“It is what it is. I’m going to live here out loud.” Cheryl Scruggs joins Tina Fornwald for a raw and vulnerable conversation about navigating the turbulent waters of a mother’s grief. After experiencing a series of devastating losses, including the passing of her daughter, Stephanie, Cheryl opens up about her struggles with mental health, suicidal thoughts, and the complexities of grieving multiple losses at once. She shares her journey of healing, the importance of finding your community, and how her faith has guided her through the darkest of times. Cheryl also discusses her book, Surviving Grief, and her podcast of the same name, where she shares her story and offers support to others who are grieving. This episode is a powerful reminder that even in the face of immense pain, there is hope for healing and that by embracing vulnerability, we can find strength and connection with others.

I am sharing my experience of loving the same man for 32 years, a mother to two adult children, a retired military officer, a breast cancer survivor, and my connections with others.

Anyone experiencing suicidal thoughts should reach out to a suicide hotline or local emergency number in their country: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/suicide/suicide-prevention-hotlines-resources-worldwide

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Watch the episode here

Listen to the podcast here

A Mother’s Grief: Finding Strength And Healing After Loss With Cheryl Scruggs

Cheryl, welcome to the show.

Tina, thanks for having me.

When you hear Welcome to the widowhood, what really comes to your mind?

Women who have lost their spouses.

Thank you. You’re like, do I fit in? Is this a space for me? I appreciate the organic and transparency. For everybody, I am still getting over bronchitis. I have tea and I am trying not to sound like my fictitious character, which is Marge. This has been smoking six packs of cigarettes a day because when I start coughing badly, that is what it is. Sure enough, I’ve had this conversation planned and I’m committed. Be patient and be kind and don’t tear me apart in the ratings. Cheryl, you bring up a good point.

Thank you for mentioning that. When we came up with a name for this organization, the term widowhood was to cover the entire community. I’m from Chicago. Hood means family to me. I am the widow of origin in this organization, but my children, my family, my friends, when one person passes, that relationship of every other person connected to it, somebody else, like when my husband passed, his parents would have been impacted from his passing, his siblings would have been impacted, his nieces and nephews.

Even though it was the widow experience, me, but the entire hood was impacted. As we get into your conversation, hopefully, that idea of me explaining this is you’re in that hood from the perspective of the person that you have lost. In the same vein, I’m actually going to speak with the board members about considering changing the name or using the DBA because if I have to explain it, that’s too much.

I want people to organically feel like they’re connected and know that they have a place here. Me explaining that to you hopefully gives a sense of how you do belong in this conversation but it’s like, when you’re already grieving, you ain’t got time for extra explanation. I need to have known already. We’re looking to change that, but it is intentional to support the hood. That is all of us that are grieving. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share that with you. Now that you hear the name of it, what do you think when I say welcome to the widowhood?

When you said widow, even if you didn’t have the hood, that automatically takes me to somebody who has lost somebody who’s grieving. The hood just includes everybody that’s in the midst of the grief. There’s a widow, there’s a cousin, there’s a child, there’s a parent, there’s a cousin. The hood just ties it all in. The widow is grieving, but so are we collectively, we’re all grieving.

Where are you located physically right now in the world?

Right now I’m in Maryland. I just moved from Georgia about three months ago. I moved because I wasn’t doing too good mentally and physically. I went from a size 14 to a size 2. I think I’m grieving so many different things not only the loss of my child, but a relationship. I lost my job seven days before I lost her. It’s been a lot. I had no family down there. The guy who I was seeing, he was there. Anyway, I had no family there. It was just me and my grandkids. I was crashing. I was walking 20 miles a day, not eating just so I wouldn’t have anxiety and panic. It was a mess. Now I’m in Maryland and I’m healing and I’m at a size six now and I’ve gained some weight. The anxiety isn’t as bad. I still have my days, but it’s getting better.

Thank you for sharing. I’d like to go back and dive into each one of those things that you mentioned a little bit more. I am sorry for the passing of your daughter. Your daughter’s name, would you share it with us, please?

I’m Stephanie Scruggs.

Stephanie’s Passing

Stephanie. When you think of Stephanie, you just started smiling. What are the thoughts that when you think of her comes to mind?

Stephanie was so confident. No matter what she put on, and one day she came home to my mom’s house and she had these long locks down to her feet. She was just in my mom’s kitchen and she was my mom was like, “Girl, if you would sit down and stop swinging that hair.” She was just so confident and Stephanie, as a child, always was my neat freak. Like she was very clean and she hated things out of order. She had two girls and a boy, and when they would get on her nerves and wouldn’t clean up, it would drive her crazy.

She was hilarious. You almost had to hold onto your seat because you were afraid of what she was going to say because she spoke her mind. It’s like if you don’t want her to say anything, please don’t do it around her. She was just very outgoing and just a ball of energy. She was my second oldest of six. I had four girls and two boys and she was the second oldest. Stephanie was a character. That’s all I can say. I miss her so much.

The way you light up. I’m going to ask you something. Do you still speak to Stephanie now?

I do because there are days when I’m angry with Stephanie because I have custody of her kids now, her two girls, my grandson is in New Carolina with his dad. Yes, I’m angry with Stephanie. There are days that I’m okay, and like Stephanie, “I miss you.” I finally was able to go visit her grave site. My granddaughter wanted to go on her birthday, so we went. My granddaughter had been wanting to go, but I couldn’t bring myself to go. I was like I cannot be selfish because they lost their mom. This is not only about me but I had to make sure that their needs are met mentally.

We went and it was hard. It’s funny because my granddaughter texted me yesterday from school and was like, “Can we go? I want to go see my mom.” I was like, “Not today because of traffic.” She got out of school. “When can we go?” I was like, “I’ll let you know.” Mentally, I have to get myself together because when I go, I feel like I’m leaving her again. Although I know I cannot take her with me. I know she’s gone but I feel like on some level I’m letting her down. I know before she died, she was depressed and she was sad.

