard, like cinderblock wall rock hard.
And I'm just like, Hmm, thissomething's not right here.
And I sit there and look at himfor just a minute and in my
head I'm playing things out.
And then I look at my wife andI go you know, it's something's
not right here.
(28:02):
I'm going to take him up to thehospital and I said I don't
know what it is, but I don'trecognize this and this is
concerning to me.
And so it was at that point.
It was just under ourassumption that we were going to
take him up to the ER.
They were going to look at him.
He's probably going to getadmitted for several days.
We'd come home.
It's the mindset we were in atthat point.
We were in at that point.
(28:26):
So I get him up, get him dressed, get him in his wheelchair, get
him in the van and I get on theinterstate.
I'm doing like 90, getting upthe interstate.
Now I live on the Southwestside of Atlanta and the hospital
we go to is on the Northeastside of Atlanta.
It's approximately 65 milesfrom us, which sounds like a lot
, but in Atlanta Atlanta is like150 miles across.
(28:47):
So doing 60 is nothing Likepeople in Atlanta say it takes.
It takes an hour just to get anhour from somewhere in here.
That's just how big Atlanta is.
And so I'm driving up theinterstate and I get into the
center of Atlanta and I take theinterstate that goes up to like
the state road I have to getoff to get to the hospital where
I just get on the North centerof Atlanta and I take the
interstate that goes up to likethe state road I have to get off
to get to the hospital where Ijust get on the north side of
(29:10):
Atlanta and on the road signthat lights up it says major
wreck, on all lanes blocked.
And in my head I don't show itto my son, but I'm just I'm
freaking out because it'sliterally 300 yards before the
exit I have to get off on likeit's.
We're dead stopped in the senseof like we're crawling, we're
(29:33):
not completely stopped and we'reslowly moving, kind of thing.
Now, in the process of megetting up there like I can see
him lift his midsection up likehe's uncomfortable.
And then I see him up thereLike I can see him lift his
midsection up like he'suncomfortable.
And then I see him like he lookslike he's dozing on and off and
like I'm snapping my fingers athim, going buddy, stay with me,
stay with me.
I don't know what's going on,Just stay with me, Stay awake.
(29:55):
Kind of like if you get aconcussion, you don't want to
fall asleep right after itbecause of just what could
happen.
And so after the fact, when Igo back and look on it, I'm
realizing that he's fading inand out of consciousness.
Is what is coming?
It's not he's falling asleep,it's whatever's affecting him is
really affecting him at thispoint.
So I finally get to the frontof the thing and I don't know if
(30:18):
the DOT worker flags me on, butI punch it, I floor it and I
could see him swearing at me inthe in the background Like he
doesn't know what's going on inmy van.
So I get up to the hospital, Iget him, I get up to the parking
deck, I get him out and he'sreally floppy, like to the point
.
I notice it and I'm just like,ooh, something's really not
right.
I get up into the ER and, likea lot of ERs, you've got a line
(30:43):
you've got to go through, and soI skipped the line to go to the
front desk and the securityguard comes over to me as if to
yell at me like you need to getin line.
And when he walks over to me Igo I don't think he's breathing,
I need help now.
And he immediately changes histone.
He snaps his fingers at thenurse at the front desk and I've
(31:08):
been in this hospital a hundredtimes and this is the first
time I have ever at a full runran into the ER back to a trauma
room as fast as we could getthere.
So we get them in the traumaroom.
I've been in a hospital enoughto know what kind of the almost
procedure is.
So I immediately unstrap himfrom his wheelchair, I take him
out, I put him on the tablethat's there, and I back out of
(31:29):
the way in hopes that they'lllet me stay in there because one
he's nonverbal and he can'ttalk to him and I know what's
going on to tell the doctorswhat's going on.
And so it just so happens thatthere's another trauma room with
a door to the side that's openand they're just like just stand
, you can stay, just stand rightthere, fine, no problem.
