In a Single Moment, with Karen McCord, Carley’s Mom

On this episode, Karen McCord shares her profound experience with grief, following the loss of her daughter Carley, a well known ESPN sports reporter, in a tragic plane crash while traveling to cover the Atlanta Peach Bowl in December 2019. Karen reflects on both the personal and public aspects of her journey through grief, the impact of her daughter's life, and the haunting thoughts she sometimes experienced about outliving Carley. The discussion emphasizes the importance of sharing personal stories to connect with others who are navigating their own grief journeys. Karen also shares how GOD revealed His love, grace, and comfort in very personal ways along her grief journey. Finally, you’ll hear about Karen’s recently published book, “Only Rainbows: The Carley McCord Story”, capturing their family’s grief journey and a very tender tribute to their beloved Carley.

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Transcript

Speaker 0:48

Well, hi, and welcome back for another episode. I'm Greg Buffkin, and I'm glad you've joined us. On this episode, you'll be hearing a conversation I recently had with Karen McCord as she shares her story of losing her precious 30-year-old daughter, Carley, in a plane crash just three days after Christmas in 2019. Carly was a well-known sports reporter and was actually en route to cover an LSU football game when the crash occurred. And as we talk about how Karen began processing and navigating her grief, she shares about the journey she undertook to discover who Carley really was as an adult child. You'll also hear how God met Karen in this dark, painful season and inspired her to write a book entitled Only Rainbows, published in early 2025, which we'll also be talking about a little later on in the conversation. And now here's my conversation with Karen. Well, Karen, welcome to our podcast. It's so good to have you with us today.

Speaker 2 1:51

Thank you. I my honor, my privilege.

Speaker 1:55

I would say the privilege is mine. I'm so glad you could carve time out of your schedule to be with us today because I would love for you to tell our listeners about your sweet daughter, Carly.

Speaker 2 2:10

Well, Carley was a very unique, unique child. That's all I could say. From the very beginning, my husband and I, to give you a little bit of a backstory, was nine years before we could have children. And so after we had Kaylee, Carley was a surprise. And she was a surprise from the beginning all the way to the end. And she was very unique, very funny, very theatrical, but very cool. She always gave the cool girl vibe. And it just she was just, like I said, a very unique individual. She was strong, she was headstrong, she knew where she was going to go in life, and she knew it very early. Now that doesn't mean that she knew that she was going to be an ESPN reporter at the very beginning of her life. In fact, she didn't even like sports until uh college. And so that wasn't necessarily her aspirations, but she always knew that she would be in the spotlight, but she would be in the spotlight to give back. And she always had that maturity of I am going to be a mentor, and I'm going to be a mentor at a very early age.

Speaker 3:29

Yeah, she sounds like she was a bit driven.

Speaker 2 3:32

Yes, very driven.

Speaker 3:33

And you said she was a uh she's a middle child, right?

Speaker 2 3:38

She is. She's the middle child, which is not the unique thing.

Speaker 3:42

No, it's you typically don't hear those characteristics uh in talking about a middle child. So that's that's very interesting.

Speaker 2 3:50

Yeah, well, you know what though, Greg, what was interesting is that I really think instinctively she and I knew that she had to put Cram 30 years of life into 90 years of living. And I'm gonna explain that because once she was born, I always had this feeling that I was gonna outlive her. And it haunted me, Greg. It haunted me for my whole life. And I always would hover over her, and she would always find that she would have to live quickly and she would have to work hard, she would have to get where she was going, she would have to succeed in a very quick manner, and she also had to give back her talents, and she just instinctively gave them back. And I think she had the feeling that she wasn't gonna live long either. And I can't explain it, I just know it or knew it.

Speaker 4:57

I do you don't have to explain that to me. I do understand that because when our son Ryan was, I don't know, probably in his mid-teens, I had this haunting feeling also that I can't explain that we were gonna lose Ryan. And whenever that thought would come, I would try to push it away as quickly as I possibly could because it's such an awful thought. I never shared that with anybody until after he had died, and it was probably, gosh, I don't know, a couple of years after he died. I shared that with my wife, Kathy, one day, and she said, so did I.

Speaker 2 5:48

Really?

Speaker 5:48

And we had never shared that with each other.

Speaker 2 5:51

So And I never shared it with anyone either, not my husband or anything, because I didn't want to put it out in the universe. But on my speaking tours, when I speak about the book, I actually have had people who have lost children who have said the same thing you and I have said.

