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After battling addiction for years, 19-year-old Tyler Shamash was hospitalized for a suspected overdose, but inexplicably, his drug test came back clean I asked the doctor three times. The doctor's like, "No, you know, our tox screen would show it. We test for opioids, and it would show fentanyl." That's today's guest on Grieving Out Loud, Julie Shamash, speaking in a piece for NBC Nightly News. Julie has shared her story on news programs and at advocacy events across the country, how her son survived a drug overdose at 19, and she asked his doctors several times if he'd been tested for fentanyl. And the doctor assured me three times, "Yes, our opioid test would cover it. no, his tox screen came out negative." Her son Tyler overdosed again the next day and died. It wasn't until five months later, after a toxicology report from the coroner, that his family learned fentanyl was in his system. The ses- test is 70 cents. the California cents. Say that again. The test is 70 cents. would've saved my son's life. While Julie can't bring her son back, she's made it her mission to prevent other families from experiencing the same kind of loss. She's advocating for legislation that would require hospitals to include fentanyl in routine drug testing. In this episode, she shares her difficult story, what she hopes to change, and how she's using her suffering to drive change When I was at the White House in May for the release of the 2026 National Drug Control Strategy, I had the privilege of meeting some of the most extraordinary people in this fight. Juli Shamash was one of them. Juli lost her son Tyler in 2018, same year I lost Emily. He was 19 years old, and the night before he died, he was taken to the emergency room with a suspected overdose. The hospital ran a standard drug test. What the test did not screen for was fentanyl, because fentanyl isn't part of the standard ER drug panel used in most hospitals across the country. Tyler died the next day. With no prior experience in policy or legislation, Juli took on the California State Legislature and won. In 2022, Governor Newsom signed Tyler's Law, requiring hospitals to include fentanyl in routine drug screenings for suspected overdoses. She is now pushing for federal legislation that would bring this standard to every emergency room in America. As a mother who has also lost a child, I feel the full weight of what drives her. It is grief, but it's also love in action. Juli, thank you so much for joining me. Thank you so much for having me. Really appreciate it Let's start off by talking about Tyler. Tyler was just 19 when you lost him, and I say the same year I lost Emily. Emily was 21. Uh, she took a drug that she didn't know had fentanyl in it. But we had struggled with her for several years, and it was apparent she was suffering from substance use disorder. We were actually working on an intervention. We were three days away from holding it when she died, so that's always a, a big regret on my part. Tell me about Tyler So Tyler was very intelligent, very inquisitive. Um, he could fix anything in the house. He was very helpful. He was my middle child. He also had ADD, so I always say, like, now looking back, he was missing the dopamine. He was always doing things for thrills. So he started when he was about 13, um, smoking marijuana. He had anxiety, and he also, he was on the spectrum. He had Asperger's, but very mild. But he told me, "Mom, when I'm high, nobody notices that I'm different, and I fit in." So, you know, I didn't think, like a lot of parents of my generation, I didn't think smoking weed was a big deal. If I grew up, I went to UC Santa Barbara, and it was something we did, and I didn't know the harms of it. You know, obviously, looking back, had I known, I would've nipped it in the bud a lot sooner. But, so that, he was doing that, and then, you know, as usual, it stops giving the same effect, so he started going to the high-potency products, the, the dabbing. And then that led to him doing lean, the promethazine-codeine cough medicine that you see the rappers carrying the big styrofoam cups. I didn't really know what that… I didn't know that was an opioid. I didn't really know. You know, he'd be like, "Can you get me Sprite?" And I'd go,"Okay." I didn't know that they mixed it with cough medicine. and then we started realizing he had a problem. We did an intervention. We had him taken from his bed at 4:30 in the morning to go to a wilderness program in Idaho. And he actually really liked the wilderness. He didn't say he liked it, but I think he did because number one, he didn't have to go to school there, and number two, he would, he would find things and make things, and he was really-- he had that really creative part of him. He made a necklace for his sister out of a bone. He made, um, a little, like, a spoon he whittled for me out of wood, and he was, you know, making things. And then they told us that he wasn't ready to come home, so then he went to a therapeutic boarding school in Utah, which he absolutely hated. He got, uh, I'd say he got bullied there a little bit. It wasn't the school's fault, but Uh, he got teased for having a big nose, for being Jewish, for I don't know what else. But he hated it, but we made him tough it out for a year, then we brought him home and he went to sober livings, sober livings. He was doing really well. He got hi- his first job, he got hurt at work and went to a workman's comp doctor. And I, I don't fault the doctor 'cause I know my son, and very likely he was drug-seeking from the doctor. Uh, so he, he got an opioid pain medicine, and but by that point he was 18, so I didn't go into the doctor with him. I didn't know any of this. And about the same time, he was hanging out with these girls who introduced him to smoking heroin, these two really pretty girls that he liked, and that was often Tyler's downfall, was trying to impress girls. So they introduced him to smoking heroin, and then he ended up with this… Uh, he came to me one day and said,"Mom, if I tell you something, do you promise not to kick me out?" I'm like, "Of course. You