A Mother's Story of Loss and the Fight for Change

Have you ever felt the crushing weight of grief and wondered how to navigate it?

Join us on this deeply personal journey as Janet shares her experience of losing her son, Ted, and the importance of keeping his memory alive. We unravel the complexities of grief, examining societal discomfort around addressing the deceased and how speaking about them can actually bring comfort to the bereaved. We also confront the internal battles of guilt and self-blame that grieving parents often endure, emphasizing the healing power of remembrance and open conversations.

Janet McGee

• Email: mcgee652@umn.edu
• Website: http://www.janetmcgee.com/
• Telephone: +1 (651) 600 8229
• LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/janetmcgeemba

In the second half of our heartfelt episode, we shift our focus to the crucial advocacy work of Parents Against Tipovers (PAT). Hear how this group of resilient families, motivated by their tragic losses, is leading the charge for product safety reform. We highlight their determined efforts to gather data and influence the Consumer Product Safety Commission, shedding light on the pressing need for targeted bereavement support. Discover the strength found within this community and the transformative impact of building formalized grief support networks for families touched by preventable tragedies.

Join us as we support Brighter Days Grief Center this month!

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Chapters

• 0:03 Grieving Parents and Product Safety
• 10:59 Advocacy for Product Safety Reform

Transcript

Voiceover: 0:03

Tales from the wild, stories from the heart. A journey into the mind and soul of fired up business professionals, where they share their vision for the future and hear from a different non-profit organization every month as they create awareness of their goals and their needs. Dive into a world of untamed passion as we join our host, Shireen Botha, for this month's episode of Friends from Wild Places.

Tanya Scotece: 0:36

If you don't mind just touching on this a little bit. So initially, do you find people sometimes like they don't want to bring it up because they don't want to upset you as if, as if you're not thinking about this in your own thoughts initially, do you know what I mean. Like, let's say, you haven't seen somebody in a while, like, and it's like this awkward, like they may not want to bring it up, to think that they're bringing you back to that moment, but you live your life. Probably every moment of that Is that can you share? Shed some light on that.

Janet McGee: 1:03

Yeah, I I'm glad that you mentioned that, Tanya, because that is something I, when I was a mortician, I always remembered the families who lost a child. I don't know why. Those things just really stick with you and even when I'd see them out in the community, my brain always was like, oh, those are the parents that lost the child. You kind of like label them that way. And right away I was like, oh, those are the parents that lost the child. You kind of like label them that way. And right away I was like I don't want to be the parent who lost the child. You know, like I'm more than that Um, but um, I think um. So I'm sorry, what was your original question? I just trailed off a minute.

Tanya Scotece: 1:41

No worries, no, it just like, for example. So like, let's say you haven't seen somebody in a while, right?

Janet McGee: 1:47

Oh, you're asking if people bring, if, when people bring up Ted. Yeah, so what I was getting at was I, I remember thinking about families kind of the wrong way, because I would think about that like oh, they're the parent who lost the child and like maybe not mention that. But for me the most refreshing thing that happened was when I joined a mops group, a moms of preschoolers, after Ted died, after I had more kids, and somebody asked me about what it was like when Ted was little and I was like, thank you, you recognize the fact that I had a baby for two, almost two years, and you're actually acknowledging that experience because, yes, he died, but I still was his mom for two years and we still dealt with, you know, all of those things every new, every mom deals with. So, you know, I think more than anything, it's refreshing when people remember them, especially when they're young, because you fear people will forget them because they weren't on this planet very long.

Tanya Scotece: 2:53

Yes, and I remember having gone through that program many years ago, probably like 2008 or nine, and I remember, you know, in that like instruction that I received and I really like took it to heart, was that sometimes if you bring up something to somebody and they get emotional or, you know, maybe shed some tears, you're not making them cry, right. Sometimes it's like, you know, they're just sometimes even happy that you brought it up. But I think as a society, especially in the United States, like we really don't know how to handle grief. As far as talking to people with grief, I mean, it's like okay, if somebody has a funeral, we kind of can understand. You know we go to the funeral and maybe you know, sign the guest book and you know, extend condolences to the family.

Tanya Scotece: 3:48

But what do you do three weeks later when you do see these folks at the grocery store? Or you know you run into them at the gas station. It's like, do you bring it up? Do you not bring it up? So I just, you know, I just so appreciate your, you know, just authenticity with sharing, like you know, the emotions. As far as you know that it is comforting if somebody asks you about Ted, right, it's not like, like, oh, we should avoid the topic because we don't want to upset you. So anything else that you want to share with us and our listeners. As far as you know, like the grief side of your journey and I never made the connection, janet that that when you, um, when, when, when Ted passed, you were not in the funeral home at that time, like you were not working- I never made that.