Speaker 6:12

Yeah, it's interesting. I was talking to with another guest not too terribly long ago, and they expressed something very similar. So so yeah, I do and I say all of that to say I I really do get that, Karen.

Speaker 1 6:27

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 6:28

Yeah. And it's not something that you really can explain to anybody else who hasn't had that experience, can you?

Speaker 2 6:35

No, you can't. And you know, and at first I just kept saying, why would I feel like this over my middle child when I never feel like that with my other kids? And and like you said, I would always stuff it in the background, never talk about it because I didn't want to do that. And I express that in Only Rainbows. I talk about how I had that feeling very, very early on.

Speaker 7:00

Yeah, I think it's good that you that you shared that in the book because I think other there are other people who will be able to relate to that. Karen, as a m you know, grief affects parents in so many ways. It's not just the emotional aspect that other people can visibly see, but there's there's a very powerful impact on us mentally. There's a a physiologic impact, there's a spiritual impact. Yeah. So for you, how did that play out in your life? What what did that impact look like that maybe other people couldn't see, but that you were really wrestling with because of how profoundly losing Carley affected you?

Speaker 2 7:52

It was very uh it was very impactful. And before I address that question, I will say each of us, and when I say us, each of my family members grieved so differently.

Speaker 1 8:06

Sure.

Speaker 2 8:06

My husband went inward. I went outward to write the book, Kaylee went outward, and she started the foundation for Carley and scholarships and that sort of thing. And Carson, my other son, was the rock of the family. He became, you know, the one that kind of held the glue together and kind of held the sanity together.

Speaker 8:30

Now, was he older or younger than Carly?

Speaker 2 8:32

He is actually younger, but he is the only boy, you know, in the three. There were two girls and a boy. So so he assumed the leadership role. And I could just remember struggling with the fact that I had to kind of hold the family together, but yet deal with my own grief. And also I had something that was probably a little bit more unique than a lot of people. And that is that my Carly's death was very public. It was a public death. It was all over the internet, it was all over the television. People knew us from afar as well as within. And so we couldn't go anywhere without people looking at us. And we would quote quote quote say, give us the look. And it was a look of sympathy and a look of, I don't know what I can do for you, but I will pray for you type of thing.

Speaker 1 9:36

Right.

Speaker 2 9:36

And uh, but none of us could go anywhere for a very long time. And in fact, we still can't go in there go anywhere without people thinking that's the family that lost the, you know, Carly in the tragic accident.

Speaker 9:53

How did you deal with that, Karen? Because in in light of the fact that the grief itself, the the death of a child is is such an unthinkable thing.

Speaker 2 10:06

Right.

Speaker 10:07

And it's a very personal thing. Nobody else understands. And sometimes you just, you know, I I know everybody grieves differently, but sometimes you you want to talk about it. Sometimes you want to be secluded away and not talk about it. But when you have the added layer of having to grieve publicly when you left your home, how did you guys process and and and try to navigate through that and still be able to still be able to deal with with it on a personal level? I I can only imagine how challenging that must have been, how hard it must have been.

Speaker 2 10:56

That was very challenging. And one of the things that happened was that there were four other people on the plane when it crashed. And people would tell me, well, why is Carly getting all of the publicity and none of the other people? I I don't know, you know, and nor do I need to know. Right now I'm grieving my daughter and it's impactful. And I can remember looking at some people and going, look, while you are making a judgment, I am picking out urns. While you are talking about this and that and how this should have been handled and that should have been handled, I am picking out pall bearers for my daughter's funeral. And when I would say that, people all of a sudden would readjust. And that is one of the things with public tragedy that you had to deal with that in a private tragedy, you don't have to deal with as much.

Speaker 1 11:58

Right.

Speaker 2 11:59

But I had to really kind of find my inner strength to say, look, that's not appropriate, you know, and please don't put this on on Facebook because there's other side and other people grieving. And when you put when you stand behind a computer and write things, you know, I am feeling it. And please understand that there's a grieving family on the other side of it. And I could address this as well with if you have a school shooting or if you have the flood victims that just recently, you know, lost children in the flood. You know, people say things on Facebook like, well, we should have gun control and we should have this. Well, you know, maybe we should just stop and say thoughts and prayers for a while and give the family time to process it before we get into other political things or other issues. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Speaker 13:00

Yeah, that's not the time or the place.