can tell me anything." "Oh, well, I've been smoking heroin." And my stomach, I mean, heroin? Like that-- Okay, marijuana, okay. But heroin was not on my radar and, you know, in, in, in my day heroin wasn't something. I didn't even know you could smoke it, much less-- the worst thing, through the, the worst thing you could do, right? Wasn't… I mean, that's how I looked at it, and I didn't know my daughter was using heroin. I didn't know she'd graduated from marijuana and Xanax, you know, to heroin. I didn't know that. Um, so when I found out after her death that it had been heroin that she thought she was using, laced with fentanyl, I was sh- I was like, like you said, that feeling in the pit of your stomach, like, "Heroin? Like, what?" I mean, I just think in our generation it was, like, the worst, I mean, the worst kind of drug you could do, right? Nobody did that not, not something nice kids in the suburbs did. You know, it was really something that you would see on TV, some guy with a thing around his arm and a needle in his arm on the streets. It wasn't something that I didn't even know that people But, right. But because of the opia- opioid epidemic, it became so much more common because it flooded our streets. When people couldn't get the pills and things that they became addicted to, we know that heroin became much more commonplace. I mean, looking back, you and I know that now. But so, and also the other similarities, uh, that you talked about that I've heard from so many parents that starting marijuana at such a young age, we know how damaging that is for the developing brain and how it sets kids up for addiction. We didn't know necessarily all of that in 2018. My daughter also started with marijuana. And to me, like you did everything possible to save your son. You spent so much money. I mean, I think about wilderness programs and boarding schools, and I've talked to other parents who, who did the same thing who ultimately ended up losing their child anyway. you know, and it's not even just the financial. I mean, the toll it took on my family. I have two other kids, and I always say, you know, now I understand when people say addiction is a family disease Right you know, 99.9% of our attention went to Tyler. We Of course therapies and Zoom therapies when he was in boarding school and, know, phone calls from the boarding school and the therapist and the this, and, you know, my poor other two kids, I, you know, thank God they're really good kids and they're pretty self-sufficient, but they shouldn't have had to be Yeah. I feel that way about my other kids too. I mean, because Emily did suck up all the energy in the room. We were ki- and when you have a child who is struggling with something, it is like a dark cloud is following you around, and you can't fully engage in your life or fully be happy. You're always worried. Um, it's so difficult, and it impacts everybody And now we can't fully engage with our life because no matter what you do and you are happy, there's always that underlying sadness. I mean, even if you're Wait thing and, you know, y- you still notice who's missing, and you can't I always call it the dance between grief, uh, and joy. The dance between grief and joy. I wrote a blog about that even, that, you know, that will always be with us, I think. It's y- it's not that we can't experience joy eight years later. I mean, I just marked the eighth anniversary of my daughter's death. And, but there's still that, like you said, that underlying grief because we shouldn't have lost them and we shouldn't have lost them. Were it not for fentanyl, they would still be here After Julie found out her son was using heroin, he told her he planned to try detoxing on his own. When that didn't work, he agreed to enter a treatment center. So he goes to, uh, a treatment place, and then he goes to a sober living, and then that sober living suddenly closed down, and for some reason they told the people there. And when you tell people with addiction something that's upsetting, you know, what, what is their first go-to gonna be? Drugs. So he, he and a friend, uh, his friend there said, "I can send you to a pl- a treatment place, and they'll give me money, and I'll split the money with you." So it was called brokering. Oh, I've heard about that. Right. Yeah un- you know, fortunately, they made it illegal now in California, but unfortunately Tyler died in October, and that law passed in December. unbeknownst to us, I thought he was being so mature, and he found a treatment place in Laguna Beach. And I said, "Why are you going, you know, kind of far from us?" He's, "Oh, because they take my insurance, and they have a really good reputation." And I called his therapist, and I,"Doug, oh my goodness, like, think he's finally getting it. He's mature, and he's found a place himself." And we were all so proud of him. La- later, after he died, we found out why he went to that place. Uh, they gave his friend money. His friend gave him the money. And he was at a sober living near our house at that point, and I get a phone call like 2:00 in the morning saying something happened. He's okay, but he's on his way to the hospital. So I laid in bed that night I was like, "You know, if he relapsed after we've spent so much time, energy, and money, like I'm done. He can just go live on the streets. I'm, I'm so done." And then I get a phone call from him

like 7: 11:41

