Angela Kennecke: 0:07

Peter and Erica Zurkow never imagined they'd be part of a nationwide TV special, especially for a reason that once seemed unthinkable. They believed their son was sleeping soundly in his bedroom, safe within the walls of their own home. But in reality, he was in danger.

Peter Zurkow: 0:26

on Friday night, he said to me, I want to go to sleep early. Because I want to follow you tomorrow in the finals of this golf tournament. I was playing and said, I want to follow you the same way I did when I was a little kid because he used to follow me in the finals of tournaments.

Angela Kennecke: 0:42

23 year old Henry, never got the chance to watch his dad play in that tournament. His sudden death has left the Zurkows heartbroken and searching for answers.

Erica Zurkow: 0:53

I think about Henry every morning when I wake up, he's right there. My other children are there also, but not in the same way. If I wake up in the middle of the night, it's Henry there. It's hard.

Angela Kennecke: 1:06

While the family is grieving, they're also raising awareness about the cause of their son's death, to make sure others don't feel the same heartbreaking pain. Hear their story of loss, resilience, and a mission to make a difference in this episode of Grieving Out Loud. Well, Peter and Erica, it is just wonderful to see you again. I feel like here are my new best friends because we're brought together by these horrible tragedies. I mean, absolutely horrible, but yet I thought you guys were so kind and wonderful. And we met in person, we were both featured in the Nexstar special which aired in Somewhat like 180 TV stations across the country, our stories, the stories of our children. And then they brought us together in Dallas where they recorded another special that's coming out sometime this spring. And we'll have links for our listeners for that when it does come out and we'll let people know on our website and everything. But they brought all of us parents together. We had a chance to meet, we had a chance to really dive into the issues and really talk about them. I don't know how much of that will end up in the special, but. I thought it was a great approach. What did you guys think?

Erica Zurkow: 2:22

Same. I felt the same. The one resounding fact is that every one of us cares about helping someone else. We can change it for one person, we've contributed, doesn't

Angela Kennecke: 2:32

Right. I've heard over and over again, every parent who's in our boat, so to speak, has said, I just don't want it to happen to anybody else. I mean, why else would you put yourself out there? Right? During the Nationwide TV special, the Zurkows opened up about their journey with their son Henry and his battle with substance use. Peter and Erica believe Henry's struggles with substance use disorder began in high school following sports related injuries.

Peter Zurkow: 3:03

Henry was a very accomplished athlete very determined athlete, very disciplined. Ended up having four devastating injuries while he was in high school, multiple surgeries. There were some pretty serious. It had a very serious hip injury. And it was combined with another leg injury. It was all one surgery. We calculated once he spent 18 months of his high school, four years in high school on crutches.

Angela Kennecke: 3:29

Oh, wow.

Peter Zurkow: 3:30

And

peter-and-erica-z-_1_01-16-2025_170547: 3:31

he

Peter Zurkow: 3:31

still went back to football in prep school to try to get back on the D1 recruiting program and he got hurt again.

Angela Kennecke: 3:39

In addition to his physical injuries, Peter says his son became more and more defiant. However, they had no idea he was abusing prescription painkillers because his medication bottles were never empty.

Peter Zurkow: 3:53

Through the end of high school and the beginning of his PG or there was a lot of hostility that was going on towards me in particular.

Angela Kennecke: 4:02

Hmm. And so I have a couple questions for you. When you said hostility, that kind of perked my interest because I dealt with a lot of hostility from Emily in high school. All of this rebellion and it was like she completely changed. And now I trace a lot of that back and I've just learned so much now about marijuana use in the developing brain. and there was a boyfriend who was dealing marijuana and she had started kind of with that and the Xanax. And I want to know about what you meant, Peter, when you said hostility from Henry.

Peter Zurkow: 4:34

physical violence.

Angela Kennecke: 4:37

Because you were trying to stop him from doing something or what was it in relation to?

Peter Zurkow: 4:42

didn't want second guessing anything. He didn't want any questions. He didn't want any inquiries.

Angela Kennecke: 4:50

Yes

Erica Zurkow: 4:51

he didn't want to answer to us.

Peter Zurkow: 4:52

and it was easier to go on offense than to be on defense.

Angela Kennecke: 4:56

that sounds like my daughter. I mean, quite frankly, think a lot of our kids, I think It's so painful to go through that as a parent, to have your kid, you're the enemy. You're suddenly, you know, here's your beloved child, right? And then suddenly you're the enemy and I have struggled a lot with that, quite frankly.