(31:50):
They immediately cut off all ofhis clothing and they
immediately start chestcompressions on them right there
.
And the one thing that caughtmy attention is no more than he
got put on the table.
They took this drill and Ilater found out it was some kind
of port they would put in liketo immediately get like
medications in them and theylike drill it into his knee.
(32:10):
Just most normal people,without any pain medication,
would have come off a tablebecause it would have been just
intensely painful.
He never flinched.
And so I back off into this room.
Like 30 people out of nowherecome in there, they start chest
compressions, they immediatelyintubate him, which is putting
(32:32):
the tube down his throat.
And so I'm off in this roomwatching from the side and the
head ER doc comes over to me andgoes to the down to the minute,
to the best of yourrecollection.
How long has he been this way?
And I told her and she goes,okay, she goes over and barks
orders at him and then she comesback and she goes explain to me
the symptoms and reasons as towhy you brought him up here like
(32:54):
this.
And I told her everything andshe went back and barked orders
at him.
They started doing some things.
Now, mind you, this whole timethey're doing chest compressions
and CPR on them At this point.
It's about 10 continuous minutesat this point and so they
continue to do it and then theydecide they're going to get the
paddles out.
(33:14):
Now, in olden times they werethe big people where they put
the gel on, they rub themtogether and they go clear kind
of thing.
Well, now it's like pads theyput on you.
It almost looks like an Xboxsitting to the side and they
press a button.
So they put it on them and theyyell clear and they hit it and,
just like the medical drama, heliterally lifts off the table.
(33:36):
I see him just convulsedbecause it shocks you back to
life and so I see that.
But I'm watching the monitor onthe screen because I've watched
it so many times for breathingrate and oxygen rates and it
literally goes boop and goesright back to what it's doing.
And even though at that pointwe were about 15 minutes in and
(33:57):
they work for 30 more minutesafter that, I looked at that and
instinctually in my head I wenthe's not coming back.
I just I knew and the emotion ofit didn't hit me in the moment
just because I was so focused onwatching what they were doing
and just listening to theverbiage of what they were
(34:17):
saying, just so if I needed torecall it later I could remember
it kind of thing.
And so they, throughout thiswhole process, they shock him
probably four or five times.
And right after the fourth timethe head ER doc comes over to
me and goes we could shock himagain.
But she said I think theresult's going to be the same.
(34:38):
Would you like us to shock himagain?
And I said well, I know a lotabout his medical issues, but
this is out of my wheelhouse.
If you think it'sprofessionally necessary, go for
it.
And so they do.
And nothing happens.
And she immediately pronouncesthem, right then and there.
And so, as you can imagine, Iturn and I go and have a moment
(34:58):
in the room I'm in and I regaincomposure and in my head I'm
just like at this moment I'vejust got to compartmentalize
this, because so I then my wifewas working at home for a major
company remotely, and I calledher and I to this day we'll
never forget the sound she madewhen she thought we were going
(35:21):
up there for just a generalillness and I had to tell son
was dead on a table, and then Ithen had to.
I called my mother, who watchedthem for years, and said the
same thing.
I'll never forget the responseshe made.
Now she later, my mother later,came back and told me she goes.
The one thing that struck me inthat moment was you were eerily
(35:42):
calm, like almost stoicallycalm, and you had just lost your
son.
And I said well, I had to be inthat moment because one I had
to remain strong, if you will,because I had to tell Jennifer,
I had to tell you, I had to talkto all the care team people, I
had to figure out what was goingon, what the next steps were,
(36:03):
and so in like action, mode,going on what the next steps
were, and I so you were in likeaction mode?
Speaker 2 (36:06):
Yeah, I was Like I have to just I have to keep my
head down and do the things thatI know I need to get done
before anything can come out.
Speaker 3 (36:14):
Yep.
And so I'm sitting there, Iregained my composure, the care
team that she offers hercondolences and I look right at
her and I go this is going tosound cold and callous and I
don't mean it to be, but I haveto be this way in this moment.