00 in the morning saying, "Mom, did you hear what happened?" I said, "Yes, and I'm furious with you." He says,"No, no, I didn't take anything. I took too much Imodium'cause I started a job." He started a new job. And he did-- That wasn't out of character for him. He would get upset stomachs. And what do I know? Like, okay. But I'm like, "Tyler, I don't believe you." Uh, he's like,"Yeah, Mom, really, my tox screen came out negative. You can come over here." So I run over to the emergency room, talk to the doctor, ask the doctor three times, "Did you test him for, for fentanyl? Did you test him for everything?" And you have to understand, at the time it was 2018, so probably like you, you were maybe just starting to hear about fentanyl. I really didn't know anything about it. And the doctor assured me three times, "Yes, our opioid test would cover it. no, his tox screen came out negative." So okay, we, we leave, we go, go back, and, went-- We stopped to see my mom, and my brother was here from Hawaii, and y- you know, I, I leave him. That sober living, uh, kicked him out. Uh, that's a whole other story. It's like a, a cycle where one of them kicks you out, but their friend will take you in. said, you know, he, he,"We can't have people overdosing, whether it's by accident or on purpose. We're in a residential neighborhood. We can't have ambulances coming in the middle of the night. But he can go to our friend's place." Okay. Friend's place is right around the corner from my house, like literally like two blocks. And, um, and leave him on the porch 'cause they were-- he had to talk to the intake person, we had a, a dinner with, uh, clients of my husband's who were here from England. So he got to see the dog, and he got to see his brother Griffin, and we left him and, you know, he calls and says, "Can-- I'm really, really hungry. They haven't picked me up yet." It was like 8 o'clock at night."Can my friend Blake take me for food?" And, and I trust Blake. I'm like, "Yes." You know, Blake, the only thing Blake does is, is smoke marijuana. So I'm like, "Okay, but if Blake's car even smells like marijuana, and you inhale anything, and your drug test there turns out positive, you're done." "Yes, I know, I know." Goes, Blake drops him off at the place. Everything's fine. I text him good night, and then I'm folding laundry. It was a Sunday. I'm folding laundry 'cause the day before I spent it in the emergency room with him, and I'm finally, oh, I can do everything I was-- planned on doing the day before. My husband goes to brunch with a friend, and I get a phone call from my husband saying, "Did the place call you?" "What place?""The place where Tyler is. He fell and hit his head. The ambulance is there." And I'm like, "No. Okay, I'll, I'll come and pick you up." They had walked to brunch. Run and pick him up, go to the place, and I see an ambulance or paramedics out front, but I also see a police car. And you know, you're not thinking straight. I, I thought like he fell and hit his head. Maybe he's unconscious. Maybe he needs stitches. Like why is there a police car? I'm like, my gosh, was there a fight? Like, what happened? I-- no idea. Run in and ask the paramedic, you know, "Is he conscious? Is he okay?" And he says,"No, he didn't make it." And I was like, "What are you talking about he didn't make it?" Like it really wasn't-- You know, you're so in shock, it wasn't computing to me. It was, for some reason, you know, looking back, I'm like can't believe I was so naive. But overdosing was never on my radar because Tyler was so smart and would research everything. He knew everything about drugs. Like the dog would take something, and he'd be like,"Oh, that's a so-and-so and does this." Like he-- I, I just, I don't know. I guess I was just, I don't wanna say stupid, like I just didn't ever think. And, um, and I'm like, "I wanna see my son." They wouldn't let me see him. There was a police standing at the… He'd, he had fallen in the bathroom. I guess when you pass, when you die from fentanyl, you fall forward quite often. So he hit, he did hit his head on the bathtub. But I didn't believe them. I wanted to see him. They wouldn't let me see him. They said it's like a crime scene until the coroner gets there. So I never actually saw Tyler dead, and I don't know if that's one of the reasons that whole next two years seemed so surreal. I just expected him when I'd pull up to the house, that he'd be sitting on the porch where I left him when he died, or we'd go to the cemetery. I'm like, maybe he's in witness protection. He's gonna pop out from behind a tree. I mean, I knew realistically that he was dead, but it was just so surreal, and I just couldn't believe it Yeah. The shock and then the acceptance, whether you saw him, you know, whether you saw his dead body or not. And I saw my, I was with my daughter, um, after she died, and that was so hard, too. So I don't know that there's an easy way, but Right it is just all difficult. So then you find out that this fentanyl had been in his system from when he was treated in the emergency room the night before or the day before Yeah, we, we were able to just, you know, all these, I wanna say lined up. It didn't line up great for me 'cause he died, but like Right we were in the emergency room and then he was on the front porch, and we have a camera on our porch, so we saw he didn't buy drugs from anyone on the porch. And then he was with Blake, and then he was at the sober living. Yeah. alone. my question. He didn't take something between the time he left the hospital and died he was never alone, but so we went into-- After he died, m- my daughter and I were able to get into his phone, and that was luck, too. He had called me and asked me for, um, to look into his iPhone'cause we didn't let him have an iPhone when he was in treatment. He had one of, they used to call 'em Obama phones. They were like free phones you could get when you were low-income people. And even though he was in, you know, $4 million sober living, they considered him low income 'cause he didn't have a permanent address. So it makes no sense to me. But anyway, so he gave me his phone code by chance for the iPhone 'cause he wanted me to look at something. So the phone that he had, thank God it was the same code. So we-- my s- daughter and I were able to get into his phone, and we saw his, his, um, conversation with the girl, one of the girls that had introduced him to smoking heroin originally. And so he reached out to her, "I got this money," because he, with his ADD, if he had money, it would burn a hole in his pocket, and he wanted to impress her. And he's like, "I wanna get some drugs." She referred him to the dealer. She referred him. Now, now, to be clear, and I'm always very open about this, his case was not a case of him thinking he was getting something and getting something else. She said to him, "Let's not