Speaker 2 13:03

No.

Speaker 13:04

Because what the what the parents are dealing with, the the pain and the and the suffering that that comes with losing a child, the last thing on your mind and the last thing you want to even think about are the social or political issues potentially surrounding that as happens in a public grieving situation like yours. So do you think because of that, because you guys were put in the spotlight like that, do you think it delayed your ability to process your own grief or to begin navigating it in a healthy way, or do you think it that it caused you to have to or it caused that process to speed up? Does that make sense?

Speaker 2 13:54

Yeah, it does. And I I will say it was both. It actually was both. In some ways, it just stunted us because, you know, um my daughter deserved the publicity because I was trying to honor her fac her affiliates and give them news reports. So, in one way, I wanted to honor my daughter because the news media wanted to honor her, the New Orleans Saints wanted to honor her, and all of the NFL wanted to honor her, and as well as the national championship was going to be played. And when you had the national championship, you had all kinds of stories swirling around the plane crash because her father-in-law was one of the coaches for LSU, who's playing in the national championship. Couple that with Joe Burrow's perfect season and the Heisman Trophy, we were the talk of the town. However, it was nice to be the talk of the town because it was nice to see how Carly was being honored by her peers and the love that her peers and the love that the NFL and the college football world gave to her. She worked with Michelle Tefoya, she worked with Aaron Andrews, she worked with Holly Rowe, and so they knew her. And it was nice to see that those people took time out of their lives to honor my daughter. So it was a double-edged sword.

Speaker 15:31

Right. For for you, Carly was your little girl. For these other folks, she was she was a sports reporter and she was a you know a public figure. It's different. Your your world was different than the world that that they were in, but you're all focused on the same thing. And I'm I can only imagine that that for you guys it was kind of difficult going in and out of the personal, the very personal aspect, and then on the other side, the very very public aspects of grieving. So did for you, Karen, did did you struggle with some of those physical aspects of grief, uh grief brain and and and that sort of thing?

Speaker 2 16:26

Absolutely. I I could just always still and I still can go into grief brain, can you?

Speaker 16:32

Yeah. Of course. I don't I I think that's one of those things that you do kind of get move in and out of over over the the course of your journey.

Speaker 2 16:41

Right. In fact, November 1st, of course, is All Saints Day in the Catholic Church. And I I struggled. I just had that grief brain. It was just, I didn't want to talk to anyone. I wanted to just stay in. And I just wanted to be me, you know, and leave me alone. And and yes, some days I, you know, grief brain is so real and you feel like you're in a fog. And then there are other days that you go, I can do this. And as you get further away from the tragedy, of course it lessens, but it still always comes back, you know, and at any given time, I could be in a at a wedding celebrating, and then all of a sudden Carly will pop into my mind. And you just can't get away from that. You could get time does heal, but it doesn't, it time patches up, but it doesn't heal the whole heart. The whole heart is it's got a scar on it, and it'll have a scar for the rest of its life.

Speaker 17:51

Yeah, that that's very true. And I think the healing comes from God. I think the the time, I think the time aspect reduces the acuteness of the pain that we feel and experience early on. But as as we move, as you said, as we move further and further ahead of that early season, it becomes more of a chronic emotion that that can come in and out and in and out. Sometimes triggered by different different things. It could be a smell, it could be a photo that you haven't seen in a long time. It could be somebody saying her name. There's a a myriad of things that can cause those those memories to come flooding back.

Speaker 2 18:39

Yes. I always compare it to arthritis. Some days are good and some days are just darn bad, you know? Yeah. And some days it's just tolerable, and you just go on with it like that. But it is a pain that just kind of never goes away.

Speaker 18:55

You're exactly right. And it's it it's messy, it's unpredictable, it's not for the faint of heart.

Speaker 2 19:03

No, it is not.

Speaker 19:05

You know, there was something that you shared with me when you and I were had a phone conversation a few weeks back. You talked about how not too terribly long after you guys lost Carly, that you you kind of went on a personal journey to try to discover who Carly was as your adult child. Right. And I'd like for you just to talk a little bit about that and what it was you did discover. I mean, you're her mom, you you knew your child better than probably anybody. But what did you discover about her as that adult child that maybe you didn't know before?

