Urban Tidepool

Growing up with a terminally ill mother, a mentally ill and addicted brother and an alcoholic father is an almost surefire path to become a social worker. Through thirty five years in the field, my colleagues haven’t known that my mother’s death unanchored me when I was seven years old, leaving me surrounded by addiction and mental illness and shuttled from home to home. Grief, gratitude and everyday heroes are my foundation.

Urban Tidepool explores the background of a social services professional through the lens of reclamation and forgiveness. Interjected with dark humor, the majority of this gritty manuscript chronicles the time frame between the deaths of my parents. Supplemented with stories of young people with whom I’ve worked, Urban Tidepool leads readers through moments of desperation, paralyzing fear, and high risk behavior to acceptance and then to connection, healing, and creation.

It is time to tell my truth. Gut-wrenching stories of youth suicide have become standard fare. My truth is that it is possible to survive catastrophic loss by finding humor in a futile search for Christmas tree pants, in the danger of sharks in the closet and in opportunities to help a Gulf State cockroach with his grooming, and to use it to facilitate life-altering changes for a new generation.

Welcome. Walk with me and I’ll tell you a story. We’ll lead with our light.

Nancy