Surviving-ISH Podcast
"Surviving-ish" is a podcast with a unique and purposeful dual focus. The "Surviving-ish" is our way of creating a space for lightheartedness—it’s about the everyday, petty grievances that are frustrating but also a source of shared, human comedy. These are the moments we survive, like when the laundry pod explodes all over the clothes, your morning coffee isn't quite hot enough, or a passive-aggressive text from a relative ruins your mood.
The core mission behind "Surviving-ish" is to show our audience that while we may have been victims of serious circumstances, that does not mean people have to walk on eggshells around us. We believe in the power of laughter and the importance of finding humor in life's small frustrations. By blending serious topics with these minor, everyday grievances, we aim to normalize the idea that it's okay to joke and laugh, even after enduring significant challenges.
For further inquiries or to share your own story, please reach out to us at survivingabusepodcast@gmail.com. Together, we can create a network of support and healing for survivors.
Surviving-ISH Podcast
Overcoming Unimaginable Loss: Ashley Stoker's Journey Through Tragedy and Resilience
Imagine waking up to a regular morning only to be confronted with a life-altering tragedy. Join us as we sit down with Ashley Stoker, a TikTok advocate and survivor, to hear her deeply personal account of losing her parents in a horrific accident caused by an impaired driver. Ashley opens up about the dreadful day her brother hydroplaned, setting off a chain reaction that led to her parents' untimely deaths. Her mother's love for photography, surprisingly, became a beacon of hope, providing vital evidence in the ensuing court case. This episode serves as a poignant reminder of the devastating impact of drunk driving and the unexpected ways we find strength and solace.
You'll be gripped by Ashley's recounting of a morning filled with unshakeable worry and rising dread. She shares the chilling moments of discovering something was wrong when her typically responsive parents were unreachable. The dread escalates as her calls and texts go unanswered, and a sense of foreboding takes hold. As the hours tick by, the reality of the unfolding disaster becomes painfully clear. Through Ashley's narrative, we explore themes of unimaginable loss, the importance of road safety, and the resilience of the human spirit in the face of overwhelming grief. Don't miss this heart-rending yet inspiring episode.
In every dark tunnel there's a glimmer of hope.
Speaker 2:In every painful moment there's a strength to heal anyway.
Speaker 1:Hi everybody, welcome to Surviving Podcast. As many of you all know, my family was a victim of a drunk driving accident. That laws ended up being passed in our name. I have shared that story on here and I have made a friend named Ashley Stoker. You may know her on TikTok. She is definitely an advocate doing the work. Let's start with the introduction Ashley, how are you?
Speaker 2:I'm good, thank you.
Speaker 1:I'm so glad that you're here. It's hard to say because the conversations that we're having, but life happens and there's traumas, but when it brings people together like this. So tell us a moment, if you don't mind, and introduce yourself. Tell us who you are.
Speaker 2:So my name is Ashley and I grew up and lived in Washington my whole life, growing up and living in Washington. There's tons of beautiful scenery and I grew up with both my mom and dad and an older brother, and my brother was out on a Saturday morning and he was going to meet up at one of the waterfalls with his car and he's a part of a car group and he was driving north, northbound Washington and he had actually hydroplaned in some of our sometimes in Washington it's rainy and he hydroplaned first and went into the guardrail and then from the guardrail into the ditch and so he was driving alone that day, made it perfectly fine out of the ditch and some good Samaritans that traveled on the freeway just behind him called 911 and they called a tow truck for him. He walked away perfectly fine, but the car was totaled and so they called a tow truck for him to get the car out of the ditch. And then he called my dad and who was just about 45, 50 minutes away, and my dad then told my mom, hey, got to go pick up our son. I personally was over at Eastern Washington University, attending college at this point in time, so I had absolutely no idea.
Speaker 2:At this time I was still sleeping.
Speaker 2:They had gone.
Speaker 2:Both my mom and dad went to go pick up my brother from the side of the freeway and it was at that time when the trooper had left the scene.