I saw that and she became a different person. I took the girls and thought she would get herself better but I feel like I also let her down because maybe I should have taken her with me too. I struggle with I feel like I let her down. Like I didn’t fight hard enough to get her better because she started using drugs. She became a different person, of course, and she wasn’t taking care of girls like she was supposed to. I stepped in, but I also feel like I should have just taken her in. I don’t know, but it bothers me. I wrestle with that.

I talked to Stephanie. I’m like, “Stephanie, I’m mad at you today.” After this, “I miss you.” I got many videos and she loved to sing. I got all those videos and I listened to them. Some days I smile and some days I’m just so angry because I just miss her. I guess I just miss her. The last time I saw her was Mother’s Day, 2023. I relived that day over and over and over and over because I felt like I should have just taken her home with me and did something. I also know that people who get on drugs, they have to want to get the help. You can do everything under the sun, but until they’re ready, then just nothing you can do. That’s my girl.

People that get on drugs had to want to get help. You can do everything under the sun but until they're ready, then it's just nothing you can do. Share on X

Thank you for sharing that. I don’t know if you’ve heard this, but I have that people say, “You shouldn’t be mad at somebody that’s not here.” I feel like people who make those statements have not been in a position where they are having true feelings as we’re wrestling with our person that is not here. If you were to bump into someone in the laundromat and they have a daughter who passed, and they say that they’re mad at her, but they don’t feel like they have the right to say it out loud. What would you tell?

You have every right to say it out loud because you feel how you feel. I think so many people, because of where grief can take you, are afraid to express themselves and speak out loud because they’re scared of what family is going to say and what people are going to say. No, you feel how you feel. You’re entitled to feel how you feel. If saying that out loud helps you, then by all means, say it out loud because that’s not them, they’re not in your shoes. Until somebody is actually there, then please don’t tell me how to feel about my child that I’ve lost, that I carried in my womb for nine months, that I nurtured and taken care of.

From your own experience, did you find it better when you let it out or keeping it in?

I found it better to let it out. I have this thing now where I’m healing out loud. I think for so long I carried that and a turmoil, so to speak. I was worried about what the family was thinking, what people were thinking because mine started with weight loss. My granddaughter pointed it out to me that I was letting people know. I was great when I lost the weight because I didn’t want people to ask me, “You lost so much weight.” I would say it before somebody could ask me or somebody could say something about my weight.

I don’t really care.  I’m grieving. I’m getting through something. It is what it is. What’s happened has happened. If you don’t understand, I make no apologies for how I feel about nothing that I went through. I went through it. Some things I can learn a lesson from and some things it has strengthened me to become the person that I’m becoming. That’s life. I also realized that life is not only life and for sure, but so many other people.

I always ask God, I tell them on Facebook, and I say, when I get up in the morning, my first prayer is “Lord, don’t let me break before my breakthrough because I recognize the space that I’m in and I was been suicidal. I’ve been not eating for days and weeks at a time and not even recognizing that I wasn’t eating. It just became a way of life for me and my body had adjusted to it.” It is what it is. I take it one moment at a time instead of one day at a time, because sometimes it’s those moments that you got to get through. That’s pretty much how it is what it is.

Navigating Different Griefs

You bring up a point that I actually wanted to ask you about and you talked about how different family members feel in grieving the same person. As you mentioned, your daughter that you carried in your womb and for her not to be here, and then at the same time, caring for your grandchildren who have lost their mom, and then other family members. How do you manage or navigate the complexity of different people’s grief as you’re housing your own?

With the girls, I started out us having dinner together, just sitting at the table and, because they were with their mom a lot, of course. We would just sit around the table and talk about stories because they always have a story about their mom. We would just sit around the table and talk about that. Talk about the things that their mom did, all the fights that they have seen, and different things and just the stories.

Of course, that’s their mom and they don’t want to have to deal with it alone. I didn’t want them to feel like, because I’m grieving, I lost my child in the space that I’m in that they cannot talk about their mom. I made that a thing for us to talk about their mom. My baby granddaughter, Janaya, she just turned fifteen. She posts her mom every day to a song or something. That works for her. I think last night I told my best friend and my friend Tony that last night was the first time that I actually went to bed at a normal time and slept all night because I don’t sleep.

Girl, talk about that, the lack of sleep.

I do not sleep. Usually, if I get up, If I go to sleep at 6:00 in the morning, I’m up by 10:00, or 11:00 and then I’m up to the next day. Last night I slept, slept, but sometimes I will be scrolling on social media and my granddaughter has this long video and songs to her mom and it just takes me to a place and I break down and I’m no good. I got to get up and I’m just crying and I’m crying and I’m crying. I know she needs to express how she feels. Me and her were on FaceTime the other day and I was helping out with something and she said, “Grandma, look, I found the text that my mom sent me.”

It was like the last text her mom sent her before she passed. We just talked about it and we laughed about it and I let her know, “It’s okay.” Sometimes she’s angry. Her sister, Juju, is 17. She doesn’t talk about her mom as much, but when she does it’s always a story or something her mama did to piss her off that she didn’t like. I like to give them that space. I did a podcast one time, like my 10th podcast, and I think it’s called The In-Between, and it was dedicated to siblings who have lost. My boys don’t say much about their sister, but my girls they post because they were it was always together.

They like stairsteps. I think the oldest and Stephanie was born eleven months apart. Danielle and Jay were her and Stephanie in December of ‘88. They’re like in the same year. All my kids are stairsteps. They were always together. You’ve seen one, you’ve seen the other. You’re going to fight this one, you going to have to fight all of them type thing. I’ve realized that when mothers are grieving or people lose children when people send out condolences, of course, I don’t think people think too much about the siblings and the grandparents.

Like you said, the hood it’s the children, the siblings, and the great-grandparents, because my mom is still here and they got aunts and uncles and 2000 cousins. I tried to check on everybody, and I noticed that I went so deep into my depression and despair that I got away from that. One of my daughters said one time, “We lost her too.” It just made me think like, I’ve been so concerned with my own grief that I haven’t taken the time to check on her siblings to make sure that they’re okay. I felt bad about that because I never knew that grief could take me to this space.