Janet McGee: 4:35

I wasn't. Yeah, I had. After I got my MBA, I decided to let my funeral home license or my mortuary license lapse, and so I was not a licensed mortician. I hadn't been working for probably I don't know 10 years, maybe maybe eight year, in the field. It had been a long time.

Janet McGee: 4:53

Um, yeah, I think the only other thing that I would say about that, about losing Ted, that was eyeopening to me is there is something about and I'd say this to all the parents out there who, even if you I don't want to say even if, because that's not the right word If you have been in a situation where your child was injured or killed from a dangerous product on the market or a home accident, it's so easy to believe that you're responsible that you um to shame yourself. Um, and there's probably always going to be a part of me that wonders what could I? You know I should have anchored his furniture to the wall. Um, and I'll get into that in a minute about you know what I did with, with the information I had, but I think what was the most helpful for me was to just reach a point where I can't change what happened. I learned from it, and the best thing that I can do is to spread awareness and to help other people so that this doesn't happen again, to the best of my ability and to.

Janet McGee: 6:14

I saw how many parents that this happened to and, through social media and through the internet, how publicly shamed they were from people who didn't know the scenario, and it's not even tip over parents. But I worked with other other other parents you know, and parents who you know lost kids with from window blinds or left kids in hot cars or things. Where it's like you you have to understand there's nothing that you as a stranger could tell these people that they haven't already told themselves. And so if you want to live your life harassing a bereaved parent online, I guess that's your choice. But is that helpful? I would say no, and it's something that the parents are having to grapple with that um themselves, and I think the only way to help people heal from that is um through love and not shame yeah, yeah.

Shireen Botha: 7:16

So, Janet, with that, I would love you to to go into the next part of your story, of your journey after this incident.

Janet McGee: 7:24

You know what happened so about four days after Ted died, I was sitting on the floor in his bedroom and one of my friends had come over and she said well, this wasn't an Ikea dresser, was it? And I said it was, but I don't know what that has to do with anything. And she, she said, well, I just I was telling my coworker about Ted and she said something about Ikea dressers being unstable and I was like I don't know. So I'm sitting on the floor of my dead son's bedroom and I Google Ikea dresser deaths and the first thing that pops up is his dresser, his exact dresser. And I find out that day that it killed two other kids two years beforeer. And I find out that day that it killed two other kids two years before him. And I find out that there had been a not a recall, but a repair kit program that was issued through the Consumer Product Safety Commission seven months before he died, where IKEA said they didn't recall the product, but they said this dresser is dangerous if it's not anchored to the wall, so contact us and we'll send you an anchor kit in the mail. But what I know now is that Ted was the eighth child to die from an Ikea dresser and there were two other kids that died a year after him and actually he was one of 500 people who had died in the last two decades, since the year 2000, from a dresser or TV falling on someone. 90% of these deaths were toddlers. The other high percentage, around 10%, were elderly. If you think elderly have trouble fall risk, you go to grab a dresser. You know the dresser comes down with them.

Janet McGee: 9:15

But often, as I submitted a FOIA request, a Freedom of Information Act, so I could actually see these in-depth investigations, these IDIs, it takes forever and in fact I filed one gosh five years ago and I still haven't gotten a completed request. It's a very slow process, but you know, some of these, a lot of the ones we looked at, are such similar situations to ours, where a parent put the child down for a nap or to her bed at night and went to go check on them at nap time or went to go wake them up in the morning and found them under their dresser and they didn't hear anything because their body absorbed the noise of the fall. And so what we ended up doing was and again I Tanya, I attribute it to our background, you know, as a mortician and just kind of that compassion. But reaching out, found people on Facebook, just Googling, googling newspaper articles, googling tip over deaths, finding, finding their names, finding them on social media. Reaching out and say, like this happened to me, I heard it happened to you, let me know if you want to talk. You know, and eventually found several groups of parents who were willing to talk and I found out that several of these parents had actually been trying to spread awareness of tip overs for almost, you know, 10 plus years before Ted's death. So they're kind of unilaterally, you know, spreading awareness in their own states and in their own areas, but nothing had really changed.

Janet McGee: 10:59

And so and the other thing I'll say is, as we got more and more into this advocacy, we realized this was not just an IKEA problem. We realized that they just didn't have a lot of completed data. So the data that we did have showed a lot of IKEA, but most of the data that we had did not show what type of dresser it was. So the manufacturers, we were finding there was a lot of finger pointing going on, and I understand that from a business perspective, how do you justify making billions of dollars worth of changes in your product line or millions of dollars, how big your company is, without data to back up the change. Right, I mean, I understand that completely. So I saw the problem that we were in, but the reality is that we have all these anecdotal stories and no data to back up what's happening. But we need to stop turning a blind eye to all these children that are dying.