Speaker 2:Later on we had found out that it was so close to my parents leaving the side of the road that my dad's foot was on the brake pedal and it had released at the time of impact and, unfortunately, an impaired driver had crossed multiple lanes as my parents were going to be leaving the side of the freeway, rear-ended them, pushed the car forward into, unfortunately, the tow truck driver, arthur Anderson, was in between my parents' vehicle and his tow truck and unfortunately, both my mom and dad and Arthur Anderson were pronounced dead on scene and my brother was found conscious, but underneath my mom's front seat. So, like any of us, he woke up and was going to go for a nice drive and go see some scenery and have some good Saturday with some friends. But that unfortunately was not the case and just a lot of us tend to think if you need to go pick somebody up, my parents were just going to go pick them up, be right back, everything would be good, and that, unfortunately, was not the case either.
Speaker 1:So your parents made it to your brother's scene, scene of accident and then tow truck was there. The tow truck guy was still working with the cars.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So my brother's car was already up on top of the tow truck and Arthur Anderson was securing the last little bit and he was going to go around to climb back up into his cab to take off my parents. My dad was the driver and it showed that his foot came off the brake pedal to start going. So they were literally just about to leave the side of the freeway and something I don't know if interesting is the right word to use, but people who knew my mom, especially my mom she was in the front passenger.
Speaker 2:She took hundreds of thousands of photos a year, hundreds of videos every single year. Like she was an addict to scrapbooking and so I had photos. Later on, when I recovered their cell phones and stuff and personal belongings from the vehicle, I found her phone and I went through it from the vehicle. I found her phone and I went through it and a lot of the photos that she actually took of my brother's accident and some of the photos she had on there were time stamped from minutes before the car's computer chip showed impact. It showed a lot of pictures and videos from the scene that were later used in court to show that there was a wide 12 foot shoulder. They were clearly off the side of the road. It showed that they were, that the tow truck had his lights going and it was a whole dispute between defense of his lights weren't on or they were partially in the road. And my mom took thousands of photos and fortunately but unfortunately, they were used in our actual court case.
Speaker 1:I think the universe does work in those ways and you're right. Like there's never a good word to put to something like that. You say interesting or things like that. But part of me wonders if sometimes we just know, and our instinct or God or whatever it is you believe in, how do you do these things that's going to help bring the people left behind some peace or help get the situation resolved in some kind of way. So your brother survived, and was he a teenager?
Speaker 2:No, he was 25 at the time and I was 22 at the time.
Speaker 1:And I don't know how I never caught on to this, because I watch your TikToks, but I just always assumed maybe it's where I vision my story with it that I pictured you as a child. I didn't realize you were off to college in your adult life. I don't know how I never caught on to that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think when a lot of people view my TikToks as well, looking young, sounding young, probably portraying not that I try to portray myself as young, but I've just turned 25. And I think a lot of people view me as 14 to 16, or that maybe this happened a long time ago. But I also do think it's in part of how I talk about our family structure. I think it's in part due to how close of a family we were that some people may connect closer towards. If I say that I'm talking with my mom or my dad every day, that's something that maybe a younger person would do because they're at home more often. But that's just goes to show how close of a family we actually were. And my mom was my absolute best friend and my brother's best friend was our dad and I had talked to them even the night before. I was on the phone with them for three hours.
Speaker 2:It's just, we're such a close family and perhaps this may be speculation, but as you get older, sometimes you grow away from your parents and you find your own independence. But I don't even think we got to that stage in our lives yet. But we weren't necessarily young little kids when you go from being a close-knit family and you're still dependent upon your parents. And then, all of a sudden, here you are head of household because I had to take care of my dad's stuff, my mom's stuff. My brother was supposed to be, as the oldest sibling, executor of the estate, but he was in the ICU in and out of it. All of a sudden, here I am just doing my schoolwork and I'm head of household for a family of four. Not knowing what I'm doing, I still feel like a little girl. I'm a 25-year-old little girl.
Speaker 1:I don't know what I'm doing, Absolutely. So the question I would like to ask I have so many, but maybe we'll start with this Is your brother? Okay now?