And I pointed my son, I said Iwill deal with this in a minute.
I need to know answers toseveral questions.
(36:37):
And she goes okay, what areyour questions?
And I rapid fire off about 10questions, like she literally
takes a step back.
I go what happens from here?
How long will he be in thisroom?
When will he go to the morgue?
When will the coroner see him?
Will you do an autopsy?
(36:57):
If you do do an autopsy, what'sthe turnaround time?
If you don't do an autopsy,what's the protocol for doing
one and for not doing one?
Who do I need to contact for,like for a funeral home so I can
get them home, kind of thing?
And I just rapid fire all theand again she like literally
takes a step back and she goeswell, the first thing we're
going to do is I'm going to talkto the coroner.
(37:18):
I'm going to see what hisdecision is on, if he's going to
do an autopsy or not.
Okay, fine.
So she comes back and she goes.
The coroner's decided he's notgoing to do an autopsy.
And I didn't mean to come offas rude, but I literally went
why?
Why is he not going to do anautopsy?
And I said because I want toknow the protocol as to why you
decide you would or would not doan autopsy.
(37:38):
And so she goes.
Well, in a children's hospital,she said there's typically
three or four reasons why wewould.
If your son or daughter wasperfectly healthy, they came in
here for something like this anddied, they would do an autopsy
to figure out what it was, ifit's criminally related, if it's
drug related or if it's abuserelated.
(37:59):
Those would be the four reasons.
She said but because your sonhas an extensive history in this
hospital for all of his medicalissues, he's just going to
attribute it to one of hismedically related issues.
And I said OK, that's fine.
And so the team that was therewas great.
(38:19):
She was just like we don't needthis room anytime soon, spend
as much time as you want.
I said well, his mother'scoming up.
Her parents are driving her up.
She said fine, you can be.
She said it can't necessarilybe all day, but you can.
If you need a couple of hours,you can be in here, fine.
And so I do that and my wifecomes up and we spend probably
(38:39):
about another hour there.
And, like I tell people outsideof watching my son take his last
breath and watching him die, Isaid one of the hardest moments
I had was after we decided wewere going to go home.
I had to get all of his cut offclothing, put it in his empty
wheelchair and walk that emptywheelchair through the hospital
(39:00):
to the parking deck, put it inthe van and drive 65 miles home
in dead silence.
I said that was the hardestdrive my wife and I ever had to
make.
And then, at that point, mydaughter, with her delays.
She didn't necessarily like shedidn't know, she was at school
(39:24):
and so when she came home shehad no idea, like all she knew
was when I took my son to thehospital, I left with him, I
came home with him, and so nowshe's home and she's looking at
me like where's zachary?
And I did it in the mostsimplistic terms I could, for
even though I don't think sheunderstood, and I told her what
happened.
(39:44):
And, yes, my daughter did grievein her own way.
Was it like crying or anything?
Not necessarily, but you couldtell behavior wise like the
absence and the loss wasaffecting her.
So for the longest time I feltlike she was angry with me, and
rightfully so.
I took him to the hospital butI didn't bring him home and I
(40:08):
constantly told her I said, girl, if daddy could have brought
him home, daddy would havebrought him home.
So we dealt with that and wedid the whole funeral process.
And it's true what they say youdeal with the worst possible
moment in your life and now youhave to make a thousand
decisions.
So I will say I have a weirdsense of humor when it comes to
(40:31):
stress and all that.
So we go into the funeral homethe first day.
We get information.
The second day we come back andwe make decisions.
We decide we're going to havethem cremated because it wasn't
cheap.
But the cheaper of the twooptions?
And so we.
So we said we're going to havehim cremated.
And the funeral director comesover to us and he goes.
I'm required by federal law andI went stop.
(40:53):
I said what does the USgovernment want to know anything
about my son's cremation?
And he goes right back into aspill.