Janet McGee: 12:04

So, anyway, we formed a parent group called Parents Against Tipovers PAT, we call ourselves, but there was a group originally of about, I want to say, nine or so families where we all lost children and we were from all over the country. We were from Massachusetts and Missouri and Florida and Washington, the state of Washington and Chicago, Arkansas. Where was the other? Oh, New York. I mean, we were kind of all over the place. I'm in Minnesota and we basically got together and we flew out to Washington DC and met with the Consumer Product Safety Commission and we tried to make it as easy for them as possible. I mean, we made table tents like here's our name, here's where we're from, this is a picture of my child. We need you to hear our whole stories chronologically. This is what's happening and we really approached it, as we're not here waving our finger at you saying what you did wrong. We're saying you know what say you?

Janet McGee: 13:29

And what was refreshing, you know, looking back years later, is the he's retired now but the former commissioner, bob Adler, said you know you are one of the most well-organized parent groups I'd ever worked with because you came to us with data. You know you came to us not pointing fingers but wanting to solve a problem and you came to us with your stories and it wasn't just about your tears. So many times you know you hate to say it but, like as a government agency, you hear families crying with their tears and their emotions, which is horrible and hard to listen to, I'm sure, and heartbreaking, and you want to change it. But if you don't have data to back up how to make changes, it can be very difficult. So my understanding from what he told us is that was one of the ways we were so effective was because we kind of had both. We had kind of the logical and reasoning, but we also had our stories. That brought that change.

Tanya Scotece: 14:32

Right. Right, it's just amazing, though, just the. You know the advocacy portion. So a couple of questions I have for you, janet.

Tanya Scotece: 14:40

So, as far as you know, bereavement right, a lot of funeral homes offer like aftercare or support groups. So has there been any initiative for funeral homes to offer this type of support group for families who may have child who has passed from accidents, or the you know tip over type of situations? You know what I mean Like, for example, like there's, like the SIDS group I'm aware of we have, like in Florida. There's different advocacy groups here, but I just wonder, from like a national perspective, or even international, for that matter, what? What is your thought, as far as you know, promoting the, these type of bereavement groups or grief, grief supports for families that have children that have died, that they don't, they don't really know where to go, like you know, I mean like somebody that passed of cancer that's 90. It's sad, but it's a different type of grief, right, it's a different type of situation. So can you shed any light, as far as you know, how far that initiative on the bereavement side has gone?

Janet McGee: 15:43

I think I think it's needed.

Janet McGee: 15:45

Um, in fact, I think that that I think most of the parents in our parents against tip overs group could speak to the fact that we were each other's rocks.

Janet McGee: 15:53

You know, especially when you have social media and people saying that you know bad things like why aren't you watching your kids, or any, you know we had to stick together and you have to when, when someone says like this guy, this guy's an a-hole, he said this. You know we were a group where you could vent to to say you know, honey, they're saying that because if they say it out loud, that means it'll never happen to them. You know, it's a, it's a way that they're protecting themselves, it's a way that they're protecting their kids. You know, we just kind of had to bring that. We talked to each other kind of off the ledge and I think I don't have I mean, pat opens ourselves up to talk to families who have lost kids from tip overs, because you know I'm a mortician and one of the other parents in our group is a death doula, but but, but as far as if there's a formal organization that supports parents who have lost children from products, there's not one, and I would love to see that.

Tanya Scotece: 16:58

Yeah, yeah, I just, I mean you're just an amazing, amazing person. Humans mean I just you know, I just can't speak enough about you as far as you know what you've experienced, been through um and just sharing you know Ted's story and his journey, so absolutely, and I do sorry.

Shireen Botha: 17:18

I just have another question for you. Um, if you had to do everything over again, what is the one thing that you would change? Have you thought about that?

Janet McGee: 17:29

um, I mean, of course Ted would be alive.

Janet McGee: 17:33

That would be the one thing um, but you know, as far as the whole process and how it went down, um, I mean, I guess I'm just a firm believer in everything happens the way that it's supposed to. I mean, I think that one you know one one speaking engagement led to another, and one introduction led to another, and one relationship led to another relationship being built, which led to another relationship being built, which led to another relationship being built. And I think that's the beauty of life is when we can just kind of surrender um to how things unfold. Naturally we can take the weight off of ourselves and it feels actually pretty freeing, um, that we don't have to do anything, we can just be and, um, it will happen the way it's supposed to happen. Um.

Shireen Botha: 18:24

Very good answer. I like that one. Yeah, it's so true what you said. So so true. Things just happen the way it should and, yes, it's very easy for us. And there's nothing wrong with looking back and going, oh, I could have done this a little bit better. I learned from this so I could have changed that a little bit in the way, so there's nothing wrong with that. But I like your answer in the sense of you know what. Everything happens for a reason. I think this is exactly how everything should have turned out, so I appreciate that. Thank you, janet. Yeah.