Speaker 2:Yeah, relatively speaking, he is okay now. He's never going to go back to the fit 25-year-old person that he ever was. He's 28 now, so he's not going to be that kind of person. Because of the extensiveness of his injuries, because we believe that his head impacted the seat in front of him when the defendant rear-ended our family's vehicle. It not only pushed our vehicle forward so there was tons of damage to the back, to where the cargo space gone, third row seat gone, and pushed him under my parents, under my mom's seat, but it also pushed them forward at an angle and so the complete passenger side went into the back of the tow truck and that was the side that my mom and my brother were on. So my brother had tons of injuries from both being rear-ended and I don't even know if you want to call it tangentially T-boned, I don't know exactly but from the back and from the side he had broken his glasses, so like he had tons of bruises in here, and then 13 or 14 broken teeth. He had a broken arm, broken wrists. Those had surgery and he has a permanent plate and screws, broken kneecap, broken leg. So he was in a walking boot and we didn't find out till later that he had the shattered kneecap. He had five broken ribs on the left side because of the seatbelt that they had already buckled. Anyways, being on the passenger side, five broken ribs on the left side. His spine was broken in three different places and then from the seatbelt, the lap belt part had I'm no doctor squeezed his intestines to the point where they were irreparable. And so he had a couple surgeries for his intestines. So they had to cut through tons of the skin, fat, muscle to get to the inner organs. They cut like a good foot long section.
Speaker 2:Due to the severity of the scene they didn't know what condition he was internally. He may not have been externally bleeding, but you could instantly see how much damage this has caused. So they just cut him wide open to see. We got to get in there and see lungs, heart, everything, and so that's where they saw a lot of the intestines were pretty much beaten up. So they took a section of that out.
Speaker 2:But from all of the surgeries trying to figure out what was going on in his stomach chest area, that does a lot of damage to that core strength as well as the broken ribs they couldn't really do anything for, as well as the broken back, can't really do anything for that. He is fine to the extent that he's going to be and luckily no mental disabilities resulting from this car crash. I refer to him as an 80-year-old man. Doing stairs is harder for him to do, getting in and out of the car or getting up and down from the floor or a couch. Those are some of the more difficult things because it's that core strength to get up, or the knee pain.
Speaker 1:Goodness bless his heart. Would you mind to tell us about when you got notified?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that was a really terrible day. Obviously, my brother's crash happened around 630 in the morning and then the second crash happened more towards 745. And, like I said, I was still sleeping. I had no idea what was going on. I was on the other side of the state attending college, and every morning I wake up and I check Facebook to see if that little green dot is there, to see if my mom is awake. And it wasn't on. So I was like just gonna leave her be be. She might be sleeping in, whatever, because she had just had a foot surgery. My dad had just had a back surgery. They're doing their own thing, might be sleeping in. But it wasn't until maybe 9 or 10 o'clock that I was like this isn't normal. Usually she's up by now. So I started calling and texting my mom hey, good morning, you might be in the shower or whatever. Take it, just let me know when you're up. And I went about doing my homework and so then, after I think another hour went by, texted her again Good morning, what's going on? Another hour went by.
Speaker 2:Somewhere around noon I started texting both my mom and my dad separately and I was like hey, did you go for a drive or something. Logically, I knew that they can't be going for a drive. They shouldn't be like. They're supposed to be home homebodies, and I had just talked to them the night before. They don't have weekend plans. So it was just, it wasn't sitting well with me that maybe three hours before they don't have weekend plans. So it was just, it wasn't sitting well with me that maybe three hours later they weren't getting back to me. And so then I started calling both their cell phones calling my mom's cell phone, calling my dad's cell phone, calling the home phone. Nobody's answering me. So then it just started getting frustrating and nobody's answering me.
Speaker 2:So then it just started getting frustrating. Why won't they answer me? So then I texted my brother, and again't replying to me either. And it was the most frustrating feeling. Mom won't answer, dad won't answer, brother won't answer. Where the heck is everybody?
Speaker 2:So then I remembered that my mom called my grandpa every morning, and so I texted him and I said hey, have you heard from mom lately or this morning? He's no, I'm out in my car and we're all out looking for them. Nobody is responding. I'm heading over to their house right now. And then a little bit later he said that the car was gone, nobody's home. So then I'm frantic because I can't do anything. From six hours away there's not much that I can do, but there has to be some sort of reasonable explanation that they're gone, like they went somewhere and our car had white tigers on the side. So it's a pretty recognizable car in our community that like if you just drive down the street you can instantly recognize where our car is.
