Stacey | Students of AMF

Stacey, class of 2013
University of Georgia

I lost my mom to cancer at age 18, in my last semester of high school. Despite the relatively sudden loss, I was able to finish my year successfully and enjoyably because of the support from my friends and teachers. However, when I came to college, I lost that support base and found it hard to relate to other freshmen. I often felt the need to share about my loss, but I hesitated because I didn’t want to be judged or simply make a conversation awkward. As a result it was hard to build new friendships, and at the same time I had to care for my brother and dad, who were struggling on their own at home.

Several months into college, I came across a sample persuasive speech about college grief support in my public speaking book. It mentioned David Fajgenbaum and Students of AMF, which I immediately Googled. When I saw that chapters were sprouting across the country and that no such support group existed in my university of over 30,000 students, I got in touch with David and started to work on bringing Students of AMF to the University of Georgia.

During the summer, I attended the National Conference on College Student Grief. Although the keynote speeches and the presentations were great, the most valuable thing I got from the weekend was the sense of community. Being in a room full of students who had gone through what I had gone through was indescribable. I felt a sense of belonging without even speaking with them. After getting to know them for two days, I couldn’t wait to bring that warm, unique community to my campus so that others at UGA could experience it, too. Last week, our campus held its first Support Group meeting. Through building our chapter, I’ve been able to open up to more people on campus about my personal experience as well. Public speaking is not a required course for my degree, but I took it because others told me that it will be beneficial in many ways. But no one foresaw the greatest benefit that the course has given me so far — a connection to the National Students of AMF.