Erica Zurkow: 5:15

well, it comes out of nowhere and we, We don't know what to do with it, and we think, what is wrong with my child? and we don't know that they're smoking pot at that point, and I think as you mentioned the developing brain, there's a lot of research out there about this very aspect that we don't know. Was that the root of the cause with our kids? We'll never know those answers.

Peter Zurkow: 5:41

And of course you begin then and we continue even more today. Second guessing absolutely every decision we ever made as a parent and every wrong decision. I think I made, I revisit almost every day still. I know the cause, but I still feel that, that weight.

Angela Kennecke: 5:58

how were we supposed to know what to do? I mean, where is the guidebook for us as parents

Peter Zurkow: 6:04

and we were, we were pretty worried about him and then the next thing we knew he was at college and we got a call from college that said that he's really in trouble and he went and she, said, Henry, I can't let you leave. last time I let someone leave that looked like you, they didn't make it.

Angela Kennecke: 6:35

At that point, Henry was struggling with a Xanax addiction. He agreed to go to rehab, and Peter and Erica did their best to support him, going to therapy themselves, both individually and as a family.

Peter Zurkow: 6:48

And honestly, for me, and I think Erica's experience might have been a little bit different, but I was saved by sharing my experiences and listening to the experiences of other parents who had been through it was the single most valuable thing for us, for me. Learning boundaries, learning why boundaries were important, which ones made sense, learning to stop use statements like you should this and you should that. Don't give answers unless you're prepared to own what happens next and changed myself enough so that when Henry decided he was going to re engage, was going to change, was going to stop using in any way. that we were different people too, so that we didn't fall back into the same co enabling cycle that we've been in already.

Angela Kennecke: 7:42

Even with all the effort Henry and his parents put in, life after rehab still wasn't easy.

Peter Zurkow: 7:48

One of the hardest things for Henry was, what do I tell people? What's my narrative? And the world doesn't help anybody with that narrative. So it took him a while to find a foothold again, find things that boosted his self esteem, made him feel good like he could engage the world. but he basically found a new group of friends and a new group of interests. And when those finally took root, he started to take off again. But there was still this baggage from the past, part of it's physical, and I'm sure there was an emotional part of it too, but he didn't talk to us too much about it.

Angela Kennecke: 8:25

Despite the challenges, Henry stayed off illicit substances for two years. On top of that, his family was able to reconnect and build a stronger, closer relationship.

Peter Zurkow: 8:38

maybe we didn't see some of the struggles he was still having, but we had this extraordinary rebirth of love. gone back to school. He was an honor student at Boulder., during COVID, which was horrible for everybody, he taught himself to play the guitar and the piano. He started hiking, really hiking a lot, and in very tough environmental conditions, challenging himself to hike the 46 high peaks of the Adirondacks during COVID. And during this re-engagement with us four times, including all 46 peeks in 17 days in the middle of the winter. I mean, he was an adventurer and we, he got him back. We had great years.

Erica Zurkow: 9:19

we had two solid good years with Henry. before he used that night and died. We know that he didn't want to die. We know that his text exchange to the dealer said, I need to make sure this is safe. Like the famous last words, right? There's no such thing as safe. He was planning the next day to spend with Peter walking on the golf course, following Peter on a golf tournament. I think death was the last thing from his mind.

Peter Zurkow: 9:49

On Friday night, he said to me, I want to go to sleep early. Because I want to follow you tomorrow in the finals of this golf tournament. I was playing and said, I want to follow you the same way I did when I was a little kid because he used to follow me in the finals of tournaments.

Erica Zurkow: 10:06

And he didn't make the call the next morning We, found

Peter Zurkow: 10:08

him dead in his room.

Angela Kennecke: 10:10

You found him.

Peter Zurkow: 10:11

I found him.

Angela Kennecke: 10:15

have talked to too many parents who found their kids dead in their rooms. When I go speak to students across the country, I always tell them this story that, you know, parents think their kid's safe at home on a Friday night or whatever it might be. And they walk in that, you know, they don't get up the next morning, they walk into their rooms and and find them on their beds or slumped over their desk or whatever. And it's just unbelievable. it's so hard for the mind to even grasp that something like that can happen.