Speaker 2:And so they were out and about driving around and it just would not sit well with me. I'm sure that my, our home phone had 17 missed calls, my parents' phones missed messages, everything. And I think at about three around three o'clock in the afternoon I sent my last text message to my mom saying that I'm really concerned. Please, we're all looking for you. Please let me know you're okay. And then, about 20 minutes later, I got a knock on my door and it was two policemen and my heart sank. But I still didn't connect two and two together because your first thought isn't something terrible at least mine wasn't and I remember opening the door and the first words out of my mouth were actually first, I opened the door and I see that it's the police and I just have a blank look on my face and I remember thinking I don't want them to think my reaction was weird, thinking that like I'm hiding something. And so I said I'm so sorry that I just had a really weird look on my face or a weird reaction, because none of my family can get a hold of my mom and dad, and now it's really weird that you're here right now. And then they asked me to verify my mom and dad's names and they asked me to verify my name. And then they said that they need to talk to me and that they needed to come into my apartment and asked me to sit down.
Speaker 2:And then that's when they had told me that there had been a car accident and at that time we didn't really know anything about my brother's crash. It was really unclear as to what exactly happened. All they knew was my mom and my dad and my brother were in our car and there was a tow truck on scene. And at that time they said that they did tell me and I don't remember this like, oh, this is like a really big crash. And I remember thinking back to the times when we've called 911 before, like usually it's the fire department that shows up and in my mind I was picturing like fire department on side of freeway and my heart sank for the other people that were on the scene and I was like I don't know if this is a stupid question to ask, but did anybody die? Are the firefighters okay? Are paramedics okay? And my concern was like I hope nobody died. Even though and later on I remember them telling me a little bit like that thought was in my head it just didn't register because they just told me my parents were dead. And then my concern flipped to I hope nobody died. And so then they had to tell me the story all over again of what they just told me that and they had to say it slower.
Speaker 2:And a lot of my PTSD stems from being in that apartment, which I'm so glad I'm not there anymore, because anytime I would sit on my couch in that spot, all I would see in front of me was like that police officer kneeling down in front of me, his partner standing behind him and just telling me over and over again your parents are gone, your brother's in emergency surgery to save his life, and my world just crumbling down.
Speaker 2:But later on we found out that my parents' names were released to the news and there were news reports already at the 11 o'clock news and the noon news, but none of my family was watching TV to see that was happening going on, because we were all out looking for them. Nobody was at home watching TV. So my personal family has a very different perception, or I guess we have a very different reality of that day versus the tow truck driver's family. Different reality of that day versus the tow truck driver's family because they did see on the news and they were closer up there in the community, versus us not finding out. And I was the first point of contact, I was the first person that they were able to find.
Speaker 1:So then that was able to release names and information.
Speaker 2:I know I was. I I don't know what I want to do with that, but I feel like we need to start working towards a petition and some sort of legislature that you cannot release information to news media for them to report on if family or next of kin have not been notified.
Speaker 1:And I already thought that was a thing.
Speaker 2:It's not. There have been so many messages or comments on my videos that this is how I found out my brother passed away is when it was on the five o'clock news. This is how my child passed away is when they were on the five o'clock news, and that's not right. You should not be watching the news and all of a sudden there is your loved one's picture, car name. I don't think that's morally or ethically right. Do you mind if I ask what happened to the driver? First was taken to a local hospital because of the severity of the scene, with three people passing away. Both her and my brother were transported. She had not a scratch on her, no injuries whatsoever, and she was first in hospital for observation when they started doing their astigmatization whatever they're, like the eye test. So that's when she was under observation, when she kept falling asleep, and it wasn't until the second hospital that they transferred both her and my brother to. It wasn't until there that she was arrested and then released from the hospital to the county jail and from there she bailed out. Her mom bailed her out and she walked free for two years and a lot of people around town saw her driving, which is really unfortunate because you shouldn't be able to drive, kill people, continue to drive. So that was really unfortunate.
Speaker 2:But then we did eventually get to trial and after trial was the sentencing.
Speaker 2:After she was found guilty and the sentencing range that she was looking at was 12 to 15 years and luckily we did have a really good judge and because of extenuating circumstances and a lot of other lawyer jargon that I don't understand, she extended it outside of those normal sentencing ranges to it was 20 years for my mom, 20 years for my dad, 20 years for Arthur Anderson and 10 years for my brother for the assault.
