From Shadows to Spotlight with Tori Hope Peterson's Journey of Healing

Embark on an emotional sojourn with Tori Hope Petersen as she narrates her voyage from a turbulent childhood in foster care to becoming an emblem of hope and transformation. Through her lens, you'll journey across terrains of adversity where she discovered her sanctuary in the rhythm of track and field, serving as both her escape and her identity. The revelations of Tori's past and the pivotal role of AncestryDNA in her heartwarming reunion with her biological lineage sets the stage for a conversation that's as profound as it is enlightening. Her upcoming book, a beacon on the horizon set to illuminate the path to generational healing in February 2025, weaves a tantalizing thread throughout our discussion.

With Tori as our guide, we wade through the complexities of trauma, the healing embrace of genuine support, and the strides one can take toward emancipation and triumph, even within the oft-challenging foster care system. Yet, the canvas of her life extends beyond personal conquests, as she propels us into the urgent advocacy for child abuse prevention, and the crucial work of organizations like Place of Hope in Florida, where the staggering statistics of abuse reports from 2020 call us all to action. The conversation takes a turn into the darker corridors of human trafficking, only to emerge into the light of storytelling as a powerful means of transformation and empowerment, where trauma is not a shackle but a springboard for connection and strength.

In the warm embrace of hospitality and advocacy, Tori unveils the connections between opening her home, her culinary passions, and her unwavering mission to foster change in the lives of children. Her heartfelt gratitude for the love and grace that have fueled her journey is palpable, inviting us to reflect on the power of giving back. Our gratitude extends to Amy Kazma and Place of Hope for their unwavering support in making this episode a reality, as we encourage you to engage with us further, for the stories shared here are just the beginning of a dialogue we hope will resonate, inspire, and ignite change.

Takeaways

• Growing up in the foster care system can be challenging and traumatic, but with the right support and resources, individuals can overcome adversity.
• Track and field can provide an escape and a sense of identity for those in difficult situations.
• Finding a community and a support system, such as a church, can be instrumental in healing and finding hope.
• Emancipation from the foster care system can be a difficult transition, but with determination and support, individuals can achieve their goals.
• The search for biological family members can be emotional and impactful, providing closure and a sense of identity. Using Ancestry DNA can be a powerful tool for connecting with biological family members.
• Having no expectations and being grateful for whatever comes out of a reunion can lead to a healthy and positive experience.
• Proactive support for youth in foster care is crucial, providing them with tools and resources before they emancipate.
• Sharing personal stories can be a healing experience and can help others in their own healing journey.
• Advocacy work and policy change are important in improving the lives of vulnerable children.
• Hospitality and cooking can be meaningful ways to create a welcoming and nurturing environ

Title Sponsor: Crypto Capital Venture | Follow Dan Gambardello's on Twitter (@cryptorecruitr)

Chapters

• 0:02 From Foster Care to Triumph
• 8:36 Navigating Trauma and Achievements Through Track
• 15:10 Emancipation Journey and Triumph in Track
• 26:40 Child Abuse Prevention and Reconnecting Family
• 36:27 Breaking Cycles Through Advocacy and Healing
• 43:28 Healing Through Storytelling and Empowerment
• 54:52 Advocacy, Love, and Hospitality
• 58:50 Meeting Amy at Place of Hope

Transcript

Charles Bender: 0:02

Hello and thank you for tuning in to Ambassadors of Hope. I'm your host, charles Bender. We're so excited that you've tuned in to hear from local South Florida leaders who are making a difference in our community and region through our charity Place of Hope.

Maya Elias: 0:15

Hello, I'm Maya Elias, producer for the Ambassadors of Hope podcast by Place of Hope. Today, we're privileged to have Tori Hope Petersen as our distinguished guest. Tori's journey through the foster care system, overcoming adversity and finding solace in track and field, is truly inspiring. She candidly shares her experiences of abuse, instability and her eventual triumph as a four-time state track and field champion. Tori's quest to reconnect with her biological father utilizing platforms like AncestryDNA, underscores her resilience and determination. She reflects on the emotional roller coaster of reaching out to potential relatives and the profound impact of discovering her biological family, particularly her father's sister.