Peter Zurkow: 10:42

It's so common that Henry was slumped over his desk and the EMTs walked in. one of the EMTs who I later learned was working on the weekend in the suburban New York area, but worked all week in New York city. He walked in and as he was crossing the room, I heard him say to his friends, said Fentanyl just from the position of Henry asleep on his desk.

Angela Kennecke: 11:09

And how traumatizing for you both?

Erica Zurkow: 11:12

Very, very numbing for the longest, longest time. The world stopped our world, everything around us. We didn't leave our house

Angela Kennecke: 11:23

At just 23, Henry died from fentanyl. His family was shocked, devastated, and immediately started searching for answers.

Peter Zurkow: 11:32

we were able to get into his phone afterwards fairly easily. His brother figured out his code in about five minutes. And we could see text conversations with dealers. And they all started with I found you through Craigslist

Angela Kennecke: 11:47

and I've talked to lots of parents whose kids got a pill or whatever off of Snapchat. But I have not heard of someone getting it off of Craigslist. So, Maybe it's common, but I just haven't talked to anyone who's told me that before you.

Speaker: 12:03

As one of the nation's strongest financial organizations, first Premier Bank and Premier Bank Card have the strength to do good. We support nearly 700 organizations and nonprofits. Our employees give more than 30,000 volunteer hours annually, and we are continually seeking ways to make South Dakota an even better place to live. It's the premier way, first Premier Bank and Premier Bank card.

Peter Zurkow: 12:34

So after the Boston Globe article the article was picked up by two writers who follow Fentanyl for the LA Times. And they had started following fentanyl as an issue because people were buying prescription drugs at registered pharmacies in Mexico's Americans to try to get more discounted drugs and were dying from fentanyl poisoning. And so they started to investigate and they're a terrific couple researchers and they had latched onto Craigslist. they had been talking to all the social media platforms, they were very in tune with the fact that social media had expanded drug distribution a hundred fold in the United States, they were very upset about Craigslist's responses to their questions. And there had been an NIH study, in fact, that had shown that you could screen with appropriate software, filtering software, you could screen an awful lot of conversations with a 93 percent success rate to figure out what was leading to drugs on any kind of a social media platform and Craigslist use it. And said to purchase through Craigslist and they did this expose on the front page of the LA Times about Craigslist. drugs on, may have changed since the article that was a year ago, Craigslist has been an active social media platform and others have tried to regulate it, but Craigslist blessed them.

Angela Kennecke: 14:14

Multiple reports have exposed Craigslist as a place where illegal drug sales happen. Spectrum News ran a story called"How Craigslist Became a Hotspot for Fentanyl Dealers." KTU TV covered it, too, with "Craigslist Advertises Illegal Drugs for Sale. Police Say Hard to Track Dealers." And the L. A. Times found that dealers use codenames like Bluefish and Fettuccine to sell drugs on the site without getting caught. Yeah, at least they're saying, like Snapchat is saying that it's done something. I've talked to other parents who are, some parents are suing Snapchat, some parents are working with Snapchat, so I've heard that argument about, They're, they're doing something work with them. They're not doing enough, but Craigslist is just sort of sounds to me like a free for all

Erica Zurkow: 15:03

Yeah. On lots of platforms, I think, not just on drugs.

Angela Kennecke: 15:07

Yes. Also sex trafficking and different things like that. Yeah. While the Zurkows know how Henry bought the deadly dose of fentanyl, They're not sure why he went searching for an illicit substance, but they suspect it may have been triggered by an injury.

Erica Zurkow: 15:24

He got hurt snowboarding. And then I think he was re injured, moving the wrong way. We really don't know what triggered it. But he kept telling us how much pain he was in, which now to us feels like it was code for I'm going to use or I am using. We don't know that answer.

Angela Kennecke: 15:44

And you probably never will.

Peter Zurkow: 15:45

we've learned since then an awful lot about the biology of, drug problems of substance abuse. And the answer is the call is very powerful. Your system remembers for a very long time that there is this panacea for pain of all kinds, emotional or physical pain. And it's so strong and it's so biologically based that your pain or whatever anxiety you're feeling, but I think in Henry's case, it's pain from his rib injury would get worse. Your brain makes it worse in order to try to drive you to use. I have a friend who's an expert in obesity who says thing that happens when somebody tries to lose weight is your system thinks you're sick because something's wrong that you're losing weight and no matter how hard you try. your system is going to get you to eat that piece of chocolate cake unless there's some other intervening life event that allows you to learn differently. from what I read on the pharma neuropharmacology drugs, it's kind of like that too. So I think that there was this distant call to him after the injury, think it finally overwhelmed him. So we, he decided to use, but we're not even sure what he was trying to use

Angela Kennecke: 17:00

Because the toxicology report took a while to come back, Peter and Erica couldn't immediately tell friends and family what had caused Henry's death. That was the initial reason why Peter decided to write an article for the Boston Globe.