He goes I'm required by federallaw to tell you that the state
in which your loved one entersthe crematorium is not the exact
same state that your loved onewill leave the crematorium.
And I looked at him and Istopped for a second and I lit
(41:17):
in front of him my in-laws andmy wife.
I went who in the F thinks thatyou can start the process of
cremation and then come back tothe original state?
I said do they not understand?
It's very hot fire and hedoesn't say anything to me, but
he gives me this look of youwould be amazed as to the
(41:38):
responses.
And I went.
I literally looked at when I amdumbfounded that someone would
think that.
And not only was, it was adouble-sided sheet and we
literally had to initial ineight places saying that we
understood fully what thecremation process was.
And I went I am dumbfounded.
(41:59):
So that was leading up actuallyof, and then afterwards, and
then we started that beginningphase of, like everybody said,
this is our new life is how thatwent wow, for those just
listening, I lost my and notwatching the video.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
I lost it a bit, um, because I couldn't imagine and
and oh my gosh, my heart, beforewe started recording I said my
condolences because just readingyour intro, but I couldn't
imagine.
And how do you then go fromthere?
(42:41):
How do you make that your newnormal?
Speaker 3 (42:45):
Well, in the beginning, many of us in the
grief community, you almostdon't.
You resist it, you fight it.
The traditional male responseis anger.
You suppress it, you keepyourself busy is honestly what a
lot of us do Now.
Even between my wife and I, wegrieve completely differently.
(43:08):
She's a little more quiet andunto herself and she has her
moments, whereas I'm open.
There were many times rightafterwards, sitting on the couch
as I was on my laptop, I justit just hit me like a Mack truck
and I just lost it just rightin front of everybody.
Now am I out that?
Am I that way in public?
No, am I that way at home?
(43:29):
More so at home than I am outin public.
So, at least in the beginning,it's just like the stages of
grief.
You really get into that wholedenial that I can't believe this
is real, I can't believethey're gone, I can't believe
just grasping mortality,grasping the fact that the time
is really finite and that youonly have a certain amount of it
(43:53):
and nobody knows how much timeyou have of it.
And so that's the beginningstages of what you mentally deal
with.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
Yeah, I've seen mortality in my doorstep a
number of times.
I've had cancer four times.
I woke up from a surgery andthe doctor had to take a deep
breath of like a sigh of relief.
So I know, that from a personalperspective, but it's just so
(44:32):
hard to even think there's solittle and I am trying to
compose myself in this moment.
Speaker 3 (44:37):
It is moment, it is the weird, like in the beginning
, outside of just the generalsadness from loss, like the day
that we can't.
The day that it happened wecame home and I walked into his
room here and had to put hiswheelchair in which, if you see
by the name in the background,that's where I put his
wheelchair that day.
It has not moved since yeah andso I walked in here and it just
(44:57):
like it hit me like a Mack truckat that moment and I like,
through the funeral home theygive you a fill in the blank
kind of thing so they can do theobituary, and like I had a
really hard time with that CauseI'm just like one.
How do I write an obituary fora child that's lived 15 years,
which I don't think it's been?
(45:18):
I've lived 47 years now and Idon't think that's a full life
at this point.
How can I write one for 15years and then like the other
things, is it's amazing?
My son lived 15 years and it's15 years is brought to what?
Speaker 1 (45:34):
Six paragraphs is what an obituary is how do you
do that?
Speaker 3 (45:39):
So I had a really tough time with like some of
those things.
The procedural stuff is whatreally got to me because I was
the one doing them.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Yeah, yeah.
After my dad passed away it wasI felt like I had to pause my
grief and I had to cancel allthe credit cards, change the
bills into my mom's name, likeall of the things that, like we
don't think about that have tobe done and go and do the whole.
(46:13):
One is going to be thecelebration of life.
One is like, what are we doing?
I remember having to just like,all right, no crying right now,
I just like no feeling rightnow.