Speaker 2:And on that point of the assault the county they said that it was the worst assault case that the county had ever seen and I think that in part with killing three other people was that's why they decided that they can go for extenuating circumstances outside of the proposed sentencing range, but they are to run concurrent, not consecutive. So she'll be in jail for a total of 20 years maximum instead of 70. Instead of 70. But she could still get out on parole or get out on good behavior, community service, those kinds of things to bring it back down, but the end of the day, right now it's 20 years you know that it does not surprise me that she had hardly no injuries.
Speaker 1:The the not at all. Yeah, the guy that hit us, the accident I was telling you about he had a broke nose, was in and out of the hospital in no time and a few days later, once reality hit, he ended up committing suicide and his three or four year old granddaughter found them in a barn, and now she's stuck with that the rest of her life. Yeah, it's just this snowball effect of trauma and just this endless cycle of things that could have been prevented absolutely.
Speaker 2:That's the thing that just sticks with us a lot is how preventable it could have been, because she had 15 or 16 substances in her, in in her body, on her person, in her car and 19 boxes of suboxone strips is like how, how much more can you possibly take? There was a full day dedicated to all the prescriptions and all the drugs that she had with her on her, in a person and in the car. There was a full day dedicated to all of these things. And there was a prescription of I believe it was Alprazolam that had. It was supposed to have 240 pills in it. It was just filled the day before. Had she followed the prescription. At most, eight have been gone, but there were near 78 gone and I know it's like how can you take that many?
Speaker 1:was she selling some for cash?
Speaker 2:that I don't know. They did a fine dance around the defense. The defense did a fine dance around. Just because they were gone doesn't mean she necessarily took them.
Speaker 1:Because either way, it doesn't matter. She was still in the wrong and three people's lives are ended and countless of people now have trauma.
Speaker 2:She had admitted to taking and I forget if it was like an Aleve or an Advil she said when they asked have you taken anything she admitted to? I forget now, but it was one of those two names and the only thing that they found in her car that matched that description was an Advil PM. An Advil or Aleve, but either way, what do you do in taking a PM drug in the morning before driving, like you take that at night, like there's? There were so many inconsistencies with what she said upon first interrogation versus when there was trial examination, cross-examination. There were there's so many inconsistencies. It's like you are so beyond guilty.
Speaker 2:Which also made it quite frustrating is because she never said she was sorry, she never did a plea deal, she never tried to admit or she never showed any attempt of remorse until it was sentencing, because she had already been found guilty. It was already too late. So then came the I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, but the thing that defense kept saying is it was an unfortunate accident that could have happened to anybody and it just so happened to be that Miss Ireland was the person.
Speaker 2:We didn't just go to Walmart say you did it Like you were falling asleep when people, when the police officers were trying to ask you questions on scene. You were literally falling asleep. You couldn't keep your eyes open. We didn't just pick anybody. This wasn't just an unfortunate accident. It's so preventable that it should have never happened in the first place.
Speaker 1:Yeah, has any of her family or anyone tried to reach out to any of the survivors?
Speaker 2:The only contact that I had was with Miss Ireland's mom, and I don't necessarily think this lady is fully aware of what actually happened.
Speaker 2:She was just fed whatever her daughter told her, and she only showed up on the one day that it was the defense's side to share their version of the story. Nobody ever came for any of the other moments, except for when Miss Ireland got up on the stand to share her side of the story. On that day I didn't even know who it was. I later, when I turned around and found out, she grabbed my shoulder and turned me around to give me a hug and said it was just so unfortunate what this terrible accident has done. I didn't know who I was hugging, I was just forced into a hug and then I realized it was her mom. But I don't blame her mom or her family, because they are only believing the information that they've been told. But other than that, no, nobody has reached out, nobody has said anything. I'm sorry. A lot more of it has to do with blaming my brother and just blaming us.
Speaker 1:Oh, blaming the victim, isn't that the way that it works sometimes, and it makes me so mad. The tow truck man, did you say anderson? Yeah, arthur anderson was it the same trial?
Speaker 2:yeah, so it was. The whole trial case was the state versus miss ireland and it was all wrapped up in one case. So it was the three counts of vehicular homicide and then the one count of assault Arthur Anderson was. It was all wrapped up in one case because it was one crash. But yeah, I did get to know his. He had five kids and there were a couple of his kids that he took in because their father had passed away in a similar incident. I think it was two or three of the kids lost their dad and he was the tow truck driver that went to the scene and found him passed away Really unfortunate.