Peter Zurkow: 17:16

So Erica said, I want to make a Facebook post. Fentanyl and I want you to write it. So I started to write it and it was a little bit long. It was too long for, it was 500 words by the time I got done and I said, this is too long for a Facebook post. And I went to a friend who writes a sub stack newsletter and say, what do you think I ought to do with this? As you said, I think you ought to expand it and see if you can get it published. And I did. At first it was too long. it got very long, 3, 000 words, and editors didn't want to read it, including a high school friend who was an editor for the New York Times said, I'm not even reading it until you retired editor, telling you how to shorten it. It's over a thousand words. Nobody's even going to read it and through a a friend of mine who Erica also went to school with many, many years ago, we had an introduction to the Boston Globe and about an hour receiving it, they called me and said, we want to publish this. I never knew how important editors were, but the editors there were great. started out to tell the world how Henry actually died. And then it turned into an expose to basically say the only way we can stop death is by empowering kids to protect themselves. I thought it would be therapeutic. It wasn't at all, but at least I feel good that maybe we saved a life somewhere along the line.

Angela Kennecke: 18:43

and it caught the attention of the Los Angeles Times reporters that you were talking about that, you know, we're talking about the Craigslist problem. So it did. have more impact than just an Having an article in the Boston Globe is important, but then just one article, it had more impact than that.

Peter Zurkow: 18:59

Yeah. And that's how Rebecca got to us. She read the LA Times article because she lives in LA

Angela Kennecke: 19:05

And that's Nexstar for the special. That's how they found you was basically because of that. And you said, Peter, it wasn't therapeutic. Was there anything in the reaction to the article that surprised either one of you?

Peter Zurkow: 19:17

You know, it's funny. There were two sets of reactions. One, the comments on the Boston Globe, which were not that many, most of them were from grieving parents to say thank you. It was really touching. They would write notes to me and I would write back to them and from your comment, I, I suspect you lost a child. And the next thing I knew, I'd get a picture of their child.. It was a different dialogue among our own friends. We distributed the article fairly widely, as did our kids. we all of a sudden got chats back from friends copies of their text chats with their own children what their children had to do to protect themselves. that felt rewarding. That felt important to us, stirred the dialogue in our own community.

Angela Kennecke: 20:06

Right. It starts with a conversation. I mean, to really, to save lives starts with a conversation with kids. They have to be educated and informed. And it has to be the correct information. So I think that if it opened up that for your friends to talk with their kids that did something. definitely did something. Erika, I'm just wondering from you, I know you and I spoke just briefly when we were in Dallas about how difficult, you know, the, the weeks, the months, the year following your son's death really was. And it's so hard for people to understand. I think the rest of the world kind of moves on and we don't, I mean, I guess we never really move on. We just move forward. But the rest of the world kind of wants you to keep up tell me what you think about that now.

Erica Zurkow: 20:54

I think that I allowed myself, our children, the time, gracefulness to grieve the ability to just let time stop before we asked anybody to move on. And in fact, I don't know that we've really moved on. And we are moving forward If anything, in my heart of heart, I think it's because of our other children. They need to have their lives and they need us to be okay. So for that reason, it's sort of what has, has allowed me to move forward. I think about Henry every morning when I wake up, he's right there. My other children are there also, but not in the same way. If I wake up in the middle of the night, it's Henry there. It's hard. It's hard. I, I usually just turn my iPad on and try to get back to sleep. Peter's very nice about it. I try to block the light and to not think in the middle of the night and allow

peter-and-erica-z-_1_01-16-2025_170547: 22:00

myself

Erica Zurkow: 22:01

that restful time.