get heroin. Let's get fentanyl. I do it all the time, and it's better." And she had a tolerance, but he had just gotten out of treatment, so he hadn't used at all, and he had never used fentanyl before. It was, like Not knowingly anyway. Yeah, it's so interesting to me that, that in 2018 people in California were already seeking fentanyl because that's a more of a later trend in many other parts of the country, right? Well, A little bit later that had started to happen. heard of it, but, you know, I found out later that the reason that people in treatment would do fentanyl is it goes out of your system more quickly than heroin. So, know, they're all smart. They know if they're drug tested at sober living on a Monday, they're not gonna test them again till, like, probably Friday. So they, they, you know, they could time it basically. Yeah. So you find out from his phone that he had he, that it received… Yeah right? And so we, um, We, we were lucky again in this instance that the DEA had just come out with their HIDTA task force, and there had been an article about it. So I contacted-- I tried to contact LAPD, but couldn't get in touch with their homicide, and then I called the DEA here. had a meeting with LA, um, f- LAPD within an hour, and then another hour, somebody was at my house from the Los Angeles Police getting Tyler's phone, and then the DEA got involved, and they are the ones that investigated his case and saw it to fruition. And the drug dealer now is in jail for, uh, 13 years. So that was my first thing I focused on when he died. I'm a very, like… I wasn't working at the time. I was a stay-at-home mom. My kids were my life, like every mom. Um, and it really gave me something to focus on. And I Sure. The, the prosecution of his case. Yeah, and you were lucky. You were lucky that it was prosecuted, and you were lucky you got the DEA involved right away, because I actually interviewed a man on this podcast who spent four years trying to get law enforcement to investigate his college son's case, different branches of law enforcement all the way up to, like, the prosecutors, and then finally he contacted the, the DEA and they were able to prosecute the case. If you're a mother grieving the loss of a child, dear friends of mine, moms who've lost children to fentanyl poisoning and overdose, are hosting the Sisters of Strength Warrior Moms Retreat October 9th through the 11th at Wildwood Hills Ranch in St. Charles, Iowa. It's a weekend of healing, connection, horseback riding, and creative remembrance with women who understand. This weekend isn't about forgetting, it's about remembering with love. The link and details are in the show notes. I hope you'll join us So I went through the whole spiel with Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics. Got my sit-down meeting with probably a dozen agents. Got a lot of sympathetic ears. They assigned me a case agent, and it started out great. Started out really great. And then this individual got assigned to a different unit Yes, for the second time, the agent working on Graham's case was reassigned. Mark says yet another investigator was then brought in to take over. Things kinda went on, and I would reach out to him every once in a while, "Hey, where are we going with this?" Now, when I say I reached out to him, I wasn't bugging these people on the daily. This was, I'd go a month or two before I would, you know, underst- You were giving him some time… I understand how things work. Do I want you on my son's case 24/7? Well, you bet I do, but I know that's not how it works. You know, I was kinda giving him a wide berth, and I'd say,"Where are we at on this case?" And so another month or two would go by and I said, "Look, you know, if you're not gonna do anything, can you at least have my son's phone and his laptop back? 'Cause it doesn't sound like you guys are doing anything with it." And they go,"Yes." And I was like, "Well, that's not the answer I was hoping for. I was hoping for,'We're still working on it.'" And so I drove to Oklahoma to get Graham's laptop and his cellphone, because I w- people thought I was nuts, but I was like, "Would you trust your son's belongings to FedEx or the post office?" No, not if that's the last thing you have of him. No. I agree. I know there's too much evidence on there. Mark Russell never stopped pushing for answers in his son, Graham's, death. After four years of investigating the death on his own, a federal grand jury indicted Graham's dealer in December of 2023. You can hear Mark's full story by heading to this episode's show notes, where we've included a link. You can also find hundreds of other Grieving Out Loud episodes anytime on our website, emilyshope.charity. I feel so bad for that gentleman, but I'm so glad you were able to get swift justice there are a lot of parents like that. A lot of parents in small towns heard the police are like, "Well, your kid was just an addict." I mean, Right so lucky we didn't face-- I didn't feel like we faced any of that stigma. Um, the-- I, and I, and I'm sure it had to do with where we live, and he Sure. the first cases, and they weren't seeing white suburban kids dying from same with Emily. Same with Emily, yeah, right? I mean, she was beautiful, she was white, educated, suburban, all these things, and it was kind of a novelty at the time and, and it's Right much more commonplace since then. So after that, when did you realize that the law needed to be changed? When did you embark on that mission? Okay, so I found out that the drug test doesn't test for fentanyl. One of the managers at a sober living mentioned that. The doctor probably thought it did, right? The doctor who you dealt with that night The doctor didn't have ill intent. Of course not, no. Mm-hmm. I tried to call all the emergency rooms around me to let them know. know, I wasn't gonna sue the hospital. It's not gonna bring my son back. I'm not gonna ruin the doctor's life. He didn't do it on purpose, and if anyone's fault, it was probably the head of the lab or the head of the ER for not letting these doctors know that there's this new drug on the horizon. I just, I didn't want it