Speaker 2:And then it happens all over again. But you said earlier, it's nice to meet you or nice to see you, but it's unfortunate the circumstances of which we meet, which is like the same thing that we feel towards Arthur Anderson's five children. I've only met three of them, but it's having somebody who somewhat understands what you're going through. It's like it's there aren't really words to describe that relationship. It's really unfortunate that none of us wish that the other was there, but here we are trying to get through it together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you just made the comment of it's nice having someone that you can talk to that understands. Would you mind give us a couple of examples of what you have been told and why this is so important to maybe say to people that are trying to comfort others during their trauma?
Speaker 2:I did have in the courtroom. Some people come up and hug me and say congratulations, what a victory, and I'm going to use these words. You just said it's a chapter of the book closing, but that does not mean at all that it's done. Particularly in our case, we're going through the appeal stage now, even though one chapter is closed and trial is behind us. Our car is still on the police impound lot, it's still wrapped up in all these lawyer accounts and these state like one chapter is closed, but we're just in the next chapter, and so I did make that video last night of some of the things that people find I shouldn't even say comforting, because I don't know really what goes through somebody's mind, but just some phrases that I've heard in which people say that it's like you know what. There might be a little bit more education behind just impaired driving here, but more of the fact what not to say when somebody is grieving or going through these kinds of situations, and so congratulations is probably not one of them that you should say either. Yes, it would have been absolutely terrible had she been found not guilty, but I still don't think congratulations is necessarily the word to use For me.
Speaker 2:In my experience it was more so validating that justice finally came to somebody who deserved it two years ago. And sometimes silence is better than saying the wrong thing. Like even just sitting with somebody getting a tissue for them. How they say actions speak louder than words. Like just sitting with somebody crying with them. You don't even have to say anything Because it's a lot to comprehend, it's a lot of. For us it was only two years. Two years felt like an eternity, but I know that there's some people's cases that take a lot longer than that, and so there's just a lot of anticipation and buildup that just needs to be decompressed and sometimes it can come out in that moment. But it is almost like a shell shock moment, same as when I first found out and when I was first told both your mom and dad are gone. You've got to take a couple minutes and even a couple hours, couple days, couple weeks, whatever it may be, to really let that hit and sink, in that she is guilty and she won't be able to keep walking free, she won't be able to keep and maintain her innocence and trying to convince people that she's being targeted or that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:But some of the other things are quite interesting when people say, oh, they were gonna die anyway, and some of the things that it quite interesting when people say, oh, they were going to die anyway, and some of the things that it's sure that may be the truth, but is that necessarily helpful right now to somebody who is really sad and grieving?
Speaker 2:And one of the things that I really emphasize on my page is grief is normal. Grief is a natural part of our human experience and that could be being happy and excited and then feeling guilty. That you're happy and excited because then you remember that your loved ones aren't here to celebrate with you and then you are feeling sad and depressed and guilty. It is normal and natural to feel every single range of emotions from that happy, excited all the way through sad, depressed, and all of those are part of the grief process. That shouldn't be suppressed or shoved aside or away and that there's no timeline for grief, but having a support system around you of people not trying to dismiss that. Another thing is people who say those kinds of things are quite lucky that they don't understand the impact of the words that they're making.
Speaker 1:And you're so right about the support system. That's exactly why I started this podcast. When I went through the hate crime, I needed to normalize talking about the hard things, because we all have them and if I just kept it all in, I could have turned to drugs and alcohol and become destructive and ended up ending my life somehow whether it was intentional or drinking myself to death or whatever with my attacker's fingerprints all over my dead body, and I wasn't going to give that to him. He doesn't deserve that. I don't deserve that. People ask me all the time what should people do?
Speaker 2:I have always been one to bottle my feelings up, keep them in until there's something that, even if it's super small, just explodes. I've always been that kind of person. But since this it has just been absolutely too much. And why I say that there is no timeline to grief is because now I'm getting to the point where I've been. I think around the year mark. I was getting to the point where people assume that you should be done. You should be over it. It was a year ago.