Angela Kennecke: 22:03

Yeah, I've been dreaming about Emily the last couple nights and I haven't had a dream about her in a while You know, it's been for me. It's been more than six years. So I sometimes wonder like why I don't do it now and I'm dreaming about her more and I wonder like why is that? And they're not always pleasant dreams, you know, I think there's always gonna be that unresolved Because we couldn't save our kids. We were not all powerful, right? And that's always going to be unresolved.

Erica Zurkow: 22:27

children are a piece of us.

Angela Kennecke: 22:29

Yes.

Erica Zurkow: 22:30

we are a piece of our parents. It's natural for us to lose our loved one, our parents, our a child is losing a piece of our hearts that, you know, will never be whole again.

Peter Zurkow: 22:47

Yeah. Just one side note. I, I, I lost a sibling when I was 26 and she was 28. And I went back to work a week later and I never dealt with it. dealt with the range of emotions I had. been sick for so long, there was a certain amount of relief to it. But when Henry passed away, just a very strong feeling I did not want my kids to have the same pressure to immediately resume their life and not have an opportunity to Just what had just happened to them.

Erica Zurkow: 23:26

they were both very fortunate. They were in jobs that allowed them to take a good amount of time

peter-and-erica-z-_1_01-16-2025_170547: 23:31

to grieve

Angela Kennecke: 23:32

Oh, that is fortunate.

Erica Zurkow: 23:33

to be at home with us before they had to go back to work.

Angela Kennecke: 23:38

You know, Peter, that makes me think of something that I learned in my grief educator training. And I wondered if this is true for you, that whenever we have um, a new loss, like the loss of a child that you had, it opens up all the old wounds. So the loss of your sister that you never really dealt with, did you find that grief coming back up at the same time that you had all this grief over losing your son? Hmm.

Peter Zurkow: 24:02

Yeah, I did. I did, but I'm not sure that it was a direct relationship. I think I probably thought more about. the unresolved things that I carried with me for relationships with other people, including with Henry. And maybe, you know, you lose a child under these circumstances, you start pointing the finger to yourself for every mistake that you've ever made. And somehow it brought you to that moment that you couldn't do what you had to do to help your child. Maybe I couldn't have helped him in any way, shape or form, but it's going to take a while more for me to really get to that point. So I think that what burdens me more is the sense that I might have carried a lot of weight around in my life that affected him that I should have dealt with years before.

Angela Kennecke: 24:54

I get that. I get that. And I think for, for men, especially fathers supposed to be protectors supposed to, you know, you have this ingrained in you. And I think that's often I talk on this podcast, I'm hearing from more dads now, which is great, but I hear from a lot of moms because it's really difficult for dads sometimes to open up. and talk about these things because men are supposed to be the protector. They're supposed to be the provider and the protector and more powerful, right?

Peter Zurkow: 25:23

You know, you're right. I have not moved on as well as Erica has with all of this.

Erica Zurkow: 25:28

I wanted to mention something, which is that through all of this, we've been supportive of each other. in our own unique grieving and the boys as well our two other sons, and I think that we never pointed the finger at each other. We both know we made mistakes. We made plenty of mistakes that we wish we had done things differently, but we also knew we did a lot right. That for as much as we could think we did wrong, we did the same things wrong with our other two children. They just didn't get caught in the world of addiction. had a different path. And so, I think the one thing that we talk about is forgiveness, also love, like not to forget the love. How important that is, and especially with our children that are suffering, to not forget that we love them.

Peter Zurkow: 26:27

You know, I think that was a big part of the parent group that we had in the early going. Was, had lots of discussions with other parents about love forgiveness, how important forgiveness was.

Angela Kennecke: 26:42

Right. we all, as parents make mistakes our intentions may have been good. It may not have been the right action at the time. But our intentions were good. If we love our kids, I want to believe we're always good. So we have to forgive ourselves because we all make those kinds of mistakes, especially when you're dealing with a hostile, out of control teenager, you know, who is showing signs of a, a substance use disorder issue, and you don't know what to do, and you may try to do all the right things and it may not work. So I think that. It's really interesting what you say also about respecting each other and the way that you grieve because we know that the death of a child can be the death of a marriage. A lot of times people don't make it because Men and women and just people in general grieve differently.

Peter Zurkow: 27:31

I think it's true.

Erica Zurkow: 27:32

It's very true.