Maya Elias: 1:03

Throughout her narrative, tori underscores the importance of embracing uncertainty and gratitude in reunions. Moreover, tori advocates for proactive support systems for youth in foster care, stressing the significance of equipping them with the essential tools and resources before they transition to independence. She eloquently speaks to the healing power of storytelling and the necessity of providing survivors of abuse and trauma with safe platforms to share their experiences. In addition to her advocacy work, tori shares insights into her personal life, including her passion for hospitality, cooking and her role as a devoted mother. Currently, she's channeling her experiences into a new book aimed at breaking destructive patterns and generational cycles. Join us for the remainder of this poignant and uplifting episode where Tori Hope Petersen's story continues to inspire and motivate.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 1:57

Well, welcome to the Place of Hope podcast. Ambassadors of hope. We're in the studio today with a special guest from out of town who came into town to speak at our 10th annual angel mom brunch. Tori Hope Petersen is here with me in the studio and I'm going to let her give a little introduction about herself. But she's just a lovely girl. We've had such a great day and after we have a big event like this, it's kind of like planning a wedding. You spend months and months and months and months and then finally the day is here. It's just like, oh, afterwards, um, but I'm so glad that we can share you with our listeners and other place of hope supporters who maybe didn't get to be in the room today. So, tori, welcome to Place of Hope and welcome to our podcast.

Tori Hope Petersen: 2:44

Yeah, thank you for having me. It did. It felt like a Superbowl that event did. It was awesome, and I was so honored to share my story with your, your guys' audience, like such genuine people who want to care and love children who need care and love.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 3:00

Well, you've got a great story of hope. We love your middle name, by the way, and you know, last summer or last spring, when we had this event, Amy Kazma, one of our angel moms, she kind of pulled me to the side and she goes OK, this is great, but we need to go bigger. And we got to get a speaker. And I want you to do some research.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 3:23

And I came across your story on another podcast and I think it was the nothing is wasted podcast, I'm pretty sure. And then I started doing my research and looking you up and, man, what a story. And you are such a light. And I think by telling your story, you're helping countless other young adults who don't have a voice, because and we were talking about this in the car a little bit, I mean a lot of times these kids, they don't want to tell their story, they don't want to talk about their trauma. And there you are on the stage today and making everybody laugh and having fun with it. So let's tell your story. I want you to share your story because I think a lot of people would like to hear it.

Tori Hope Petersen: 4:05

Yeah Well, if we don't laugh we're going to cry, so we can do both. But I really like to make people laugh and I like to make people happy, so it meant a lot to me. Afterwards A lot of people said you're funny and I was like, oh, that's the best compliment that you can give me is to say I'm funny and I make you laugh because so much of the story is so hard. I was born to a single mom who absolutely did the best with what she had. I think it's really important to say that Before I was born, my mom is a trafficking survivor.

Tori Hope Petersen: 4:37

My mom was abused and her parents died, passed away very young, and so she didn't have anyone to help her out of the situation that she was in. She was like a teenager. Her dad moved her from where I now live, defiance Ohio, small rural town, to Houston, texas, and then her parents passed away and she was there all by herself. She was in Houston Texas Like she was just a kid, really in her early twenties, and she was being trafficked and she didn't really have anybody, didn't have a community to lean on, didn't have people, and I mean when you think about your guys' organization, it's so wild because, like there are literally right. You were telling me in the car a story of a girl. Very similar situation gets dropped here in Florida, left basically by her parents. Where did my mom have to go? If your organization would have been where my mom was like, my story would be very different, because my mom just didn't have any place. And I just think it's so important to give that context, because my mom is not a villain. My mom is not this terrible person. She was a kid who didn't have all these resources that we have today, that didn't have what I have, what I did have as a kid. So I was born and you know, my mom was really on her own, did not want me to be raised in Houston. She felt like she had so much trauma there and it was really important that I wasn't raised there. So she moved us back to where she was originally from, which is where I'm from is Ohio.