to happen to anyone else, so I tried to contact all the ERs. I was able to get in touch with the ER where he, you know, he had gone. But the other ones, they don't give you their email address. You can't call them. I, you know, passed on messages. No one ever reached back out to me. So I'm like, "This is ridiculous. We need to pass a law." And I think I even c- like got in touch with SAMHSA, and I'm like, I didn't even understand. I thought standards of care like, a set thing, like, almost like a law, like hospitals have to do it. It's not something that they have to do, like a law that they have to follow. It's just, like, what everyone does for s- for a standard of care. anyway, I happened to be on a, uh, Zoom with, um, different people, and it was about marijuana actually, and there was a woman, Heidi, on there. And we were introducing ourselves and saying, like, kind of what we were working on. I was telling Tyler's story and saying, you know, "I wanna get this law passed." So someone said, "There's a doctor in San Diego. You need to meet her. She is working on the same thing," and that was Dr. Ronit Lev. She was working-- She was at emergency rooms in San Diego, and she was actually trying a pilot program in San Diego to have all the emergency rooms test for fentanyl. I got in touch with her, and she's like, "Yeah, I have the language for the bill written," which, you know, thank goodness for me because I don't know medical stuff. And she's like, "I just have not had any luck with any, getting anyone to sponsor it." So I'm like, "Oh, I'm your girl." Like, I- if there's nothing, my kids will tell you I'm a nag. So I'm like, "I will get someone to sponsor it if it's the last thing I do." So I reached out. I sent snail mail and emails'cause I'm like, okay, emails they can delete, but a snail mail they have to open, to every legislator in the Health Committee of the California, um, House and s- and Assembly and the Senate. I sent to everyone, and we finally got a wonderful, uh, California senator named Melissa Melendez to sponsor the bill. Now, she was Republican, and if you know anything about California politics, we're a very Democratic, Democrat state. And so the fear was, are people not gonna co-sponsor the bill with her because she's Republican? She's very outspoken also. Um, it, for us, it didn't turn out that way. Ronit and I went to the Assembly Health hearing. We both testified, and then the Senate one, we both testified. And it went to the governor's desk, and until he signed it, it was a fear. Like- Is he not gonna sign it because it's sponsored by a Republican? And they actually didn't do a public signing with us. Like, I tried to contact them'cause the joke was Ronnie really wanted the pen from the signing, someone said he won't do a public signing 'cause it's a Republican-sponsored bill, which is ridiculous'cause we all know fentanyl doesn't discriminate. It doesn't care political affiliation or Well, and what was your selling point for the bill? How were you able to get it passed in California? Talk to me about that, because I know several states have followed suit, and here in South Dakota, we looked at introducing a bill to require fentanyl testing in emergency rooms, and the word mandate is l- a dirty word around here, especially in politics. Insurance companies don't wanna, don't want it. They would- told us they would actively lobby against it. Um, we've been working with hospital associations and different, uh… Maybe you have some advice for me on, on, on so w- what was it? nobody outright opposed it'cause it would make them look really bad to oppose this. The ses- test is 70 cents. the California cents. Say that again. The test is 70 cents. would've saved my son's life. Now, just to go back, the way you treat a fentanyl overdose in the hospital is the same way as you would treat a heroin overdose. Now, the difference is we all know fentanyl is much more addicting, so they would've referred him to, a care place. They maybe would've sent him home with naloxone, which that wouldn't have helped either 'cause you can't Narcan yourself. But as parents, it would let me know that he was using again. I would not have sent him to a sober living. We would've sent him to a detox or a higher level of care. So that's, for us, how it would've saved his life. And also, it lets the people know that there's fentanyl in their drugs. They can dispose of their drugs, tell their friends,"You bought from this dealer," you know, "There's probably fentanyl in your drugs." And did you have any opposition when you were California Hospital Association, you know, Ronit has, Lev has relationships with everyone, so met and, and, uh, um, I don't remember her name, legislative assistant Hannah, I don't remember her last name, was wonderful. She had us meet with all these associations and, to get support. And they said, "We're not gonna oppose it, but we're not gonna be in support of it. We're staying neutral." So at one of the hearings, someone came from the California Hospital Association and said, "We're concerned about our rural hospitals, our rural underperforming heard that too. I've heard that too as well. gonna be able to do the test." Mm-hmm here's where Ronit's expertise comes in. She's like, "You have the right equipment. You just need different reagents, and I will offer my services to any hospital that has trouble figuring out how to do the test." Do you know not one of them took her up on it, so they all figured it out. It wasn't that hard. yeah, Yeah. figured out COVID testing, and that's what she said. She said, "I don't, I don't feel bad for any of these hospitals. They all made a fortune on COVID testing." So Right. And so that was your only, only person that spoke up during the process, and it's been in effect now for three years, is that right? Um, it went into effect 2023. Yeah, Yeah, so for three years had to start in January. And, And um you know that it's saved lives Yeah. And that, that's the amazing thing. Like, you know in theory, I know, like, when I'm doing the whole thing, like, yes, it's gonna save lives. But then too, there was, um, you know, I have on my phone