Speaker 2 19:49

Well, first of all, and and that's such a good question, and I do remember the conversation in the book, and I keep referring to the book, the book's only rainbows, the Carly McCord story. But in the book, I could remember I wrote a passage in the book saying, I didn't realize my daughter was this well known. Now, how could I not know that she was this well known? Well, I knew she was a sports reporter, and I knew she had a lot of friends and that sort of thing, and I knew she had a visible presence on social media and that sort of thing. But she was Carly to us. She was just our Carly. She wasn't a a famous person. And when the death occurred, all of a sudden, like I said, the media attention and the fanfare surrounding it just took us by surprise. And so I decided very early on, in fact, pretty much the day that she died, that I was gonna find out who my adult Carly really was. And as parents, and you know this as well, you know your children, but you don't know them on a daily basis as when they're an adult. For example, your mom didn't know every friend that you had or every acquaintance you had.

Speaker 21:19

Of course not.

Speaker 2 21:20

And so I set out on a journey to write this book, and when I wrote it, I wrote it from mind, heart to hand. I did not write it with a computer. And it was more like a journal. And I would write a Greg this way and this way and this way, and I would just write little nuggets, and there would be huge tears on the pages that I wrote. And I decided that I was going to go on a journey to interview everyone that I could think of that knew Carly. And this was from the janitors at the Superdome all the way to Sean Payton, to Drew Brees, to Shaq, but I interviewed childhood friends, you know, when they snuck out the room and or snuck out their bedrooms and we didn't know it, or what did they do when they were teenagers that we didn't know? All the way up to Michael Lombardi. Why did you think that she could be a character scout for the NFL? She was the first scout in the NFL, and she scout she wasn't the first scout in the NFL, but she was one of the first female character scouts in the NFL.

Speaker 22:46

Okay.

Speaker 2 22:47

Why did He feels as though she would be good at that job. Because, Greg, she didn't tell me she was a character scout because she was an undercover character scout. Her major was criminal justice with a minor in Spanish. And there's a whole story about how she is, but she couldn't tell us that because she was an undercover scout. I didn't find the extent of that until I interviewed Michael Lombardi for the Cleveland Browns.

Speaker 23:19

I didn't even know there was such a thing.

Speaker 2 23:21

Yeah, there is. And so at the end of this journey, I always say the book began as a tragedy, but it ended as a love story between mom and daughter because I realized how many people she helped and she loved and she held their hand, and how many college students she would say, You can do this. If this is your dream, you can do this. And I fell in love with my adult daughter. And at the end, Greg, I could put my head on the pillow and say, you know, as a mom, I did a good job. You know, I wasn't perfect, but I did my best. And I found joy in that.

Speaker 24:13

And I'm glad that you did. It's, you know, you sometimes I think when we go on those kinds of journeys, you know there's a risk that we might discover something that we didn't know that we'd maybe wish that we had not learned. But in your case, you discovered things about Carly that you didn't know, but they were things that bless you and and gave you joy when you discovered those those aspects of her character and the impact that she had on the lives of other people that that were just, as you said, Carly's your little girl. She's not this for you, she was not this well-known sports caster. Yeah, I I'm glad that you did that. How long did the did that whole process take, by the way?

Speaker 2 25:08

Actually took about four years. Oh, did it? And yeah, and it was very cathartic. It was a very cathartic four years. And I am gonna say, I am not a writer. I am a science teacher by trade. I I was a chemistry and physics and earth science teacher for a very, very long time. And but this was the magic of it. I could feel God writing with me. And it was the act of writing, it was the act of physical writing that actually was a very part of my healing process. And, you know, I'm gonna tell your audience, you of course don't have to put a 400-page book together. I did, and it was it was my miracle, you know, it was God's miracle that I did that because I like I said, I never aspired to be this writer, and here I was on my second book. And it was because of God that both books existed. And but you don't have to write a book, you your thoughts don't have to be perfect, but if you journal it, you can go back and you could see the progress that you made, and you could tell yourself, I am making progress, I am doing better, because look at my writings from the beginning to the end. And uh those are good words. As well as interviewing people, go on a journey and say, tell me about my Ryan.

Speaker 1 26:58

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2 27:01

And tell me about him something that I don't know about him. And because another thing that, yes, you can relate with me is that anytime anybody brings up Ryan, don't you perk up.

Speaker 27:16

Oh, absolutely.