Speaker 2:Move on and it's you know what I like posting and making these videos because there is no timeline to grief there. There is none. And especially when you have something like this where every week, every month, there was a meeting with the prosecutors, new evidence month, there was a meeting with the prosecutors, new evidence finding out new ways that your parents died, basically, and new crime scene photos and the different metrics that they used to use against and show in trial against the defense it's every single week, every month, fence. It's every single week, every month, when it's just fresh in your head, how can you possibly move forward? I don't like the term moving on, but I use moving forward because there's some things you never move on from you, never move on. But I really try to move forward and I've been getting a lot of time to move on and stop crying.
Speaker 2:But I like posting videos because I see so many comments that just me sitting on the screen and crying and sharing my thoughts for the day and saying, hey, it's my birthday, it's my parents' birthday, it's an anniversary of this or that, or I found this picture and just letting the tears flow and like some tears are just so healing. It is normal to have a good cry, it's normal to have a bad cry, but it's so much better to have a good cry and that's normal and natural and I just I really try to cry. I don't try to cry, but I try and show, like those real and raw moments, that I'm not going to tell you you should be over it. I didn't experience what you went through. I'm not going to tell you to get out If you don't like my content, you can move on but to show that this is what I'm going through after a year and I feel like six months or a year is people's typical timeline that you should be over something.
Speaker 1:I don't think that anyone ever gets over anything. I think that we learn new coping mechanisms. I think we learn how to live in a new normal. I think that we use the life skills and the skills of our support team to cope with the bad. The last thing that I want to say to that is we don't need to put timelines on things. That isn't fair, and the moment that I realized that and I gave myself permission to feel it changed everything, it was very empowering.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I like what you said there about giving yourself permission. Just because I continue to cry over the loss of my parents or thinking about how preventable this was, that's not. That's not Miss Ireland keeping that over me. That's me allowing myself to process things. My chapter with her technically will never be done because she is such a pivotal unfortunately a pivotal part in my life. At the end of the day, she is, but at the same time, I'm good, I'm done with her. I don't need to ever see her again. I don't need to sit next to her again. There was a day when we were waiting on one of the meetings that we had to sit next to each other while waiting on our lawyers, and it's. I don't need to see you. I don't need to. I'm good with you. Let me process and move forward on my own. But that's not to say that she has any hold over me. That's giving ourselves permission to comprehend and cope and process.
Speaker 1:One thing that I love that you're doing is you are bringing awareness, and I think that can make people uncomfortable, right People? Maybe it's someone that has had a DUI. Maybe it's someone that has had a car accident that just got lucky. Maybe it's someone that has even a different kind of trauma that they just hadn't processed and they don't know how, because they haven't given themselves permission and society is telling them to sit down and shut up. There's so many factors that play into it. It takes people like us that are like uh-uh, we're going to talk. Absolutely, I can't speak for you, but we will not be shutting up.
Speaker 2:No, I've cried many times over this kind of thing. I can't let this be for nothing.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I cannot let this be for nothing.
Speaker 1:So my question is and maybe this is something I should have asked sooner, and so forgive me, but would you mind and it's okay if you don't want to, but you've spoken, mr Anderson would you mind to give us your mom and dad's name and then tell us what your goals and plans are with what you're doing, what you're going to do with this advocacy for something that you probably didn't even know you were ever going to have a passion for?
Speaker 2:Exactly. Yeah, I don't even know what I'm doing at this point in time. My mom's name was Karen Stoker, my dad's name was Rick Stoker and my brother's name is Travis Stoker, and that actually was one. That was my opening sentence in my victim's impact statement is here's my mom, here's my dad, here's who they were, and thankfully I'm not talking about my brother Travis, in the past tense, because he was very close to it and this isn't anything that I thought was going to be in my life plan.
Speaker 2:I just started posting videos as a first. It was a uplift for other people and then, like I was saying, I just had to just start letting some of these emotions out, and I saw a lot of positive responses to these kinds of videos of thank you for publicly grieving. I've been afraid to grieve in public. So it's taken a lot of different turns and a snowball effect into advocacy. Advocacy into this is the impact and effects of impaired driving, which on the Anderson side for the tow truck business, inside of things, there was a law passed because of our case and it was an Anderson bill the slowdown move over and it strengthened the slowdown move over law from just the police force into any roadside assistance vehicles, and so that name is in Anderson or that bill is in Anderson's name. But to continue about, I'd like to start making more or talking with people more on podcasts or different platforms, to just extend more than just my platform talking about it but then collaborating with different platforms, and this wasn't even something that I had ever thought of until you mentioned it.