I just need to do and that ishard for someone to do for a
(46:34):
parent or a loved one I just Ican't, I couldn't imagine having
to do that for my child, any ofmy children, and so I I commend
you for your strength and forbeing able to get through that
that.
What a blessing it is.
(46:54):
I know it sounds weird, butwhat a blessing to be able to
say, all right, hold all thethings and here we go, this is
what we need to do.
So how do you help others now?
Because you did create a blog.
Letters to Zachary, correct?
Speaker 3 (47:12):
Correct and how has that helped you and how do you
help others?
Well, I'm a researcher and, like, when things happen, I'll get
on social media and, as we allknow, you can find a group for
anything on Facebook.
So after my son had passed, Ijust started searching grief
(47:34):
groups and I actually found asmall one that was actually the
loss of a special needs child,which I was actually surprised
that I found it, and so I gotinto that group and I got to
know the administrator of it.
In fact, I'm now anadministrator with her on the
group of that small group and soI got to know her really well
(47:54):
and after posting in there oneday I said I've started
journaling per my counselor andI said I'd like to share it.
Do you mind if I share it?
And she goes sure, I'd love foryou to share it.
She said we don't typically geta whole lot of men sharing
things like this, which, forthose of you that don't know
most of these groups, especiallygroup groups, it's like 95%
(48:16):
women, there may be 5% men andof that 5% you might have half a
percent.
that actually is there on aregular basis that actually
converses with people.
So I get in there and I post myfirst letter and I preface it
with I've written these.
In the moment I do notsugarcoat, I'm unfiltered.
(48:37):
It's raw If you can't take, youknow, raw, sometimes vulgar,
filled emotion, because I wrotethese right when I was having a
moment Scroll on I said becauseI'm just, I'm not going to
sugarcoat it, people need to seethe good, the bad and the ugly
(48:57):
of grief to get a real pictureof it.
And so I posted it and no morethan I posted.
I got a huge response in thisgroup and I've never been one to
toot my own horn, so to speak,but like I had a woman come
comment say I've never toldanybody my deepest feelings as
it relates to grief, and thisletter right here has said
(49:18):
exactly how I feel to the letter.
And I said, well, I appreciateit.
I said this has been inspiredby my son and I said I'm glad
I've written something that willresonate with you Outside of
the fact of to this day I'vestill gotten.
People have always said youhave just the greatest analogies
.
You can make complex thingssimple based on the analogies
(49:43):
that you write with them.
And I said, well, I doappreciate it.
I said, if only my firstprincipal could see my writing
now, because she used to hate,she hated my correspondence,
absolutely hated it with apassion.
So I did that several moretimes and got the same response.
I got several more responsesjust like that, and so I had
(50:05):
people say, well, have you everthought about doing a book?
Well, at the time I didn't haveenough material, so it's just
like I don't know if my braincan handle that right now.
Have you ever thought aboutdoing a podcast?
I definitely know my braincan't handle that right now.
And so several options came upand someone said, well, have you
ever thought about doing like aFacebook page?
(50:26):
You can list yourself as ablogger.
And she said, well, at leastyou could copy and paste what
you're doing.
I said, well, I could do that.
And, as a side note, I createdthe page honestly, out of spite,
because I could never find anymen in any of these groups.
Now, it wasn't going to beexactly like mine, but I at
least want someone in theballpark and I could never find
(50:47):
any men that would share, maybeto the point I was willing to
share.
So I made this page initiallycatered to just men.
So I create this page and,typically, like the normal way
you start one, we had 10 or 20followers, that kind of thing.
And so one day I got a wild hairand I thought, well, I'm going
(51:09):
to start emailing some of thewhat I would consider the big
names in grief and just ask themhey, my name is so-and-so, I'm
starting this page.
Can you give me some pointerson things that work for you,
things that didn't work for youbased on the direction I want to
go?
And all of them were phenomenal.
What do you need help with?
(51:41):
And so I got a lot of reallybig names in the grief community
that said sure, if you're goingto do this, you may want to do
a, b and c.