Speaker 2 27:17

And don't you go, oh, let me g let me have that opportunity to speak about my child.

Speaker 27:24

Sure. It's a treasure. Anytime you a grieving parent hears someone else use your child's name, if they ask you a question about them, or if they tell you something, uh a funny story, or something that they did together, those are treasures that that grieving parents absolutely love to receive. And and you're right, you don't have to on your grief journey, and for our listeners, you don't like like Karen said, you don't have to write a book, you don't have to do a podcast, you don't have to start a ministry. If God leads you to do that, that's that's a different story. But I think it is important that we, whether we write it or whether we share our story with other people and let the safe ones, let the safe ones into our grief journey, because not everybody is a safe person to allow in. You have to unfortunately, sometimes it's trial and error, but you have to be able to talk about it and share that grief. I know for my wife Kathy, you were talking about journaling, Karen. For probably the first year after Ryan died, Kathy journaled in the form of writing a letter to Ryan almost every single day, just from mom to her precious boy. And for her, that really helped on her healing journey. So for those of you who are listening today, that you know you're kind of struggling to figure out what I can do to honor my child, or what can I do that that will help me know that I'm making progress, I would I would say try what Karen just shared a minute ago. Write things down, and in six months or a year or two years, you'll look back and you'll say, as hard as that was, I'm so thankful that I'm still on the grief journey, but I'm further ahead than I even thought that I might have been at this point.

Speaker 2 29:44

Right. You could see the progress. And also, if you write it down, you'll remember certain things. And I'm gonna go back to remember you ref referenced grief brain. Grief brain is, you know, this fog, and you forget things, and and you uh you just go, oh, I just didn't remember this, or did I say that, or did it happen, and that sort of thing. And I could remember I was journaling very, very early on, and I wrote it down, and I'm so glad I did, because I would have never remembered this story. And it was when we were picking out Carly's urn. And, you know, what is the worst thing a parent could do is is be introduced to the urn room to pick out an urn for your child. That is a devastating moment. But God put some levity in it that just made me treasure the moment, if if if I can use the word treasure. Yeah. But uh there was this urn and it was horribly, it was like this funky pink, and just the wire was off the bow and everything. And I stopped in my tracks, Greg, and I looked at it and I said, That's the one. Um, and I just had this feeling of that's it, mom. Like Carly stopping me going, that's the one I want. And so I looked at Tracy, who is my husband, and I said, This is it. And he goes, Oh, Karen, let's let's look at some others. And the lady in the urn room was going, let's look at some others. And, you know, they had beautiful angels and crosses and beautiful sayings and everything. And I kept going back to that funky, unique urn. And I looked at the lady and I said, and I looked at Tracy and I said, I hate to be obstinate, but this is it. And I said, Do a lot of people choose this urn? And she goes, No, ma'am. In fact, it's being discontinued because no one has chosen it and it's actually on discount. And I said, sold. I said, my daughter was unique, she was funny, she was silly, and she was a little irreverent. And so this is the urn for her. And so you knew your child. I knew my child. And so the day of the funeral, the lady looks at me and she uh gets the urn out the car, and I go, Oh, it's beautiful. And you know, I it what made me say that, I don't know, because why would it be beautiful? But it looked beautiful to me, and she said, fix the bow for you. I put a new one on there because the other one was just so ratty.

Speaker 32:34

Oh, well.

Speaker 2 32:35

But you know, it was Carly, it was unique, it was different, and it was beautiful. But I wouldn't have remembered that had I not written it down. I was too much into the shock stage, and I would have never remembered it had I not nuggeted it.