Angela Kennecke: 27:35

And so when we were all together as parents, and I hear what you're saying about how it's like a, Support group because Emily's Hope has a support group and we have parents come once a month and we've all been, we've all been there, right? So we know we don't have to explain it to somebody and we know the feelings, the emotions, the pain, everything that goes with it. But we talked about the issue and what really needs to be done and how do we start? end this, stop this. We know nationally it's slowing, right? Like the, death rate is slowing, thank God, but there's still way too many people dying. So what do you think came out of that conversation that we had together? Anything stand out in your mind? Or what do you think we could be doing better as a country to stop these senseless deaths of young people?

peter-and-erica-z-_1_01-16-2025_170547: 28:20

for me,

Peter Zurkow: 28:21

look, the tenor of the discussion was shaped a little bit by my own biases, a great deal of the discussion about fentanyl, and I even heard this yesterday in Colorado was, Oh, we have to do more to stop the distribution of it. And I just think that's the most flawed argument in the world. The DEA is already seizing more lethal doses a year of fentanyl than there are people in the United States. And yeah, there's some stuff they can do at the borders more criminal prosecutions, but to stop the flow of fentanyl, it's not going to happen that way. I think that for me, at least this community of discussions has a lot more to do with what you spend a great deal of time on education. and people about taking responsibility for their own safety. letting them know where the tools are to protect themselves guide their life and to deal with their issues in another way. So for me, Dallas was an extension that the comment that was made. And to me, the most telling comment in that first Nexstar presentation by one of the DEA agents, we're not to arrest our way out of this problem. And that's the big thing for me that we're not arrest and, the group of people we were with. Right. Why

Angela Kennecke: 29:38

Yeah, we have to end the demand. they're always going to come up with new ways to meet the demand. Right? Clever ways, smart ways, if there's money involved, there's greed involved, we have to end the demand. And I think we have to look as a nation to ourselves and take responsibility for that demand and for what hasn't been done, right? steps we haven't taken as a nation, as a people, you know, to, to stop the demand and to help people

Speaker 2: 30:07

Are you passionate about keeping kids safe and informed? Emily's Hope is proud to introduce our K through five substance use prevention curriculum designed to educate young minds about the dangers of substance use. This engaging program lays the foundation for a healthy future. Visit emily's hope edu.org to learn more and help bring this vital resource to your local schools. Encourage your school administrators and counselors to explore our curriculum today. It's part of our mission. Together we can make a difference.

Peter Zurkow: 30:46

it's astonishing to me that test strips are still illegal in several states, and residents of those states don't even know that they're illegal. astonishing to me that when we were in North Carolina, in an area that has real opioid problem The only Narcan that was available was available at 50 a dose at the local supermarket. There was no free distribution source. It's It's

Angela Kennecke: 31:12

right.

Peter Zurkow: 31:13

astonishing that we don't do the protective things. And

Angela Kennecke: 31:20

We have so much stigma because with one of our Naloxone distribution boxes, we have a lot of them out there now in my state, but we have a couple free in a couple of businesses and the business owner just told me today that when they first put it in, a customer came in and said, why are you helping drug addicts? Why are you helping drug addicts? But he said that since it's been there for a few months, that's, diminishing now. He's not getting those kind of, and we're doing more public awareness campaigns, but I just think that there's just these factors that culturally we got to stand up and take notice. And said this often that there's so many things competing for our attention in this world right now. Right? We have horrible natural disasters. We have horrible things going on, wars and all of these things. And so how do you get people to pay attention if it hasn't touched them? and it has affected most people. Most people know somebody now, at least, who's been impacted by this fentanyl.

Erica Zurkow: 32:16

of the things that I do, Angela, I think I do this more than Peter. is when I'm talking to people, they are, strangers, anyone that I'm telling Henry's story to, try to show them a picture. Because when I show a kid a picture of Henry, just became real. and I see the reaction in their, faces, And so I hope that that's something that maybe they remember. and do things a little differently or completely differently.

Peter Zurkow: 32:50

But you know, the things that, that astonished me sometimes is where you find opposition may not be where you think the opposition would come from. So for example, we, we live in the New York area and you would think, Oh, gee, serious drug problem, fairly progressive, enlightened community. Well, when I wrote the Boston Globe article, you could get free Narcan on almost any street corner in a small town in West Virginia, but there wasn't a single dose of Narcan in any school in the city of New York. It was deemed enabling. Now the state passed a law requiring it. So at the end of 2023 that changed. the argument about enabling is really getting in the way of solutions and narratives that will help stop death.