the, the Google, it alerts me when it's, like, anything that says about hospital fentanyl testing. So there was an article about a family, they had twins, the parents were drug users. And one of the twins, he wasn't totally unresponsive, but he was drooling and… Babies, twin babies. Yeah. Yeah it. him to the hospital. They tested him for fentanyl. of, because they tested him and he turned out positive, they went, took the kids from them. Tested the other baby, who wasn't even really showing signs, and he had fentanyl in his system. So they took the kids from them. The fact that they took the kids from them got the parents to get sober. Parents got sober. kids are now with the parents. I think the kids are now four, maybe four years old, twins. Beautiful twins, beautiful family. They're sober. They're together. So I look at it like we saved four lives No kidding. That's a miracle story. That's amazing And I reached out to the mom and so we're friends on Facebook so I can, I see the, the kids and, Yeah. and everything, so Does that give you some comfort? I know losing a child, it's, there's nothing that can make up for that or fill that hole or nothing's gonna bring them back, but the fact that you went through all this, you, you, you know, the prosecution of the drug dealer. You went through the lobbying and, and getting that law put into place, and other states have followed. That's an important thing to note, too. And you know it saved lives. Has all that been helpful for you? It has. It makes me feel like his death wasn't in vain. I mean, I honestly, Angela, that when the bill got passed, and the way I even found out, like, no one even me that, you know, it, the governor passed it. Who- The person who contacted me was from the Emergency Nurses Association, the California Emergency Nurses, and they've been amazingly supportive. And I remember specifically I was at this little park near my house with the dog, and I thought when I found out I was gonna be jumping for joy, and I was happy, still had that sadness. And it was the same thing when the drug dealer got, you know, sentenced. I thought like,"Oh, it's closure. I'm gonna be s-" I wasn't happy. His mom is sitting there crying. Her son's now in jail. My son is still dead. The only benefit is he can't sell to anyone else to kill anyone else's kids, but it's not, there's not closure No, there's no real satisfaction. I think that's what I noticed, uh, in the cases, uh, that were prosecuted involving my daughter's death and the death of others, quite frankly, um, uh, that there was really, uh, even though there were convictions and, and I was glad that they weren't out doing, like you said, dealing to other people, possibly killing more people, it didn't really, it didn't make me happy. It didn't, it didn't bring me any, any sort of like, oh, this is, this is done now with a bow on it because that loss will always be with us, Right. right? I wasn't jumping for joy, but then, you know, I-- Oh, they did a, a story on, on me and Ronit and the law and Lester Holt, so it was a national news story. So after that story, I had parents reaching out to me through Facebook Messenger"Oh my gosh, something similar happened to my kid. How can I do this in my state? How can I help you?" And it turned out one of the people had reached out to me years late, a few years or maybe like a year later. She ended up in a grief group that I'm in online, which is based out of Los Angeles. I don't even really know how she got involved, but we became friends, and she's one of the ones-- She got the law passed. It's called Gage's Law in Florida. Yeah, I'm familiar with that. Yeah. Yeah the first person that reached out to me was, uh, Maryland, uh, a woman whose fiancé had died, and they knew that he was using fentanyl or he had used fentanyl in the past. But she was a psychology student or a student of social work, and she said, and I never even thought of this, she's like, "You know, if they're not testing, all of their statistics are wrong." She's a very, like, mathematical kind of person, and that's how she came. I'm like, "Oh my gosh, you're right. All the people that they're saying are surviving these overdoses, you know, they do have fentanyl in their system." So we helped her get it passed there. It, it does give states and governments a better idea of how much fentanyl is actually in the drug supply, how much fentanyl is out there, which should make everybody want to do it. It's relatively easy to do. It's cheap to do. Um, but like I said, w- I've still run into some resistance here, but I'm not giving up on that. And But the federal law, so to go back to the federal law is, you know, in a perfect world, I would like them to mandate that Yes but the federal government cannot mandate to states things that are not in, like mentioned in the Constitution. So that's because of the Tenth Amendment. And so the federal law says that Health and Human Services will do a study and find out, you know, how many t- hospitals are testing, are the negatives, there are no ne- negatives, they will make a recommendation to all hospitals. So they're not issuing a mandate that you have to do something. They are issuing a recommendation. And, and, and that will not only let them know about fentanyl, but then a light bulb's gonna go on over their head saying, "Oh my gosh, if we're not testing for fentanyl, we need to do separate tests for xylazine. We need to do s- you know, for any new drugs on the horizon." They're gonna think twice about that Well, in this, you're talking about the federal law. So there's a federal bill that was passed in the Senate, uh, in March, I believe, of this year that would Yes m- have, do exactly what you're saying, have Health and Human Services do a study and then make a recommendation to hospitals across the nation. It's now before the House. Do you know where it stands? It is. We had a hearing. So it was first introduced three years ago, it didn't go through that legislative session. We always had positive, um, like feedback from Energy and Commerce Committee, from the staff on there, and it was really just them finding a time. Like, you know, every