Speaker 32:53

Yeah, I I I get that. Uh, you know, I remember, as you described a moment ago, going into a room to pick out an urn for your child. For us, it was going into a room and picking out a casket for Ryan. That's an that's an experience that is such a foreign concept. It's something you never ever imagined that you would be doing, and you're never prepared to do that. For me, I can remember that I lost it in that in that room filled with all these caskets. I mean, we found just the right one that we wanted, but I can remember really not very emotional most of the time. But I can remember just absolutely losing it in that room. And our daughter came and put her arm around me, you know, to provide some comfort. Uh and I will, you know, it's a moment I'll never forget. And those are the things that that sometimes people on the outside who've never been where we have been, where we are. That's one of those things that that's not visible to other people. And they have no idea. Those are the things that we're having to do behind the scenes, you know, plan a funeral, pick out a casket or an urn, and do all of these, all those legal things that have to be done. You know, and and you're in no state of mind to be able to really do that. Somehow you just you just get through it. And I I know for me it was God enabling me to do that. Uh, I mean, it was truly his grace that that allowed us to be able to do what just seemed impossible and repulsive to have to do, you know? Right. Something else I want to ask you about, because uh everybody's journey is different. You know, when something like this happens, when we face suffering and tragedy like like you guys did, we need people in our lives that that can become our support system. People who, even though they may not understand because they may not have been there before, they may not be able to empathize, but they can sympathize and they can be there. We need community. What was that like for you guys? Did you, again, because of the public aspect of all of this, did you guys have close community already in place with people who loved on you guys who didn't try to fix you, who accepted you for who you were and for what you were going through and just loved on you?

Speaker 2 35:56

I I I absolutely did have a lot of community. And of course, my sister offered the beauty of community and the family, and my family's very close, so they offered it to me. And then, of course, I have dear friends Marsha and Susan and Sonia, and you know, I could go on and on and on, but they were always very protective of me and let me vent and talk when I needed to talk to. But interestingly, Greg, and I'm curious to hear your point of view on this. A lot of my community came from people that I didn't even know. And they offered me, I've I've gained a whole bunch of new friends because of this. And I'll tell you a quick story of Christy and Heather and Amy. Amy was my one of my daughter's dear friends. She is the head of Bingo Bells at Tiger Stadium and at LSU Tigers, and she's very well known in the community. And she was actually, she's actually an older lady that Carly actually worked with and just respected and loved. And so Christy was her niece and Heather was her friend. And it was about three years after the event, and they asked me to join them at the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame to help them decorate. And so I went. And the reason why I went is as Carly worked a lot with the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame, and it was one of the things that she really enjoyed covering. So I went and I helped them decorate. And it was the first time, and this was three years afterwards, but it was the first time that we were there that I laughed and not just laughed, but really belly-ached, laughed. And you know, we had a girl sleep overnight, and we just decorated and just had a really good time.

Speaker 1 37:59

Yeah.

Speaker 2 38:00

And I could remember turning to Heather and Christy, who were pretty much virtual strangers at this point. And I turned to them and I said, Y'all, is it okay for me to laugh like this and have a good time?

Speaker 38:16

Did you feel guilty?

Speaker 2 38:17

Yes, I did. And they said, of course it is. And I said, You don't think anybody, everybody's looking at me? Because a lot of people in the town knew Carly because she graduated from there. She was Miss Lady of the Bracelet, which was the queen of the campus. And of course, she did, you know, the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame. And so I said, a lot of people knew me. I said, is it okay to laugh? And they're like, you better laugh. You better find joy. And that was the first time I could really belly ache laugh. And it was with strangers, you know, it was strangers that let me laugh. It wasn't with my close friends, and it wasn't that I couldn't laugh with my close friends, but it was just that I found that spark of joy.

Speaker 39:06

Yeah, and that's so important. I'm glad you shared that because it it is a difficult thing to try to navigate early on because you've uh I I think this is pretty universal. When you s when you have a good day again, and it takes it takes some time. You have a good day, you see something, or you hear something, or somebody says something that makes you laugh. You suddenly feel guilty because you your your thought process is I shouldn't be feeling this good. I shouldn't be laughing when my child is no longer here. It just it almost feels like a betrayal of your child that you could actually bring yourself to laugh or have a good time when they're no longer here. Right. It's such a hard thing to explain to anybody else. So I'm glad you shared that because I know there's somebody listening today who's had a similar experience, and maybe they're struggling with could I be able to do that? Should I be able to have a good day again? And am I a bad person if I do that? Am I a bad parent? And the answer is no, you're not. But it's perfectly normal for you to be able to move gradually back to a point where it becomes more about your child's life and celebrating that life, celebrating all of those memories that you have, as opposed to early on when everything, all of your focus is on their death, that they're not here any longer. And and it takes a while to be able to make that transition. It's not to say that it you know it won't ever happen again, that you know you'll you uh that you won't ever feel guilty again. It it may happen, but that's okay. It's part of the process. So don't don't um don't put yourself down or think negatively about yourself for having those days or having those feelings.