Tanya Scotece: 18:58

Jenna, I believe we had spoken previously um about. Initially it was um and I don't want to put words. I don't want to project words for you, but I think it was. You know, again like this, want to put words. I don't want to project words for you, but I think it was. You know again like this you know it's like Ikea made this dresser and now we're going to investigate, and then now you actually serve on their advisory board. Is that correct? Or with them?

Janet McGee: 19:20

I don't serve on their advisory board, but what happened was something incredibly beautiful. Again, we don't choose, you know where to go, but I think things just lead us to where we're supposed to be. Um, what happened was um, in the end, I'm very impressed with how Ikea handled this situation. Um, I said from the beginning, I'm not here to throw this company under the bus. I just want them to take ownership of this problem because it's happening. And what I've learned is that, you know, the company knew that it was happening and I believe we're trying to make changes and we all, myself included, you know we didn't know what that looked like. You know this is such an you know and I think that's the power of vulnerability To be able to sit.

Janet McGee: 20:19

I mean, ikea reached out to me and other parents at Parents Against Tipovers and said you know we want to help you pass the Sturdy Act. You know we want to help you pass the sturdy act. You know we want to support this legislation, we want to be part of the solution, and I respect them for that. And so we met every week for almost two years to strategize and try to get the sturdy act passed. We reintroduced it three times and COVID was in the middle of that too. So, of course, our country was busy doing more important things during that time, but we eventually did get it passed, and IKEA was a big part of that and to this day, you know, I'm really I'm proud to be part of what they've worked on.

Janet McGee: 21:07

I mean, they developed a new system where you can you open one drawer. It's an interlocking drawer system, so you open one drawer and the rest of the drawers remain locked, so you can only open one drawer at a time, but if you were to anchor it to the wall, it will release the system, so you can open all of the drawers at once, as long as it's anchored to the wall. And they actually did a patent pledge last October, in 2023, to release that to the public. So they said you know this, we believe this innovation is life-changing. We want other people to use it, and so they released that patent to the public, which I thought said a lot about what their intentions were. They've redesigned a lot of their dressers and, of course, now, with the Sturdy Act, the Stop Tip-Overs of Unstable, risky Dressers. On Youth Act, now it requires manufacturers to um, to build, uh, to adhere to a stronger and mandatory safety standard Um. So they have to take um some additional uh elements into their uh, into safety, into designing safety, into their dressers.

Janet McGee: 22:25

So, they have to consider. You know what? What does it mean when the, when there's actually clothing in the in the unit, instead of it being empty when we test it? What does it mean if it's slightly elevated because it's maybe on carpet? There's carpet tack that runs along the perimeter of the room and is the back of the dresser slightly elevated and does that make it more susceptible to tip instead of testing everything on? You know, like a concrete floor in a lab, empty. You know it's not how we use dressers as consumers. We use them a lot of times on carpet and we have things in them because that's what they're designed to do and we teach our kids to use dressers and interact with them. So, you know, it might be that kids are opening, you know, one, two, three drawers at a time, and if that's not safe to do, then why are they designed that way? Love that.

Shireen Botha: 23:15

Yeah, okay. Well, now we've got to move on to the nonprofit section of the podcast, but I do have a question about your business. Do you want to talk a little bit about it? Your LLC, and how are you, you know, changing the community with your business? Do you want to talk a little bit about it, your LLC, and how are you, you know, changing the community with your business?

Janet McGee: 23:35

Yeah. So I'm kind of in the middle of a transition right now, because for several years I used my LLC called the Lifted, short for the Life of Ted, and I used it to spread furniture tip over awareness. So I would go and speak about, um, the dangers of unanchored furniture, and I'd go to mom's groups, I'd go to babies are us, to CPR classes, to basically whoever would listen, um, and just say you know, um, I'm just going to give you some information. You do with it what you will. I can't, I can't make you anchor your furniture, but, um, I just want to tell you my story, um, and then I had anchor kits, you know, for people and um, and so I did that. I um was able to partner with children's hospital here in Minneapolis. So we um worked together, um, on a couple of projects and anyway it was. It was really good.

Janet McGee: 24:29

But you know, once Sturdy got passed, I thought, well, now I'm going to get into teaching. I got this opportunity to teach at the mortuary science program and so I began thinking you know, what do I want to do with this LLC? And so now I'm in the process of kind of rebranding it. I still want to keep the name. The lifted the life of Ted and I. Now I want to. I'm working on creating continuing ad for funeral professionals to continue using Ted's story to invest in the funeral profession.

Shireen Botha: 25:01

Tune in next week for part three of Friends from Wild Places.

Voiceover: 25:07

You've been listening to Friends from Wild Places.