If you don't want to do thisand you go this way, you might
want to do these three thingsand which I used a lot of those
and like my page now iscompletely different than what
it was in the beginning yeah soI started doing that, posting my
letters and all that stuff.
I started doing all of that andafter about the first month I
(52:05):
started getting a lot offollowers, like it was.
It was getting to be like 70and 80 followers a month.
It was starting to blow up onme and typically I get a couple
hundred and then it wouldplateau and get a couple hundred
, plateau.
That's how it's been the wholetime.
And when I was getting thatresponse in my brain I was going
(52:26):
well, maybe I have somethinghere.
And I was just like I don'tknow how I'm going to do it, but
I need to keep building on it,to continue just getting the
following.
And like my wife said, why areyou so obsessed about at least
getting to a thousand followers?
I said because at least when Iget to a thousand followers, the
probability that they willshare it to.
(52:47):
If one person from all of thosethousand followers shares it to
one person of all thosethousands of followers, think of
the exponential growth thatwill happen.
And then I said then, like, ifI try to get media to jump in on
it, to like, share it in themedia until you hit about a
thousand followers, a lot ofthem will be just like you're
(53:08):
not quite big enough, like I hada local news reporter I
contacted and that was basicallyher comment Cause I'd caught.
I had about 600 followers atthat point and she didn't come
out and say it, but that was herresponse was maybe we'll come
back later, as if I could do astory, but you may be gone
(53:28):
tomorrow.
So as of today, I'm at 1,015followers.
I have representation in 46 ofthe 50 US states and I'm in 18
countries as the representation.
I have original content in theform of letters, poetry or prose
(53:50):
, like I quote, tweet a lot ofgrief stuff and give commentary
on it from my perspective.
I have video form.
I have memes.
You name it.
If I can think of a media formto do, that's what I put.
Video form I have memes.
You name it If I can think of amedia form to do.
(54:11):
That's what I put on there.
So again.
But it started off for men tosay, hey, this is a safe space
for you to comment, to feelvulnerable.
I'm not going to judge you.
In fact, the rules I've listedin there I've point blank said
if you're coming in here bashinganybody, male or female, on how
they're feeling, you willimmediately get removed.
Yeah, this is not the place forthat, so it started for that.
However, I did have several bignames say it's great that
(54:33):
you're doing for men, but ifyou're trying to get a massive
audience cause, there's somepages on Facebook that have
10,000 followers, 20,000, 50,000.
If you're trying to get tothose numbers, you're going to
have to open it up.
So I did so.
Even though it's initially formen, I have since opened it up
for anybody grievingspecifically women and at least
(54:55):
from the woman's perspective,the response I give them is from
the woman's perspective.
The response I give them is I'mhere to give you a perspective
into the male mind into how wegrieve, what's expected, how we
do it, and then, like I'm here,like I've had several women come
up to me and say we lost ourchild X number of months ago or
(55:17):
a year ago.
He's not opening up.
What do I need to do?
And I'll go.
Well, I don't know if these are100% work, but here's some
pointers I think that shouldhelp.
And so, like I actually came upwith, what did I call it?
It was the 10 commandments ofmale grief is what I came up
with?
Just different things to say towomen.
(55:37):
Here's what we deal with,here's how we deal with it,
here's how I feel like you canhelp, and so that's how the
pages evolved.
Speaker 2 (55:47):
That's amazing.
I have a friend of mine thatthey lost their child.
He was, I want to say, likemonths old and obviously we as
women we grieve very differentlythan men and her husband was
(56:08):
internalizing it all and endedup, I think earlier this year,
going to like and it was calleda rehab but it wasn't for
substance abuse, it was like foremotions and like, and
thankfully is doing so muchbetter.
But that was one of the thingsthat I mentioned to her.
I was like, how has he evenprocessed, like, the grief of
(56:31):
losing a child?