Speaker 2 41:18

Right. And you know, I don't mean a transition, but one of the things that I loved about your podcast is it oh it mentions the empty seat. And and and I uh that is what uh really brought me to your podcast and brought me to start listening to it was the words empty seat.

Speaker 41:40

Empty chair in our case.

Speaker 2 41:42

Yeah, an empty chair. I'm sorry, it was empty chair. I I apologize because that's what it was. It I uh formulated it mine as the empty seat because we always called it Carly's seat.

Speaker 1 41:53

Yeah.

Speaker 2 41:54

But with with uh traditions, I mean, with uh Christmas and the holidays rolling around, and they're gonna roll around uh for the whole year, you know, after Easter around here is uh 4th of July, and then it's the birthdays, and then it's the anniversaries, and you know, so holidays are not just Christmas and Thanksgiving, but you know, the first holidays that you experience, you can't help but just be sorrowful, and you can't help but go inward and just you know be almost suffocated with with emotions.

Speaker 42:31

It's hard.

Speaker 2 42:32

I found the second year was actually harder than the first year for some reason.

Speaker 42:36

A lot of people say that, Karen.

Speaker 2 42:38

Yeah, and I did, and I would look at Carly's seat and we would all sit, no one would sit in Carly's seat, okay? You know, it's like and and by the third and fourth and fifth traditions, we invented new things and kind of changed, instead of doing the same things, we changed the seating pattern so that we wouldn't have to look at Carly's seat. We we went ahead and we did different things, we played different games and we trimmed the tree as a family as opposed to everybody just trimming their tree. And we made new traditions that that showed that our lives could continue on. And so now our our family traditions, instead of saying, oh, Carly sat there, oh this with Carly, oh that with Carly, we would say, Oh, Carly would love this game. Or Carly would laugh at that. And but we would always keep one tradition, and that is I have a big picture of Carly in my in my living room, and we all gather around, but when we take our family picture, we have to take it by that portrait so that she would be in it.

Speaker 1 43:58

Oh, I love it.

Speaker 2 43:58

And so that's kind of our new tradition. So uh so to tell your listeners, evolution occurs in many different ways, and also with your holidays. And like I said, holidays are not just Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, but it goes into Mardi Gras. Well, we celebrate Mardi Gras down here, and she she set Carly loved Mardi Gras and you know, Easter and the rest of the gang. So you need to think about when you make your traditions how you can make it yours again.

Speaker 44:33

So glad you shared that, Karen, because that is something that's very important for uh particularly for those who are in an early season of their grief journey and who are facing any of those. Firsts, because let's face it, there's an entire year of firsts. And it's all those things that you talked about, and there's others. There's birthdays, there's some anniversary of something that you enjoy doing together. There's a myriad of them that you don't really think about until it happens. And each one of those, you know they're approaching. And sometimes the anticipation can be a little more challenging than the actual day itself. But the important part is that you figure out how for you and for your family, or for you and your spouse, to start either start new traditions or to carry on with traditions that that include that you always enjoyed with your child. What works best for you guys. Don't let other people try to tell you that this is maybe maybe not a good idea for you guys. I don't think this would work. Go with what you and your family members talk about. And if that gives you comfort and if it gives you joy, then go with that. Whether it's an old tradition that has to be maybe tweaked a bit or a new tradition, there is absolutely no right or wrong way to do that. It's just a very personal way to do that.

Speaker 2 46:22

Yeah, I would totally agree with that. I, you know, because I could remember this is a funny story when Carly had her birthday. It was the first birthday that she was gone. And I went to her grave site and I bought a piece of cake, and I ate it and said, here, here's a piece of cake that I'm gonna eat for you. And I sang happy birthday. Yeah. And, you know, tears were rolling down my eyes. Well, ever since then, I I I decided to get a little clever and I bought an angel food cake. And I said, I are you eating angel food cake up in the sky while I'm eating it with you, you know. And uh so those traditions, like you said, they don't come automatically, but you'll see them, you'll you'll see yourself forming those little new traditions and then them evolving, those traditions evolving, and then you can find some little bit of humor in, you know, the angel food cake as opposed to the red velvet cake, and and you know, and and you could see yourself evolving. And once again, you could see yourself grieving, but grieving while you're improving as well.

Speaker 47:42

Yeah. And, you know, for those of us who are in a relationship with with Jesus, we can grieve with hope.