Tori Hope Petersen: 6:02

My mom, she knows she always said she loved me. She always said that she wanted the best for me. From a very young age I remember from like the age of four, my mom told me I had to go to college, I had to be an educated woman. That was always very important to her. I know that my mom wanted the best for me, but she was involved with dangerous people.

Tori Hope Petersen: 6:17

I ended up going into the foster care system due to a drug bust. There were uniform men busted through our front door. I was probably like four years old and they just took, you know, bags of drugs down from the cabinets and this nice young woman came, swooped me up, took me to the backyard and she just said we're just going to go somewhere for a little while. And so I went into my very first foster home and during that time I was like I do not want to be here, I want to be with my mom. My mom loves me. My mom provided for me. I mean it was with drug money which I didn't know was bad, but I was provided for. I did have a relatively, you know it. It appeared stable, it felt stable, it didn't feel dangerous, it was normal.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 6:53

It was my normal, it was my normal and you don't when you're that young, you don't know what you don't know.

Tori Hope Petersen: 6:58

So I just wanted to go back. I just wanted to be with my mom. My know you don't have a concept of time when you're four years old, but my mom said I was in the system for about six months. The system did one of its roles fulfilled. One of its roles is reunification, and I will be very frank in saying that I don't always believe that's the best option. I think it's very trendy in foster care to say, like reunification is always the best option. We always need to put like foster children back with like biological family, and that's not always the best case. And that that proved itself true, because I went to go live back with my biological mom and we were stable for a little bit, but as time went on, the abuse in my home started to increase. My mom was really struggling with mental illness, I think because she had never healed from the trauma that she endured when she was a teenager and when she was younger and it was just coming out in herhood. Because motherhood is hard If we don't take care of our stuff, it's all going to come out in our motherhood and our wifehood because it's just so hard and so she started to be very abusive and the abuse started to get worse and worse and worse.

Tori Hope Petersen: 7:54

And so when I was 12 years old, I went into the foster care system again for a second time and this time I had a sister. She's 10 years younger than me, so she was like about two at the time. We went into the system together. I was so relieved Like it was a complete like black and white completely different feeling than how I felt the first time. I was like okay, like we're going to get stability, like things are going to be normal, we're going to get to escape the abuse and the chaos, like I was looking forward to it. I was like we're going to have a family, maybe I'm going to have a dad, like foster care seemed like this really great thing. But abuse had happened in that very first foster home that we were in.

Tori Hope Petersen: 8:31

Unfortunately, I reported it. They said that I was lying and me and my sister were separated. I went to live in a residential group home which I was very upset about, and I was upset because the residential group home it was for high risk teenagers, it was for high risk kids, and I had never done anything to put me under the umbrella to be considered high risk. Never done drugs, never did alcohol, didn't get into trouble. I had I was a 4.0 student at this point and so I was pretty upset. But one of the things that they mandated was they mandated for us to be in therapy. I went to therapy and I was like I literally was like in therapy. I was like I'm going to go through the motions, like I'm just going to do what I have to do and say what I have to say to get out of here. But like, as she was asking me questions and I had to answer them, like I was like I'm not going to be, I wanted to like be in had actually really hurt me.

Tori Hope Petersen: 9:29

There were many different behaviors in this home. This home had such a such an impact on me and and not like their programming, but just like in the way that I could see myself for the first time and it made me realize things about myself. Really, through the therapy and during this therapy, you know, I realized that growing up with my mom had been really quite hard and all these girls, we had to have different behaviors. But one of the ways that my trauma manifested was that we so we had point sheets. Um, so if you are not in child welfare, I'm just going to try and like really explain this to you very clearly. So we carried around a clipboard with a piece of paper on it and every time we had we did something that was good quote, unquote, good or that was good behavior. They would have us write down positive a thousand points and then we would write down the good behavior. If we did anything bad, bad choice, bad behavior uh, we would have to write down negative, negative, 3000, negative 3000 was the minimum. That was like the starting, and for me those negative points were just crushing.