time they have a shutdown, it backs everything up. So they didn't, didn't get it passed. So then this time it was reintroduced and they, a- again, they were so supportive. They're like, "Juli, we know about the bill. We've heard from all our members. It's really just a matter of time." So they did have a hearing in the health committee. And, um, Guthrie is the chairman of Energy and Commerce, and he likes everything to go through regular order, which means it goes through the exact procedure. Like, you know, there's certain ways you can skip certain things, but he does not allow that. So it went through the hearing with a bunch of other bills, and now it has to go through something called markup in the health committee, and then markup in the full Energy and Commerce, and then it would go to the floor. And, you know, unfortunately for us, one of the rooms that they use for these markups is under construction, so now it's even, like, a worse backup of bills. And Energy and Commerce is in charge of a lot of committees, so them trying to find the time. So they've assured us it's gonna happen. They, they thought possibly in May. Well, it's not gonna happen in May. They're out this week. Um, so I'm hopeful June. And I'm kind of on hold. I, I don't have to be there for the markups, but I wanna be there. I mean, it's my baby, you know? It's Yes. Yes, it's even named, there it's named after Tyler even on the federal level. Yeah. Yes be sitting there holding his picture, so if they're gonna vote against it, they have to s- look at me and face me. Are you ready to protect the next generation from the dangers of substance use? Emily's Hope has created a comprehensive K through 12 substance use prevention curriculum designed to educate, empower, and equip students with the tools they need to make healthy choices. Our age appropriate lessons start in kindergarten and build through high school using science, real stories, and interactive learning to help kids understand their bodies, brains, and risk of drug use. We're already reaching thousands of students across multiple states, and we're just getting started. Visit emilyshopeedu.org to learn more, and share our curriculum with your school administrators and counselors. At Emily's Hope, we believe prevention begins with education. Let's work together to keep our kids safe. And how do you feel about all of the advocacy work you've done nationally? Because I, I met you at the Eisenhower Building in the White House complex. We were both there. You were there to speak on a panel. I was there to listen. And, um, I think it's interesting to do some of this advocacy work, and I've done it under both administrations now, the last two administrations. Sometimes I feel like it's, um, not really pushing the needle a whole lot. I, I, I don't know. Do you feel like it's making a difference when you go, when you go to Congress, when you go to meet with, uh, officials and administrations? I mean, I feel like every-- You know, when you meet with people, you-- I, I rarely meet with the actual politician. I meet with people from their offices, and those people are in their 20s, early 30s. And I feel like if nothing else, even if their boss decides not to co-sponsor my bill, those are one or two people that now know Yeah and they can spread the word. And that's what I've always thought. I go and speak to schools or businesses and, you know, if it's not a big audience, like, that's okay. Because even if it's 10 people, those 10 people will tell other people about fentanyl poison drugs. So that's kind of always my-- the way I look at things. And what's next for you? If, uh, hopefully we will have, uh, Tyler's Law federally. It's growing across the country in terms, I know there's different names for the laws in different states, and we're working on it here in our state, but what's next for you? I don't know. I think, um, you know, I, I am actually concerned about that. I was thinking about that yesterday. Um, that I don't have this to focus on… 'Cause this, I, I mean, I didn't know anything about getting a bill passed. It's a lot of sending emails, meeting with people, and, you know, people don't answer you. I've sent emails to cer- certain offices that I won't name, look, I'm sorry, you know, it takes you two seconds to respond and just say,"Sorry, we're not interested." They don't answer me. I don't even know, like, am I emailing the right person? Are they not getting it? And I'm just that nagging. I'm like, "Hi, it's…" One time I'm like, "Hi, it's my monthly nagging email," and they, you know, still don't answer. So it's really, you know, besides speaking at schools and doing my advocacy and doing, uh, outreach and all the things I do, really this is my main focus. So I am concerned that when I don't have this, am I going to be in a puddle on the floor? Because I feel like… Not that I didn't grieve my son,'cause I grieved my son, but like you, I have other kids, and you gotta hold it together for the other kids. And I remember, like, every time I would start crying and I'm like, my husband, you know, men wanna fix things, so he would get upset. And, 'cause there's no fixing this. When you miss your child, you miss your child. There's nothing anyone can do to make you feel better. I mean, I've met amazing parents and you, we have an instant bond, I feel like, with any parent whose child died this way. Um, but you know, I keep it together for my other kids. I mean, yeah, I, I did cry, but I feel like I never went through, say like debilitating grief. Not that you have to go through that, but I'm just, I am concerned, like, if I don't have anything to focus on, um, you know, is it gonna be bad? And, and that's when I always miss Tyler more, when I'm home and I don't have anything to do that day. I'll, I'll try to like think of like, okay, I'm gonna clean out a closet or I'm gonna… Stay busy. And that's your way of coping, staying busy. And I think there is, uh, a great value in, in, in finding purpose in your pain. It sounds cliché, but you really found a very direct purpose and a place to put that pain. And when that all goes away, yeah, I, I get it. I get