Richard Riordan Interviewed by Susan Whitmore My name is Dick Riordan , and my former wife, Genie, and I had five children—four daughters and a son. My son was killed in a scuba diving accident picking up shellfish to cook for his friends 21 years ago, and my daughter died of a heart attack when she was 19 about 19 years ago. My daughter’s name is Carol, and my son’s name is Billy. Billy loved to cook. So he would go out in the early mornings in a shallow bay and pick up shellfish to take home and cook for his friends. One morning 21 years ago, he went out in this bay, in about 15 or 20 feet of water, and he died there. Even so, we buried Billy at sea because he wanted to have his body recycled if anything ever happened to him. Of course, we never […]

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Shana Feste, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, and Wendell Whitmore Interviewed by Susan Whitmore “The Greatest” Written and Directed by Shana Feste   Susan: Did you always want to be a writer? Shana: I don’t know how I could not be a writer. It feels like something I need to do, even though the process is always painful for me. Writing “The Greatest” was a very painful process. I kind of fall in love with the characters I write, and I want to take care of them and make sure they are taken care of. Susan: You wrote the screenplay and you directed it. What attracted you to taking a risk of doing such an honest story about the death of a child?. Most people don’t take risks like that. Shana: I think it was all of the personal stories from parents that I had read about that really intrigued me about the grieving process, […]

Dr Jack Jordan Interviewed by Susan Whitmore Susan: You have co-authored three books on the subject of suicide: After Suicide Loss: Coping with Your Grief; Grief After Suicide: Understanding the Consequences and Caring for the Survivors; and the latest book coming this Fall, Devastating Losses: How Parents Cope With the Death of a Child to Suicide or Drugs. Why did you begin doing bereavement work in the first place? Dr. Jordon: I’ve been a grief counselor for most of my professional life and was then drawn to suicide survivors 15 years ago. I started as a family therapist and then got into grief and bereavement for several reasons. First, my father died of cancer when I was in my mid-20s, and that was a life changing experience. Also, when I was young, I thought of becoming a minister and was interested in spiritual issues. So that side of my personality was drawn to […]

Marylou Falstreau Interviewed by Susan Whitmore What inspires you to creat a particular card? Ultimately, every “Women and the Hourglass” image is a reflection of the place I am holding in my own life. The first creation in the series, “One day she woke up and discovered she’d grown wings,” was an acknowledgement of a turning point in my life. I had navigated my way through a pretty significant storm and was worthy of a medal, I believed. “Wings” seemed to be the most appropriate symbol at the time. The next in the series was “One day she woke up and decided to love herself more than she ever thought possible,” and I have since learned that everything good comes from making this powerful decision. Can you tell us a story or two about some images that are especially meaningful to you? Oh, there are so many. Actually, each one […]

President and Founder, KlaasKids Foundation, Inc. and Beyond Missing Interviewed by Susan Whitmore S: Please tell us a little about you and Polly. M: My name is Marc Klaas, and I am the father of Polly Klaas. Polly was 12 years old when, on the evening of October 1, 1993, a bearded stranger wielding a knife broke into her room while she was having a slumber party with two of her girlfriends. He threatened the girls’ lives and told them that if they made a noise he would slit their throats. And then he kidnapped my daughter. We spent 65 days searching for Polly before learning that a recidivist violent offender, only recently paroled, had kidnapped and murdered her within two hours of her abduction. He told his cell mates before getting out of prison that he would avoid AIDS by getting “a young one.” That was his form of “safe […]