Speaker 1 47:51

Yes.

Speaker 47:51

And that is so important because hope's not a concept. Hope is a person, and that's Jesus. So let me ask you one last question. Karen, what have you learned about God that you didn't know about him before you lost Carly?

Speaker 2 48:07

That he's always with you, no matter what. And I am going to say he has now shown me that he will always be there. He loves me, and that even though Carly died, she's still living. And I'm gonna end it with this story if this is okay with you. And this, of course, has to do with your question, but you're gonna have to stay with me a bit. I went to grief counseling after Carly died. We all did. I I personally don't think I could have done it without grief counseling.

Speaker 48:49

Wise decisions.

Speaker 2 48:50

Unfortunately, yeah. Unfortunately, it was through Zoom because it was 2020 and we were farther isolated because of COVID. You know, all of those factors just really hit us very hard in a number of ways that, you know, we don't have time in this podcast to discuss. But my grief counselor was talking to me just like pretty much like you and I are speaking right now. And she looked at me and she said, Karen, what day in your life would you would you change? And I said, Well, you know what day I would change. And she goes, Stay with me. There was one day in your life that you could change and do again, what day would it be? And I said, I would change December 28th, 2019. And she says, What would you have done differently? And I said, Well, first of all, I would have the night before Carly told me that she was afraid to get into the plane. So I should have stopped her. And she goes, Really? Would that have helped if you would have stopped her? And I said, No, she's headstrong, you know, and no, she would have gone anyway. But I would have slashed her tires on December 28th. I would have crashed her car December 28th. I would have hung on the plane's wings if I had to to stop that plane from going up. She goes, Ah. So you would have played God. And I said, No. I would have played mom stopping the plane. She goes, Karen, don't you think God could have done all of those things? Don't you think God could have stopped that plane? And I said, Yes. And she goes, Karen, stop playing God. It wasn't yours to change. It was her time.

Speaker 1 50:49

How profound it is.

Speaker 2 50:51

Deep, deep in my soul. I knew she was right. And I could feel the guilt melting like butter because I'm not God. It was her time. I have to accept it. And if I believe in God, which I do wholeheartedly, I know instead of a microphone down here, she has a skyline up there. She's very happy. And one day I will get to see her again. And I put my head down at that moment and I said, God, thank you. Thank you for letting me see my daughter graduate high school. Thank you for letting me get her college see her get her college degree. Thank you for letting me see her achieve her goals as a sports reporter. Thank you for letting me walk let Tracy walk her down the aisle. Thank you for letting her meet Steven and get me married. I wasn't supposed to see children, grandchildren. But you know, thank you for 30 years. It was my honor and it was my privilege. And it's now time for you to do the detergent, use your tie detergent in heaven and wash her clothes because I'm done.

Speaker 52:15

Oh, wow, that is almost have no words. What a gift. What a gift you were given that day. What a gift. And thank you for sharing something that's so personal. I think when we lose a child, we realize that the control that we thought that we had in their lives was only an illusion to begin with.

Speaker 2 52:40

Only an illusion. Yeah.

Speaker 52:41

Yeah. Yeah. It's only an illusion. It's really hard trying to play the part of God when we're not God.

Speaker 2 52:48

You're exactly right. And you have to be let God be God.

Speaker 52:52

You do, because He is such a good father.

Speaker 2 52:56

Yes, He is.

Speaker 52:57

Karen, thank you so much for all that you've shared with us today and for giving us a glimpse into your journey over the past six years. Thank you for sharing your daughter with our listeners and with me today. She sounds like somebody I would love to have met, and I'm sure that a lot of our listeners would have loved to have met as well. Karen mentioned her book several times throughout the our conversation. And for those of you who who didn't have a chance to write it down, I will include, I will include that in her uh episode description. And again, it's called Only Rainbows, the Carly McCord story. And if there is any anything else that you would like for me to include in that that description, Karen, I will be more than happy to do that if it's a link or whatever it might be. So you guys can can check that out when you know when you listen, you can go back to that uh summary and and check those things out. For those of you who have joined us today, if you if you have any comments, if you have any questions related to to Karen's story, there is a link in the episode description that you can click and either leave a comment, you can ask a question. And the other option is you could you could leave a review on Apple Podcast. We love to hear from our listeners. We thank you as always for for listening, and we look forward to having you back with us in two weeks.