I would like to share a story with you that I can relate to that. Thank you for sharing that. When my husband passed, we were on vacation together and he had a massive heart attack in our hotel room. I was understandably shaken in a way that I never knew grief could take you to a place like that. My son was already in the military and my daughter was leaving to go to the military a few months after her dad’s service.

It had been about three months after Mark passed and I was looking at the text thread between my children and me, and it was silent because I was so gone and so trying to fight for my life and trying to understand a world where he no longer existed. Even though in my head, I knew they lost their father, I didn’t have anything to give them because I was struggling myself. About six months after he passed, we got together for Christmas, I was able to see them. I apologize that I was in my own space, in my own grief, in my own devastating life, I didn’t have anything to give anybody else.

I wished that I did because like your daughter said, not only did they lose their father, but for those six months they lost their mom too, because I was not showing up in life in the way in which they were accustomed to me showing up. At the same time, life is different than what it was. I cannot show up because I’m not who I was then when their dad was here. Even though you have your other children, I would dare guess Stephanie’s absence from this reality, this world we’re in has impacted how you live life and who you are as a person.

Impact Of Stephanie’s Absence

Yes, very much so. Me and my husband at the time, we had our four girls and two boys, and we had an adopted daughter. She was my oldest daughter’s friend in high school, and she just become part of the family, and we love her dearly. We have seventeen grandkids and a great-grandchild. We’ve been divorced for ten years, but my take on life as I’ve raised my kids, and my oldest granddaughter has lived with me and she’s gone off to college and God is blessed. Now she’s a nurse, she’s working in a hospital.

My thought process was, “I’m finally going to live my life. I’m finally going to take care of Cheryl and do something for Cheryl.” That didn’t happen. Stephanie before she died, I took the grandkids because I wouldn’t have felt good, me trying to live a good life in there struggling because their mom is struggling. At one point I felt selfish because it wasn’t anything that I wanted to do. In my head, my thought process was, I’m going to take the kids, Stephanie gets better and then she can have the kids back. That didn’t happen.

I felt myself,  “Here I go again.” During the process of getting the funeral arrangements together and in my head, I was like I got the kids for good because the kids didn’t want to be with anybody but me. I was like, “Jesus, this is not what I want to do. I want to take care of myself because I don’t know what it is to live alone or be alone or just take care of Cheryl.” Actually, I’m having to learn how to take care of myself in the midst of everything that’s going on. If I’m honest, I don’t know how to take care of myself.

I’ve taken care of others for so long and making sure everybody was good. All of this, the depression and the weight loss, and everything that I’ve been through has made me realize that “You’ve taken care of everybody else and not yourself, and look where you are.” Part of me feels selfish because I do want to just take care of myself, but I also know that my granddaughters need me too. Of course, I’m not going away. I’m there for the long haul because that’s just who I am.

In the midst of my mental decline, I went to church and my pastor was like, “I know you don’t want to hear this, but God told me to tell you, the girls belong with you. If you take care of them, he’s going to take care of you.” I’m like, “Really God because my mental health ain’t the best. You asking me to do this and I’m a mess and I cannot do this. I don’t have a job and actually, I still don’t have a job.”

That’s depressing and I’m like, “God, you said that if I do, you were going to do it.” I’m learning to understand God also on a whole other level. It’s teaching me to trust not only in God but in mankind again. This has been a journey that I wouldn’t wish upon anybody. I lost my dad and my aunt just passed not too long ago. I lost people along the way, but I’ve never experienced grief like this. I say I survived the loss, but the grief, that’s a whole nother state.

I cannot even explain the inner turmoil that I feel. I guess because not only was I experiencing the loss of her, and my relationship, I also lost my job, and then seven days later, her dad called me. I just got the call, “Stephanie, she’s dead, she’s gone.” I was home by myself and I was like, “Did you just say she gone?” For weeks I couldn’t sleep because I kept replaying that over and over and over and over in my head. I’m like, I don’t know. There’s something that I cannot describe to anyone. It’s hard.

You mentioned, and I would agree. I resonate with the word inner turmoil. You also mentioned about when your daughter and your granddaughter and her posting and the breaking down. Were you afraid to break down the first time like you may have lost yourself there?

I think originally I went into it because when we got the phone call. They were in North Carolina with their granddad for the summer. My sons went and got them from over my daughter’s house. I was on FaceTime and their granddad was trying to tell them, but he couldn’t. He broke down. I had to be the one to tell them. I think I was home alone and then my sisters came and my best friend came. When the girls got home, I went into grandma mode. I put all my emotions and feelings to the side because I got to make sure these girls were okay.

I cannot let them fall and crumble. I didn’t realize that I wasn’t grieving because I was just hell-bent on making sure that the girls were okay without thinking for myself like I figured I’d be okay. Of course, my mom was checking on me and like, “I’m okay.” My sister stayed with me for a while. I remember breaking down a few times but I’m like after the girls get here, I just got to be strong grandma, sure, and just get through this. In hindsight, I wish I would have just whatever, let’s all grieve together, no matter what that looks like. I didn’t do that because I didn’t want them to see me fall apart.

Let's all grieve together, no matter what that looks like. Share on X

Actually, I hate to say it, but they saw me fall apart in the worst way because I was depressed and they saw the weight just fall off me in no time. It got worse as it progressed, but they stuck by me. The girls, they teenagers, of course, they drive you crazy, but they have stuck in there. No matter what they’re like, “Grandma, we just want to be with you.” I’m like, “Get it.” I love them to death. Like I said, they are teenagers, I’ve been there before. In hindsight, I wouldn’t have just made sure they were okay. People making sure I’m okay and I’m telling them I’m okay. The girls would see I’m okay.