Like I know how you'veprocessed it and how, and you're
very open and vocal and you goto different counselors and all
of that, but what is he doing?
That's probably where thedisconnect is, um, between you
two, because there's such adifference in, like, the way
(56:53):
you're processing, in the waythat he's processing, that
there's no communication inbetween.
And yeah, she said that afterthat, he it was.
It's been like night and day interms of their relationship and
it's I it's such a difficultemotion to deal with in general
because it's like sometimes youwant to laugh, sometimes you
(57:14):
want to cry and sometimes youwant to just remember the happy
memories and sometimes, like weall grieve so differently.
I have three kids that have lostmy ex-boyfriend, which was
their stepdad for six years.
He passed away and that wasdifficult and each of them
grieved so differently andthere's no manual on how to deal
(57:37):
with.
Well, number one tell kids thata loved one has passed.
And number two, how to helpthem process it.
And I've experienced that withwhen he passed and when my dad
passed.
That was like their secondfather and it was the same.
Like they all processdifferently and they all, like,
(57:59):
still grieve it so differently.
And so it's just, it's sodifferent for everyone and it's
not a linear.
There's an illustration outthere that, oh, these are the
grief stages or whatever, andthen it's like this, all these
squiggly lines, that isperfectly what it illustrates,
because there's no like setsteps to grieving, you just
(58:25):
allow the.
It's like all the things, allof the things, and it could be
different things.
Sometimes you want to rememberthe good times and sometimes
you're like, oh, it's so pissedbecause, like, why did you leave
so quickly?
Yeah, that is amazing.
I will put all of theinformation on the show notes
(58:45):
for Letters to Zachary so thatwe hopefully increase your
following as well.
I think it's very needed.
What limiting beliefs orroadblocks did you have to
overcome in order to get towhere you are today?
Blocks, did you?
Speaker 3 (59:00):
have to overcome in order to get to where you are
today.
Well, one thing I tried tostress to the female population,
if you will there are a lot ofsocietal things that we have to
overcome just as a gender, and Ireally try to point out I'm not
saying it's better or worsethan the other side, but like
(59:20):
I'm old enough of a generationwhere I was part of the tape it
up and walk it off, rub somedirt on it generation.
Are you hurt or are you injured?
And yes, there's a difference.
I'm old enough to be a part ofthat generation, and so I was
always taught men are thefoundation, we're strong, we're
(59:41):
protectors, we're problemsolvers, that kind of thing.
That's the thing that we do.
Sure, you can get emotional, butit's a limited time that you
can be emotional and then youjust got to suck it up and walk
it off.
That's just how it was.
And so when you're programmedwith that all your life and all
of a sudden this moment comes in.
(01:00:02):
I tell people all the time Isaid when you hit some of these
stressful moments, you go backto what you know, when you don't
have an answer, and that's whata lot of us men know, we know.
Well, I got to compartmentalizethis I'll have a moment later,
if I ever get to it and so I tryto tell women that y'all have
(01:00:25):
to help create an environmentwhere it's trusting and safe and
I hate to use the word safespace, I know that's a key
phrase these days.
Speaker 2 (01:00:36):
Yeah, where they feel comfortable.
Yeah, where they feelcomfortable, where you feel
comfortable.
Speaker 3 (01:00:47):
And the two other short things I'll say is men
have been taught from birth thatthe woman's emotion comes first
period.
It's just.
That's just what we've beentaught, and 99% of us don't mind
that.
I'm not saying there's aproblem with that, but it has
been instilled in us.
Of the two people that aregoing to get emotional, it's
going to be the woman.
She has first dibs, firstrights to it.
Okay, fine, that's great andwonderful.
But we're programmed to say,hey, you do this and I'll do
(01:01:12):
everything else.
While you're emotional, there'snothing in there, at least in
the beginning, to say, hey, youcan have time to deal with
whatever you're dealing with.
And so we have to overcome thathurdle.
That we've been taught at leastI was taught all my life.