Tori Hope Petersen: 10:36

My mom was someone who really valued achievement. Like I said, when I was like four she was like you gotta go to college. My mom was someone who really valued achievement, high accomplishment. She had a really really high standards for me and so when I got like negative 3000 points, it was so crushing and I would go to my room and I would just I would like rehearse how like I'm going to do better, I'm going to do better and I would like replay in my room how I would react better so I wouldn't get the negative 3000 points again and like the girls, girls, the other girls I was living with, like they got like multiple negatives like in a day and I would maybe like one negative a week because I was so like I have to be perfect, I have to not get it, and like the programming was actually quite I think it did a bit more damage than it did. Good, but that is actually one of the things that the therapist pointed out. She was like this is how your trauma is, like crushing you. She was like you think it's a good thing and everyone else. It was so wild. She's like everyone thinks this is a good thing, everyone praises you for your accomplishments, everyone praises you because you're the good kid, but the reality is this is how your trauma.

Tori Hope Petersen: 11:42

Perfection is a trauma response and it helped me see myself in this this way that, like, perfection is the enemy of good. I couldn't have peace, I couldn't just live in the simple goodness, because I was always trying to be perfect and I was always trying to wrestle with that. So eventually I left this group home. I moved throughout many different homes. I moved throughout 12 homes throughout my entire time in foster care, which was very hard.

Tori Hope Petersen: 12:10

You know, you just feel unwanted, you feel disposable, you feel like no one wants you. You feel like no one wants you, loves you, wants you. You just feel like you're not, you don't belong and you're moving from. I mean, people were always like, what was it like moving from home to home to home? Well, it was like, okay, I'm going to go and try to fit in here, I'm going to try to fit into this family and mold in whatever way they need me to to belong.

Tori Hope Petersen: 12:36

But the reality is, is the opposite of belonging is fitting in. We can't belong and make ourselves fit into something that someone else wants us to be. Belonging is being who God has created us to be, and so I was always trying to be who everyone else wanted me to be and I couldn't figure out who Tori was. I had track as my escape. I think track, you know, was this one place where I was like I could be who I felt was most like Tori, and that still was like high achievement, high accomplishment. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing, I just think when we aim for perfection it can be destructive. But high achievements and high accomplishments was something that was always part of me. It's something that still is a part of me and track was kind of like this outlet that how old were you when you started running I?

Tori Hope Petersen: 13:22

started running when I was like in the seventh grade, but I wasn't good like I was just like it was just fun just like in gym class or yeah, well, I started track. So, like in Ohio, you can like start track like in the seventh grade, unless you're like on a travel team. But I was poor and then I went to the foster care system and usually foster parents do not have the bandwidth to have a kid in travel sports because they're fostering usually a lot of kids and foster care is already so hard with caseworker visits and stuff.

Tori Hope Petersen: 13:51

So I didn't start until the seventh grade and yeah, it was just this escape, like I just loved it and I was okay at it. You know, I I was a part of a good relay. And then in between my junior and senior year I always had a goal. I always wanted to go to state, but I'd never been to state in an individual race. Um, it was. I was going into my senior year and never been to state in an individual race and my track coach said I think you can go into the state track meet and I think you can win it.

Tori Hope Petersen: 14:17

But he added a caveat and he said if you do everything I say so I was like, whatever, I'm gonna listen to this old man, I'm gonna do everything he says it doesn't work out, then it's his old man's fault because it was his idea, everything he said.