It is interesting, I’m going to say from the community in which we are in, that language that is inherently built into us about putting on this strong persona, even when we are falling in part and not being given permission to not be okay.

I think for most people it’s about image. When I post on my Facebook page, I’m very transparent because one thing I’ve realized is that where I’m at in my life, my mental journey, rebuilding. I’m like, “God cannot bless for one who I pretend to be.” Two, I did a podcast last week called A Surrendered Yes. I realized that “God had required some things of me.” I said, “God, I’m going to do this thing.” I realized that I had given God part of it, but I didn’t give him all of it. I surrendered but I hadn’t given him that full yes, because I tell them often that I am the person that I’m going to figure it out.

I know that in the space in my life, God is just saying, “Cheryl, just trust me. You’ve been trying to figure it out and it hasn’t worked too well. Can you just give it to me?” I lost my car recently because I don’t have a job. God blessed me to get my car back, thank the Lord. I posted a picture on Facebook, this is me now, and this is me today, of my daughter’s friend. I had a body for days, I was barely living on this side. Since then I’ve been very transparent. I’m like, “It is what it is. I’m going to live, hell out loud. I’m going to live my truth. This is what happened.

This is what is happening. Today, I didn’t feel like living. I feel suicidal. I don’t want to be here. I’m hurting from the relationship. I love this man. He did me dirty. There are days that I still love this man. Do I want God to fix it? Absolutely, but that’s up to God.” I make no apologies for how I feel. It’s how I feel. “You all, I lost my car today. Yes, I’m not in a good mood today. You all, today is not a good day. I’m feeling like this, I’m feeling like that.” It’s crazy because the more transparent I am, the more other people are being healed by my story.

My pastor told me Sunday, he said, “Your healing is going to come from your story of healing other people.” I’m saying to myself, “Personally, Lord, I don’t want a story. Lord, I don’t want a story. I want to be whole. I put a bunch of pictures. I put like nineteen pictures on Facebook the other day of me when I was smiling and I had to wait and I was on vacation and I said, “I miss her.” My caption was, “I miss her, but I wonder how much of her was unhealed.” Before the death of my daughter. How much of me in those pictures where I’m smiling and I’m on vacation with this man I love and I’m out with my friends, how much of me was really unhealed?

I told them, “I’m glad that I recognize the parts of me that got me where I’m at. I can take accountability for some places that I’m at in my life because I’m realizing when God says, “Let go.” He’s saying it for a reason. We human, we want love and we want what we want, we tend to ignore what God says. That’s me. He was saying, “Let go of the relationship. Trust me.” I was like, so trying to manipulate God to do my own thing. That was me. God was saying, “If you just let me do what I need to do.”

I just kept on my way and God said, “Since you cannot, let me take care of this for you.” Did it hurt? Yeah, it hurt. Now I can sit and I can understand as far as the relationship and stuff go, why God has taken me down this path that I’ve been on. I can appreciate it because of the person that God is making me. It doesn’t feel good, but I know it’s going to work for my good. I’ve had to learn some harsh lessons and it is just unfortunate that it all happened at the same time.

That perfect storm. Thank you for mentioning that again, because even though we both know grief can obviously be a result of a loved one passing. There are other things that we grieve in this life. I want to share this. You lost a job.  You lost a relationship that you thought that this was going to be the man that you would spend your life with. You lost your identity in that relationship, in the job, and a sense of financial security, and then Stephanie passes. I feel like, back to the thought, we can handle it. I can handle the dude. He ain’t going to be here no more. I can find me another job and we learn how to cascade through that.

The pendulum stops when a loved one close to us dies and all the other things we were able to hold up and do it all comes crashing down. I wonder if the people in our community or the people that are around us really understand the rippling effect of all the things that we are grieving. They’re thinking, and I don’t say this lightly, it’s not just that person, it’s everything on top of it. As your children may say, “Mom, I’m right here. I know Stephanie’s gone, but see me.” The weight of everything else has just spiraled out. I can see how that created the onset of all that. You talked about mental well-being. Has therapy been a part of your healing journey or mental wellness, what does that look like for you?

Healing Journey

I’ve talked to a few people, but I was in therapy for six months before Stephanie died. I was in therapy already. Of course, I lost my job, so I lost my insurance. I was just winging it. I got my prayer part in that church and God has placed her in my life and God has given her wisdom beyond her years. It’s been helpful but in my mom, I thank God for my mom. I’ve talked to the suicide hotline more often than not. They called and checked on and I promised myself I was going to get into some therapy. That’s what I’ve been working on.

I haven’t been as diligent as I should be in working on getting into therapy, but when I felt myself really slipping, that’s when I created the podcast and I wrote the book to keep me going. I know I have at least fifteen journals and they would be lying around everywhere in the car. When my mind started going, I could write in my notes and my phone, it’s packed just to release whatever I was feeling because the anxiety and the panic attacks it was horrible. This is one promise that I made to myself.

After the demise, and the breakup of the relationship, I told God, “I’m not going to seek out anybody else. I’m not going to try to get under nobody to get over somebody.” I said, “I’m not going to God gave me a tribe. I got to be a tribe to my friends.” When I move back, they take me out every now and then make sure I eat, and try to lift my spirits. I’m blessed because they understand whatever state I’m in. They say, “Get you some friends that can understand you in all seasons. The broke seasons.

The sad season.” God has really given me my people but I told God that I didn’t want to go out all the time and find a man. I’m committed to my healing. I told God that this is what I’m going to do no matter how much it hurts, no matter what it takes. Is it easy? It’s not easy. My daughter said to me one day, I said, “I’m not going to talk to anybody. I need some space.” I think she was upset because like you said, they need you too. I don’t think I was able to be that mother to them. She said, “This grief isn’t all about Stephanie.”

I was upset because like, I never said that the grief was all about Stephanie. I know that I’m grieving. The job, their loss of relationship, the someone I love, and my daughter. I don’t think they understand that everything just came all at the same time. When Stephanie died, I knew about some things happening in a relationship, and that’s when I should have let him go, but I loved him and I didn’t want to lose somebody else. I decided to hang on and fight and fight and fight. God was saying, “Let go, sure. Let me fix it for you.” At that point, we don’t talk about when we’re angry at God and why.