Speaker 2:I have thought about going to our local driver's ed schools because I personally remember when there was somebody that came in talking about the effects of drunk driving and I think a lot of people when they hear impaired driving, they automatically assume drinking and driving. But it could be impaired meaning drinking or drugs or really anything that impairs your ability to make decisions while driving. And so I have thought about going to our local schools, especially when they have proms or homecomings. They usually have two assemblies and they have police come in and sometimes some victims, like families and victims, come in and give speeches at schools and driver's eds. And again, I'm just getting started.
Speaker 2:But this has to mean something, whether it be on the impaired and the driver's decisions in driving or hand your keys over or give somebody a call. There has actually been a comment on one of my videos that said you are the reason why I saw obviously impaired man stumbling across the parking lot to his car and I called the police on him so he didn't go out there on the road. There's so many different avenues that I probably some more that I can't even think of. That has a ripple effect and an impact that I'll just. I'll keep continuing doing what I'm doing and we'll see where it takes me.
Speaker 1:I'm so proud of you and I'm so honored to yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:And I'm so honored that you trusted me and my platform to to come on and share your story and be a part of the podcasting journey. It is hard work and people ask me. Yeah, and people ask me all the time, like David, you're telling your story day in and day out. What does that do for your mental health? And it actually does a lot of positive things for it. I'm connecting with some great people and we're going to change the world, so a question I'd like to end on is what do you do for yourself? When do you allow yourself to have those moments of okay, I want Ashley and Ashley's inner child to just eat ice cream, I don't care what it is. What do you do for yourself?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really funny the million things about eating ice cream. Yeah, ice cream is my dad's favorite thing and absolutely when I scream I feel like I'm connecting back with my dad. It doing things for myself has been a big struggle, not gonna lie. There's been a lot of struggles that I've been and still currently working through. There were a lot of coping skills, such as an artist painting. I love it. I completely gave all of that up because my parents were my number one cheerleaders and so I think, just going back to what helped before and working through those mental blocks, honestly, so far making TikToks has been my physical relief because you are speaking it and physically getting it off your chest.
Speaker 2:That one has definitely made a big impact in my life because I feel as though also I'm being heard. It has completely expanded my inner circle. I've made so many friends and people who understand a glimpse of what I'm going through. I like listening to music and I have an emotional support animal. Ice cream soothes the soul Absolutely.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I've been going live a lot this past week on social media because I cannot allow myself to spiral down, so I need to, for myself, choose the other fork in the road and I go live and I hang out with other people, and the other night a lot of great people joined and lifted my spirits up. But then we also cried a lot together and I let people join and we cry together and we sit in silence together. But I think everybody has their own unique outlet depending on their likes and interests. And some people recommended to me journaling. I don't journal, I'm not disciplined to, I'm not self-disciplined to sit down and write something out every day. But I think everybody has an outlet and exploring what works for you is a great find once you figure out what that is, and there's millions of them out there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, I will end on this will end on this. There were parts of me that I lost. Trying to recover from my trauma. It took a little bit of time, but one day I just woke up and was like I want to do this again and I loved it. It was better than ever. Maybe, when it comes to painting and things like that, you haven't touched in a while. Maybe it's not over. Maybe it's just on pause right now and that's okay. But I want you to remember to take care of yourself, and I know that it doesn't matter how many millions of followers you may end up having or already have. I know that none of them will be as big and powerful as Miss Karen and Mr Rick, but I'm so honored to get to know you and be a cheerleader for you and for them and watch what you're doing to allow this or to prevent, to change to all those things for your community and further and beyond. So thank you for that. Thank you for all.
Speaker 2:If we don't, if we don't know any better, we can't acknowledge any better. Therefore, we're not going to be doing any better. So it just starts with sharing and speaking up and, hopefully, if we all impact three people's lives and they impact three people's lives, it's it grows exponentially.
Speaker 1:So yeah, here we are, and that wraps up another powerful episode of surviving abuse. I want to extend my deepest gratitude to our incredible guests for sharing their transformative journey with us today. Join us next week as we dive into the healing process and share more incredible stories of triumph and resilience.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking a good kiss and a bad goodbye. Now I'm back and I'll pray for you. I'm done hurting you.