And then the last thing I wouldtell women is a lot of men, the
reason why they don't open upbecause at some point they have
(01:01:35):
told someone that they cared forit has been remembered at a
later date and has been thrownback in their face specifically
in an argument or something tohurt them.
And I always use this examplejokingly, as a stereotype, if
you will.
I said, as men you always hear,well, women will remember the
(01:01:55):
most finite detail, like Iremember, in January 23rd of
2021 at 4.30 PM, that you saidthis to me at this moment, and
it may not so much be the casethese days, I don't know.
That's what I always grew upknowing, and so those are the
(01:02:16):
three big things that men arejust battling just to get to the
point of opening up, and sothat right, there is an uphill
battle, not including the otherthings that men have to deal
with yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 2 (01:02:29):
What daily habits or rituals do you say helped you
reach to where you are now?
Speaker 3 (01:02:35):
the journaling.
Honestly, the irony of it allis, when my counselor suggested
it, my response was I don't knowif that's my thing, I don't
know how great of a writer I am.
Just because it helped me getit off my chest, because I'm one
of those ones that would justsit on me.
My mind would play it around athousand times, and so at least
in the beginning I could write aWord document or print it out,
(01:02:58):
and I could either save it for alater date or if, if need be, I
could just throw it in the fireand burn it just to get it out.
That that was probably thebiggest thing yeah, that's
amazing and I agree.
Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
I just came to the conclusion with my therapist,
like last time I saw her thatbecause I I believe journaling,
I think that it is amazing.
And when you said, throw it upin the fire, that's where I need
.
Because when I was younger, mymom found my journal and read
(01:03:32):
through it.
I felt like that was an unsafeplace for me and so I haven't
gone back to journaling and Iwas so.
That helped me so much beforewhen I was in my teenage years,
and I even tell my kids that nowjournal, even if you have to
burn it, I'll help you burn itafterwards, like I'm not, I
won't have to read it, just getit out.
(01:03:54):
And as you said that I'm like,yeah, because it feels there's
something that feels safe aboutI can get it all out and then
get rid of it, so no one everhas to see that or whatever.
So, yeah, I definitely secondthat.
Anything else that you want totell our listeners today.
Speaker 3 (01:04:17):
To men specifically our listeners today, to men
specifically, it's ironic to methat a gender that does not like
being told what to do at allfalls into this category.
When it comes to emotions,whether it's grief or anything
else where they fall into, whereeverybody and their brother's
telling them what to do on howto express themselves, and I go
(01:04:39):
for a gender that doesn't likebeing told what to do on how to
express themselves, and I go fora gender that doesn't like
being told what to do, thatwants to have control of things.
You are certainly bending overbackwards to let them control
how you express yourself.
Why are you concerned aboutwhat anybody else thinks,
especially online?
I would tell them do you knowhow many ignorant opinions there
(01:05:01):
are online?
Why are you concerned aboutthem?
They're behind a keyboard.
How are they going to changeyour life in any form or fashion
just because they typesomething?
In yeah absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
I love that.
Well, thank you so much, jason.
I so appreciate it, and myheart is seriously completely
with you and your family,because it doesn't matter how
many years have passed, but Idon't think it ever becomes
easier.
We just learn how to live withit, and so I'm sending you guys
(01:05:37):
all so much love.
I hope you listeners got somuch out of today and send this
to somebody that you feel needsit.
Whatever type of journey griefjourney they're on, it is so
important, it is so, soimportant, and I will put again
all of Jason's information inthe show notes.
(01:05:57):
So please go follow, share it.
I think that it's somethingthat we as society need, but I
really truly feel like men needthis in their lives, because it
is so tough to give that spacefor the men to be sensitive and
be in their feelings.
Sensitive and be in theirfeelings.
(01:06:17):
But I definitely, I know it'sneeded, so please share.
Thank you, listeners so much.
I hope you have an amazing restof your day.
Peace out, love your life.
Bye.
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