It was on my list but go ahead. You can jump in. It was coming up.

You saying, “Let go of the relationship and let you fix it, but you didn’t fix my daughter. My daughter died. I didn’t understand why God wouldn’t give her another chance, just fix her.” I didn’t understand that. I went to church and my pastor said, “I know you don’t want to hear this, but God has given her a rest. You don’t know what she was going on, dealing with out in the streets. You don’t have to worry about anymore where she’s at, what she’s doing.” I had two other daughters that were on drugs.

I thank God that God like he delivered them. They’re working, they’re doing good. God has blessed them. I was telling my oldest daughter, I say, “I don’t think you all understand the post-traumatic stress that you guys put on me.” I was here in Maryland, their dad lives in North Carolina, but I was going out looking for them. I was always afraid that I was going to get that call. In Baltimore, I was living in Frederick, but they were living in Baltimore. Baltimore has so many abandoned houses. A lot of times, they find bodies in them.

By the time they get to them, you cannot even identify them. That was in the back of my head that they would come up missing and we would never know where they were. When Stephanie died, I did tell God thank you because she was in an open space where somebody could call an ambulance. We knew where she was and so many people deal with losing a child or loved one and never been able to have a body to bury. They lived with that for years. God did that for us. She died on the street in Baltimore. Somebody called the ambulance and they took her to the doctor. They resuscitated her at the hospital.

She went into cardiac arrest and the second time they couldn’t bring her back. They say we didn’t have to come and identify the body. I didn’t believe she was gone because nobody came to identify the body. By the time I got in touch with my mom, she was like, “I’m going to go down there.” They told her that she didn’t have to identify the body because Stephanie had been there a few times and they knew who she was. I still didn’t believe it because I sat outside the church on Sunday when I was waiting for her because nobody identified the body. I’m not believing that she’s really gone. My mom was like, “Cheryl, she’s gone.”

It’s a lot.

It’s a whole lot. I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. Some days I’ll be like, I’m surviving, but I’m barely surviving. It’s better now. Like I said, I started gaining my weight back and I talk to myself out loud. If I feel the moment that I need to be transparent, on Facebook or something, I do. I know God is working, he’s doing it in his own timing because anything fast doesn’t last. I just wanted God to take the pain away.

As a human being, I know God to just take the hurt away from the relationship. I go back into some other foolishness. I want to be whole. I want to be like really healed because I have things I want to do. I get God saying, “I’m going to do those things for you, Cheryl, but if I do them for you now in the state, and you lose everything. You’re not going to survive. It’s not going to survive. You want to do this, you want to do that, but you cannot do it in your state of mind”

Like I said, I’m committed to my healing. I know it’s some things that I need to be honest with and face so God can do his best work. His big one with me as I call it. I told my best friend, “At my big age, I done cried on my mama’s lap more often than not.” When you’re young like, “I cannot wait to get out of here. I want to do that.”

Was that not the, “Who thought that? What was we rushing for?”

I got married at sixteen. I’ve been gone from my mom a long time but like doing this for my life. I knew that I had to get myself together because my mom is a praying woman and we’ve been in church all our lives. One day we were on the phone and she said, “I don’t know what else to do.” She said, “This grief is going to kill you.” I knew at that moment that I didn’t want to see my mother sad. I was like I got to get myself together.

I learned that for the grandkids, my mother, the children, no. I got to get myself together. I got to do this for me because I think all my life I’ve done everything for everybody else. Doing this for me is going to make it last. I cannot do it for the grandkids. I figured if I did it for me, everything else would fall into place. First I got to do it for me, be selfish, and just love on me a little bit, whatever that looks like. Like I said, I don’t even know what it is to take care of myself, but I’m learning.

I think that is beautiful. I have a few more questions if that’s possible.

No problem.

On Wishing The Pain Away

Being on this side today, this moment of suicide versus where you were in the moment where you felt like you wanted to take your life. Oftentimes when I talk to people who are in your situation, in that moment, it feels like there was no hope. At that moment, it felt like this was the only thing to stop the pain. Would you say you give it 24 hours and 48 hours and get outside of your head, there is hope. If somebody’s wrestling right now with thinking, “I want to stop the pain and I don’t want to be here anymore,” from your own experience, what would you share with them as far as how that changes?

I think in the beginning when I was like very suicidal because I think the hurt just kept coming. It was just there and there was nothing that I could do to make the pain go away. In my head, the only way I can make the pain go away is not to be here. Nothing was going right. Nothing was going right. I still couldn’t get a job, after all these interviews. It was frustrating in a relationship. I still didn’t have my daughters. I’m paying bills with no job. It was just I could not really describe the way I felt. I just knew that like, “If God doesn’t come and do something today, then I’m not going to make it.”

That’s how I always felt like I was suicidal. One day I was, when I was living in Georgia, I was walking. To this day I walked, and I walked and I walked like 20 miles back and forth. I felt it so strongly on me that today was going to be that day. It was scary. I was walking and it was like, because you don’t want to die. Like you really honestly don’t want to die. You want to live, but you want things to get better. Things just don’t get better overnight. There’s a process. I was walking and I was crying and I was talking to God.

At that moment, I called my aunt and I was like, she just heard it in my voice, and she was driving her and my uncle. She pulled over and she began to pray. I could feel God just lifting that off of me. It was so surreal in that moment. I just went home and finally got back to the house. If I walked myself to death. Mind you, I was paper thin. I couldn’t even eat. I think the best I could do was drink something. I remember coming home and my baby sister, she didn’t want to say it to me then. She was like, “Are you sick?”