Angela Kennecke: 33:41

Right. Right. And I always say we just got to keep people alive, you know, and then we have to get them the right help. And that's a whole other can of worms. Because we know the whole system is fraught. The whole recovery system is fraught. Anybody can hang up a shingle and call themselves a treatment center. So sorting through all that is difficult for people too. And just sometimes, some days, I just think, All we can do is our work in our little corner of the world to try to make it better. One way the Zurkows and I have worked to raise awareness about the fentanyl epidemic was through the Nexstar special. You can find a link to that nationwide broadcast and the show notes of this podcast. While you're there, we'd appreciate it. If you could just take a moment to rate and review this episode. Please share it with your friends and family. Your support helps us to spread awareness about the Fentanyl crisis. Reduce the stigma surrounding substance use disorder and connect more people to the help they desperately need.

Erica Zurkow: 34:50

I think that every time someone tunes in and learns something about this problem. It adds up to more knowledge and more knowledge is more protection.

Peter Zurkow: 35:01

I was so reluctant to participate in the special in the first instance. I just, I guess I was overwhelmed. I'd had enough and after we watched it, we were so glad that we did. And interestingly enough they sort of forgot to tell us it was going to air in the local station. Two people that we knew called us and said, I just saw you on television and what a horrible story I didn't know. I learned so much. So yeah, we're really glad we, we did it. I asked the producers about the kind of distribution they had had. In addition to the viewings on television

peter-and-erica-z-_1_01-16-2025_170547: 35:40

they

Peter Zurkow: 35:41

said they'd had over, and this was. three months ago, four months, over a million and a half viewings online. the answer isn't an enforcement. The answer is we have to save lives and we have to go with the root problems afterwards. so yeah, I think it really did make a difference. Did you,

Angela Kennecke: 35:58

I hope so. I feel like I've been shouting this from the rooftop since 2018 and to 2019. Of course the pandemic, , set back some of these awareness efforts. I think people are now more aware. And I hope they continue to be more aware and I hope the education we have more states passing laws requiring this kind of education and that's a good thing. It should be in every school. Every kid should be getting an education on this and parents need to be educated as well. And thank you. Like I said, if we can just lessen the demand through awareness and education, I think that's a big piece of it, but then we also need to help people who are struggling because we know 49 million Americans suffer from substance use disorder and many cases that may be alcohol. But it's still a problem for people, right?

Peter Zurkow: 36:45

So one thing I was very impressed that you mentioned when we were in Dallas and maybe I can ask you again about it is how early you think education needs to start because I seem to recall your curriculum, your suggested curriculum is very early.

Angela Kennecke: 36:59

kindergarten. That's right. And in fact, our doctor, our child psychiatrist, who's also an addiction medicine doctor, says you can start talking to kids in preschool. We don't do that into our education curriculum, but we do start in kindergarten, and I don't think that you can start with these age appropriate conversations soon enough.

Peter Zurkow: 37:17

During the summer, last summer, I was, out somewhere walking with a friend who's much younger and has children who are 9 And he said to me, I just have one question. How early do you think you should start this conversation? And I said, right now. I saw him the next day and he said, I had a conversation with my daughter last night. And I think it's going to be an ongoing dialogue. And I think that it was warm and friendly. I felt really good about that.

Erica Zurkow: 37:46

important is the education of the professionals, teachers, principals. GPs, our general practitioner doc, everyone needs to be more knowledgeable and have more resources available that make sense. Our

Angela Kennecke: 38:06

right, cause we're working on training modules right now for educators. It was sort of the last step in everything that we've done over the last few years. And, you're right because they need to know enough about these things to feel confident to have those conversations. Right. And not everybody does. So we're working on that too. I just want to thank you again for coming on the podcast, for sharing Henry's story. And some of the things that you've done and it has been, like I said, just a pleasure to get to know you. You're welcome. And thank you for everything you're doing as well. And thank you for listening to this episode of Grieving Out Loud. Do you have an idea for a podcast? We'd love to hear from you. You can find my contact information in the show notes of this episode. There you'll also find a link to our Emily's Hope website where you can find more episodes as well as information about our substance use prevention curriculum. And the latest news headlines surrounding the fentanyl epidemic and substance use disorder. Thank you again for listening until next time, wishing you faith, hope, and courage. This podcast is produced by Casey Wonnenberg King and Marley Miller.