it. What happens?'Cause I, I'd done the same thing. I'm, I'm a doer. I've been busy. Emily's Hope has a lot of initiatives, and I just keep thinking of the next initiative. What's the next thing we're gonna do to help people? What's the next thing that needs to be done? So I think you'll find another thing that needs to be done focus. I don't, I don't know, well, since you didn't know she was, your daughter was using heroin, but like Tyler was in all these sober livings and he had ADD and they wouldn't let him take Adderall. And they expected him, and he was young too. I think when he, we took him out of the boarding school he was just under 18, and they expected him to pay attention in their meetings and then he would get in trouble for not paying attention, but they wouldn't let, let him take Adderall. And I'm like, I, I, hindsight's 20/20 and I really try not to think of all the things I didn't do, 'cause I feel like we did do so much. But then always it comes into your head like, "Why didn't I fight more for him to take the Adderall?" I mean, I feel like I set him up for failure. Well, I think you're taking too much of it on, and, and I do that too. I mean, we all do that, right? We all take too much of the problem on, and there are so many things out of our control that we couldn't have stopped or prevented anyway, and so many outside forces, like someone telling him he can't take it, um, that are beyond our control. But that might be something that you can look into next. Like, w- and, and they wouldn't let him, you know, as a parent, we, we don't have addiction in our family, make us better than anyone else, it just means I have no ex- I had no experience dealing with this, and Me either. to the Yeah. So he, Tyler wanted to take Suboxone, and they all said no, he couldn't at a sober living because he'd be trading one addiction for another. Well, now hindsight, who cares? I don't care if he would've stayed on Suboxone his whole life. Right. And we know that's, yeah, we… on medicine Oh, that's so upsetting to me because we know that that is the gold treatment for substance use disorder. We know it keeps people alive. We know people can be on it for years just like they're on diabetes medication. But I do believe back in 2018, and hopefully they've changed that now, these places, and they would allow him to be on Suboxone today. I hope I has changed. But you should look into that. I think that's maybe the next thing I am still gonna look into, um, uh, if they are still taking, uh, kickbacks for, like, referring people, 'cause I did read an article recently, like all these places fly people in from out of state. Mm-hmm. and then with their, uh, once their insurance doesn't pay, they kick them out, and the people can't back, even though there's a law that says that if they fly them in, they have to provide a ticket back. maybe that will be my next, uh, I'm gonna follow it 'cause you, you get things done and I ca- I can't wait kind of to see what you take on next, and I hope I can be part of that effort in some way as well, just like we're, we're working here to, you know, continue Tyler's Law in our state. For more information on the bill in Tyler's name at the federal level, check out the show notes for this episode. We've included a link to the full text of the bill, along with its current status. At the airing of this podcast, the US Senate has passed the bill, but the House had failed to introduce it for months. While you're checking out the show notes, we'd sure appreciate it if you'd take just a moment to share this podcast with your friends and family and give us a five-star review. The more people who hear these stories, the more awareness we can build and the more lives we can protect. To parents out there, it's so hard not to go back and think about what we didn't do. But I do-- My husband always says this, I have to give him credit for this, is, you know, in our grief group, you have parents, one person tried tough love, one person didn't, one person tried, you know, transport, having them taken to the wilderness. W- we all ended up with dead kids. The same result. you look back, the same result, and it makes you feel a little better. Like, there's-- You can't love away addiction. You can't. Now can't, you know… Sometimes these politicians, "Oh, we're gonna round up all the homeless. We're gonna put them in treatment." Yeah, you're gonna be wasting your money. If, if they don't wanna get sober, they're not gonna get sober. The person has to want And I lead a grief group of parents, and I always say, and sometimes siblings join us too, but I always say, "Even if, even if you had done this or had not done this, they still could have died anyway." And that's to your point. Um, it doesn't really seem to matter. It just, we end up with the same results, so Yeah, and my other thing is I tell parents, 'cause, you know, parents a lot of times are like,"Can you talk to my friend? Their kid is using." And I'm just like, "Why do you wanna refer them to me? Look at, you saw my result. I don't have all the answers." But I know I do feel like parents need to trust their gut because listening to the experts didn't work out. And if you trust your gut, at least you maybe won't say, "I should have done this" as much Right. Yeah. Trust your instincts. I agree with that. Listen to your heart. Uh, you know. But thank you so much for sharing Tyler with us, with our listeners and our viewers, and for all the work that you've done, and I have a feeling I'll be seeing you at more advocacy events. Yeah I hope so. Definitely stay in touch, and thank you so much for having me on. I, you know, love to talk about my child, of course. And thank you for listening to this episode of Grieving Out Loud. Stay tuned each week for a new conversation, and if you or someone you love is struggling with substance use disorder, please don't wait to seek help. Your life matters. Help is available. You can find a list of resources on our website, emilyshope.charity. Thank you again for listening. Until next time, wishing you faith, hope, and courage. This podcast is produced by Casey Wannenberg King and Kayli Fitz