She said, “I saw you and I was about to cry.” People saw me that was not physically sick, but mentally sick and the weight loss was hard because you’re used to somebody being sick and then they just little wafer and you can see my collarbone. It was a mess. I’ve had those feelings but they haven’t been strong. I just keep reminding myself, there is hope. Things don’t look the way Cheryl wants them to look. They’re looking the way that God needs them to look so he can finish what he started.

When we’re going through healing, we have this idea of how things shall look and how you want them to look. I’ve realized that the way that Cheryl wants them to look is temporary. It’s a quick fix. I’ve also started learning to see with my spiritual eye as opposed to my natural eye because your natural eye tells you nothing is getting better. You’ve lost your relationship. You don’t have a job right now. Nothing’s going the way you wanted to go. The spiritual eye said, “As long as there’s a God, you’re going to be okay. Allow God to fix it.

Allow God to do what he needs to do. Take your hands off of it.” I have a big problem with trusting. It’s been hard for me. It’s crazy because if you cannot trust anybody, you should be able to trust God. I’ve had issues. I get on my knees and pray, “God, can you please do this and get on my computer and try to figure it out.” I think God has left me in a space where it’s funny because I cannot. I cannot figure anything out. I cannot finagle anything. I cannot do anything and my suicidal thoughts then and now, it’s completely different.

I can snap out of it a little quicker now. Like it’s okay. I know it’s the enemy because my mom always tells me the mind is the devil’s battleground. If he can get to your mind, then he got you.  I can recognize that you’re not going to get me off my square. I don’t feel good, but it’s working for my good. I used to tell my granddaughter that God never brings you through the flood to leave you in the puddle. I remind myself that although I’m hurting, I’m in a puddle right now. God has brought me through the flood.

On the other side of the flood, it might be some little puddles, but they’re large of victory. When the suicidal thoughts come down, I understand that the enemy doesn’t know my future. He only knows my past and because he doesn’t know my future, he’s going to do whatever he can to take me out of the game or to get me to give up because he knows that there’s something that God has for me down the line. His job is to keep me from getting to that. The suicidal thoughts, maybe January to September are a big difference.

I’m trusting God a little more. I’m taking my hands off of stuff. Like just let go and just let God and letting people help me a little more. I don’t like to ask people for help. My mom, had me laughing one day and she said, “You need gas money, don’t you?” I didn’t say anything. She said, “Do you need gas money?” I say, “Yeah.” She said, “That killed you, didn’t you? You almost died.” It did. I’m like, “I should be helping my mom and my mom is helping me.” It was so funny now and I hate to ask anybody for anything, but sometimes you have to ask for help and that’s okay.

Strong Persona

That brings me actually to my next question. The strong persona and people seeing sure always standing up and being strong. What are some things that they’re not seeing and knowing about you?

This whole side of me, I think that I got married when I was sixteen. We were married for 27 years, four girls, two boys. I remember talking to one of my longtime friends on Facebook. I’ve been divorced for ten years and most people did not know that we were divorced. It’s like, “We were just so used to you guys.” We all came up in church together and a lot of people didn’t know we were divorced. Not that I was hiding anything because it wasn’t anything to hide but I think that I just let people believe what they wanted to believe or see what they wanted to see.

Actually, after my divorce, I got off Facebook for a long time. I think this whole ordeal with the loss of my child has made me vulnerable, and has made me not care, so to speak, what people think. I suffered a loss. No matter what loss it is. I think especially in the black community, a lot of us are afraid to express the mental depression and worried about what people going to think if you think I’m crazy.

I’ve come to the point where I don’t care because it’s a cry-out for help on some level. If people don’t know that you need the help or that something is wrong, they’re going to assume that you, the strong person that you’ve always been there’s nothing wrong and she can handle it and she can go on. When you just let down that God and take off that facade, God will send people that will hold you up when you are falling. I think God has done that for me. He’s given me my people, my village. I think within a relationship and other things and when things happen with the relationship, I didn’t hold a bridge.

I forgave right then and there because I forgive easily. I don’t hold branches because I don’t have the mental capacity. I don’t have time for it. I just want me to be not just a person who is strong, but I want you to know that there’s a part of me that, I’m suicidal. I’m depressed. Things are not going right. I look good in this dress, but inside I’m a I’m a basket case, so to speak. If you love me, like really love me, I had to ask God, “I don’t want my situation to change who I am, but give me wisdom and discernment to know who I can trust and who I cannot trust. Who is to be in my life and who is to not be in my life.”

I did want to do that because I think because of who I am, my giving nature, and stuff. I have been taken advantage of. I will admit that, but it’s never changed who I was though because I didn’t want to change it. You see people and people are who they are. If you’re honest, they have their issues too. They just don’t get it. The suicide then and now is completely different. I can recognize at that moment when I’m having a moment. Call my best friend or call my prayer partner, talk to my mom or something, and come right on out of it. I recognize, like my mama says, “You recognize the enemy for who he is and what he is, and you can take you to a better space.

In the beginning, nothing working, nothing happening, and you are not going to make it, and you got all these plans, nothing going to happen.” It does close in on you, and you be like, “I’m going to check up out of here.” A lot of people do because they don’t have people that they can talk to either. If they do, they don’t want to be judged for being in a bad space. That’s what happened a lot of times. People stay in a bad space and family judge them, coworkers judge them, and they feel like they don’t have an outlet.

Disenfranchised Grief

Thank you so much. I think I have two more questions. In that same vein of not wanting to be judged. There’s a thing called disenfranchised grief, where the thing that doesn’t always look good in society, and the way in which your daughter left this world. Do you ever feel like people are giving you not the space to grieve because of how she left this world, or make you feel some way about that?

I finally was able to voice that maybe about a month ago. I was on Facebook. I said, “Today is not a good day.” Stephanie, I posted a picture of her and I finally told him, I say, “Stephanie died of a drug overdose.” I struggled with not being able to save her. My prayer was to God, “If I come to this space again, give me what I can do to save my child or help save somebody else’s child.” The whole time whether she was on drugs the whole time and she came to the church and my church family just embraced her.

I never felt ashamed or embarrassed about her being on drugs because being ashamed or embarrassed would not get her the help she needed. I didn’t have time. I got her kids, I got to get her better and it is what it is. I’m not the only parent that got kids on drugs. It’s a whole lot of people out there. I just became vocal about it. My Facebook friends and family responded, “It’s not your fault.” I hear what they’re saying. A big part of me knows it’s not my fault, but as her mom, I will always feel like I wish I would have done more or what could I have done?

Yes, to this day, I replay that like, “God, give me something. Give me anything to not only help my child but somebody else’s child.” I can be vocal about it. I feel no shame because drugs is everywhere and so many people are dying from it and we don’t want to say anything. We worry about the stigma and I care about none of that. I want to eventually open up the Stephanie house for mothers who don’t have a stable environment for their kids. Stephanie was dealing with some things and it put a lot of pressure on her and she had kids and it just led her down this road.

If I can keep somebody else’s daughter from even remotely going to think about that, I want you to know that you have a safe space and there is an outlet for your healing. No shame because I’ve realized that my story, all of it, is it’s not about Cheryl. My story is here because I have to save somebody else. I got to help somebody and I know that my healing involves me making others whole. Even the parts of me that are broken right now and I had a lady that reached out to me on TikTok.

She said, “I was going to kill myself today but because of your TikTok story, I have a will to live.” I talked to her like every day. People are sending me messages saying how my transparency is healing them. I know that although what I’m going through has been harsh and it hurts. It’s going to be something great that’s coming out of this. Out of the gas when I was saucy, I was destined for greatness. I’ve always known it. I’ve always known that I’m destined for greatness, but I’ve also known that God has to clean some things up in Cheryl to get me to where he needs me to be.

Now I’m at that point where, “God, I surrender. Yes, I surrender.” It doesn’t feel good, and I don’t even always understand it because me trying to understand and make sense of everything is not me totally trusting God. I’m like go, “I’m trying to make sense of why they did me like this and why this is happening.” God’s saying, “Girl, I don’t need you to make sense of it. Just trust me.” I learned that you’re not trusting God if you’re trying to figure it out. I don’t try to be boastful but like I’m destined for greatness. I’ve always known it, but I didn’t realize how much God had to clean up to get what I’m about to walk into to be a lasting thing. It’s been a journey, but I thank God for my journey. It’s not a journey that I wanted to go.

Connect With Cheryl

Where can people find you on social media and under what name?

On Facebook is just my regular name, Cheryl Scruggs. on TikTok and Instagram is @Surviving_Grief8.

You’ve sent that to me to be able to have that in a note.

My book was an ebook at first and it got published on the 17, as a paperback.

That was my final question. In your journey and in helping, and in your own healing, your book, Survive in Grief, and also your podcasting, what is your podcasting and where can people find that?

My podcast is on everything, Apple Music, Spotify, and RSS. It’s on all the platforms.

What is it called?

C. Marie Surviving Grief.

How often does it come out?

Every Wednesday.

Faith And Moving Forward

In that process, and we’ve talked a lot. I thought I was going to talk about the book sooner, but I didn’t. I mean, but I want you to know there’s a lot of highlights and a lot of questions and stuff that I had in here. I’ll ask this one thing. I know that moving forward isn’t easy, but I also know that it’s possible. What comes to mind when you hear that now?

I can do all things through Christ, which strengthens me.

What does that look like in the idea of your faith in sometimes not trusting God because Stephanie did die in trying to trust God in the living?

It looks like a lot of crying, a lot of asking God questions that I’m never going to get the answers to because at this point, it’s simply like, “Cheryl, you have nothing else. You just got to trust me.” I don’t see the good in what happened now, but after God is finished, I will understand it. I’ll say this, the healing hurts worse than the wound. Just sum it up because I think I’ve cried more during the healing because again, we want things our way, and like, “God, if you just fix it my way, then I won’t have to go through this and I’ll be happy and I can have the person I love. This can be there and I’ll be okay.” It just doesn’t work like that because everything that we do is temporary.

I’ve learned that instead of doing what Cheryl wants to do and asking God to bless it, I now invite God into whatever I’m doing and ask him if this is will. Ask him to bless it, not after I’ve done all, I wanted to do with it, but inviting God in the beginning and not in the middle when it doesn’t go quite like you want it to go. I tell them on my podcast, I say, “Some days I cry more than I pray.” That’s the reality of it. No sugar coating it. It is what it is, but I’m learning. I’ve learned a lot about myself and I’ve learned how resilient I am. I have a will to live and I’m committed to my healing no matter what comes. I’m going to make it.

I believe you. Thank you for allowing me to share your journey and to be on this show. Thank you for entrusting me to have an open discussion without questions in advance and just to let it flow.

Thank you.

Was there anything you wanted to cover when you thought about this conversation that we did not talk about?

No. Everything was covered. I see death differently now, not just in general because death is final.

Any questions you have of me?

Yeah. You were actually there when your husband passed.

I was there, we had a heart attack. The emergency people came. He passed in the hospital. I wasn’t there at that moment, but the onset of his heart attack, and he may have actually passed, but they had to revive him. The final moment, I was not there when he took his last breath, but the heart attack happened, and we were there together.

I couldn’t imagine being there when Stephanie passed, or even the start of it. I think you’re holding up amazing.

Let’s be clear. Seven years later, immediately saw the therapist, immediately. Before I viewed Mark’s body, I started seeing a therapist once a week and sometimes twice a week. My version of being committed to my healing looks like I cannot get stuck here. If I don’t understand how to navigate this, I will be stuck at this place of devastation forever. One of the initial conversations was with my daughter. This is the night her dad passes and I’m getting out of the shower and Catherine is standing right there and I’m like, “Whoa.”

She says, “Mom, was dad your everything?” I looked at her and she had this Disney-wanting look on her face, but words mean something to me. I told Catherine, “No, your dad was not my everything because if he was, what would be left for me right now? If I had put everything inside of him, he is dead. I am still alive. It’s either going to have to be God or me. Those two will have to be my everything.” That is where my strength has to lie. This has been like another widow said, crawling through mud.

In November 2016, my son went to the military. In March 2017, my husband that I had been with for 32 years died and then in May, my daughter left to go into the military. She left on Mother’s Day and I returned home to an empty house. I cried and snotted in every area of that house. One time had to go down to the basement to get a screwdriver. Mark was an electrician. I wouldn’t mess with no screws, but I had to go get the screwdriver and cried all the way up the stairs because he touched that glass to go do some tedious chore. It was about that screwdriver.

Stopping at 2:00 in the morning in the middle of the steps crying, coming home, sitting in the garage crying before getting into the house, spending countless hours in grief therapy, journaling, and writing. I have fought for my whole life. This is not a holdup. This is the long game. This is me trusting God when I don’t understand why I just went through breast cancer, just had an emergency hysterectomy, and he dead? Like, I started thinking of a whole bunch of people who had bad marriages, and I do not understand why they is still alive. My good husband is not. I was like, such and such cannot stand him. They ain’t even together. He’s cheating. I’m like, but the good man.

You did do that. You do that.

Let me be clear. This is a result of trusting God. I remember looking out, my brother had come to stay and then my first cousin came and everybody was gone. This was my first moment in the house, Catherine and I together. I was like, “It’s time to put on our big girl panties because everybody got to go back to their life.

We get to go back to whatever this is called that we got.” I had a cup of tea and I was looking out of the window into the backyard and my husband was a hunter and there was a styrofoam deer that he would use for target practice. I looked out there and I was like, “He is never going to shoot another arrow into that deer. He is dead.” I heard Guy whisper, “The plans that I have for you are good.” I was like, “Oh.” Let me play it back for you guys from how I see it right here. That’s playing good.

I played it back like my version. I felt like a joke moment where God said, “I knew Mark was going to die because I knew he was going to die. That’s why this was in place. That’s why this was in place.” It was about twenty things that got downloaded and I wrote in my journal. After he did all that, I said, “Okay fair, that’s fair.” I said, “I’m still not a fan of this, but I appreciate you being willing to give me that information, and I’m going to trust you in this but this, I’m bullshitting.” Make no mistake. I am never out here trying to put out a front.

Absolutely, not. For who?

In March, when it is the anniversary of his death, you see my calendar like, “Don’t come to me with nothing if you ain’t really got to.” When his birthday comes from March to June, I try to be like minimal because I know what my triggering season is. I know he died in March. I know we had the nerve to get married the day after my birthday in May. That seemed cute when we were kids. Now, the worst mistake ever.

My birthday is in May too.

I do not recommend 0 out of 10. If you are getting married, do not get married the day after your birthday because the one thing we can say is, “If something happens, baby, I can guarantee you we going to die. You don’t want that death after your birthday.” Don’t do it. Don’t do it next to a holiday. It’s going to screw everything up. This has been the mental health. When my husband died, I made a list of every widow I knew and I picked up the phone and said, “Can I talk to you? Can we have lunch?” I needed to lean in how they were not crazy.

I need to lean into how they had not lost their mind. I was very proactive. I was telling everybody it’s a miserable day. I’m not liking this. We not pretending. They knew, “That girl got a lot of backpacks.” You all, “Here’s one for you. Here’s one for you. Here’s one for you.” This has been, and I would say, I get two to three years of leaning in hard like that created that change. I cannot imagine trying to stifle and hold that in. I ain’t nobody got time for that.

Look, I’m learning to just lean into the pain. When it comes, it comes. I was on a plane and I broke down.

Lean into the pain when it comes. Share on X

The brief will pack a little suitcase. Like, “You trying to dodge me? Are you trying to act like you can run away from me?” You can stay up like, “Girl, look, I got my suitcase. I’m going too. I’m wherever you at.” When you finally slow down, it’s going to do what it got to do.

That’s the worst thing to avoid it. Just let it come.

Now you use the double energy trying to run and it’s still got to come. You know what girl, let me just make this appointment and meet you. We ain’t got to go nowhere.

I’ll get with you all later, but I got a date with grief today. I just let it come. I only pay it, if it comes, I don’t care where I’m at, if I’m in church, I sit right in my pew and just go ahead and cry. You all can think I’m praising Jesus but the system had a breakdown. I just let it come when it comes. I’ve learned that though because I used to try to hold it in and hold it in. I’m like, “It’s coming. Just go ahead girl, do your thing. Just get it over with. Look, until the next time it’s up, we meet again.” I’m grateful to have met you and to be able to have somebody because grief is grief.

Maybe we should do a TikTok live together. I mean, I do a TikTok live every Monday evening. Different people come on. Also, we have a brief Discord where people are in there sharing comments. They’re having a rough day because the thing about it is it’s open 24 hours. One thing we know when we’re grieving, somebody ain’t asleep. We and people write messages and they’re sharing, they’re looking for advice. What are you doing? It’s a safe space where we’re all in there together because of the one thing, and you mentioned this early community and we are on this journey together. I will let you wrap up this with the last statements to everyone who is here and close out our conversation.

Thank everybody who’s reading or who will be reading. I thank Tina for inviting me. One thing about life is it’s going to be life-y as long as we live, but you can get through it. Find yourself a community, somebody that you trust, and be able to express yourself. I thank God for my community. I thank God for God because he’s helped me together when I didn’t want to be held. I’m grateful to God and my mom, she has been my rock and I appreciate it. My children, I know they lost their sister and my grandkids had lost their mom. I just want to say, I love you guys. Thank you, Tina, again for having me.

You’re so welcome. Thank you for being here.

Thank you.

Important Links

• Cheryl – LinkedIn
• TikTok – Cheryl  Scruggs
• Instagram – Cheryl  Scruggs
• Survive in Grief
• Apple Music – Surviving Grief by C. Marie
• RSS – Surviving Grief by C. Marie