Tori Hope Petersen: 14:27

So if the result isn't exactly what he said, it to be his fault. So I started to do everything he said, started to train, like he told me how many hours of sleep I need to get a night. He told me, like the things I need to eat, and not like super strict diet or anything, but like you need to eat healthy, right, and he would give me like I was working out out of season. So I started training like a year before the state track meet and he would give me a different workout like every day. And through that we became super, super close. But in between my my junior and senior year so that's when he told me and then my senior year I had still so my birthday's in February, so I still had like a whole semester of high school left and then I still had my track season left, because track season doesn't start till March.

Tori Hope Petersen: 15:08

And my birthday was in February. I chose to emancipate when I turned 18. In Ohio, you have the choice to emancipate or not. You have the choice to leave, at least at this point, when I was in care. So it's been 10 years since I've been in care. I feel like we should mention that. So I know that things have changed and things have gotten better, but I wanted to leave the system. I didn't want to be in the system.

Tori Hope Petersen: 15:29

I felt very burned by caseworkers. I felt like they had labeled me as, like this bad kid. When I was a 4.0 student, I had great grades, I was a star athlete and you're like, labeling me as this bad kid, hard to place, like just all these labels on me that I felt like were really similar to the labels that my mom had spoken over me, they had. It was just different. And those labels, those were the things like when people hear about the physical abuse, they're like oh my gosh, you know that's where your trauma came from. But if I had to name anything, that where my trauma came from, it was the labels trauma came from. It was the labels, it was the things spoken over me, because those are the things still to this very day that, like I have to figure out how to wrestle with and how to like when the lies come. I have to literally work to put the truth there. And so I was going into my senior year.

Tori Hope Petersen: 16:19

Well, I was in my senior year, still had a semester left, and I chose to emancipate and my track coach, you know he, gave me this goal. We were training together, but then I was instantly homeless, like 20% of foster kids who age out are, and I had no place to go. My I did have a foster mom. She's my 12th foster home and I loved her. So, like I think it's important I did not emancipate because of her, because I didn't have a good home. I emancipated because I was like I don't want anything to do with the system itself, with, like, the government entity, but I love my foster mom. She was really really good to me. She was taking me to church and I had, I had seen foster parents who they'd like taking me to church, but it was actually my 11th home where they were taking me to church consistently, but in the they would talk about God, but behind closed doors they abuse their kids, and so I really didn't understand, like there's this Jesus who is so loving and so kind and so good, but then his people like there's people are just putting a mask on.

Tori Hope Petersen: 17:19

I was like I don't want, I don't want a mask. Like I want to be known, I want to be loved, and I'm already putting a mask on all the time. Like I don't want a mask. Like I want to be known, I want to be loved, and I'm already putting a mask on all the time. Like I don't want a whole extra religion that's making me put on a mask. I was like I don't want anything to do with it.

Tori Hope Petersen: 17:30

And then I went to go with my last foster mom, whose name was Gina, and she was taking me to church consistently, very similar to my 11th foster home, but she really was very loving and she was very kind and kind. And in my 11th foster home I told the foster parents I was like my track coach gave me this goal. I would like, really love, to start going to practice every day and I want new track spikes. And they told me that it was like unrealistic. It was an unrealistic goal. And then, when I asked for track spikes and this is how the story sounds materialistic when I say and I know that. But they took me to Goodwill and they got me a pair of track spikes that were two sizes bigger than, like, my foot, but and I was like in the moment I was really grateful.

Tori Hope Petersen: 18:08

But then, when I went to go live with Gina, she took me to like a sporting store. I tried on these brand new spikes and she got me brand new spikes. And it wasn't about the materialistic thing, it was the message she sent that I believe in you and I'm going to invest in you. I believe in what God can do through you. And then one of the things that the other foster parents didn't want to do is they didn't want to take me to practice every day because I was practicing out of season. So I couldn't just like get on the bus or like get out of school and go to practice. Like I was practicing with my coach out of season, like not during the practice hours. And so, gina, she started taking me to practice every day, like whenever I needed to be taken, whenever my track coach was available, and what she was saying was like I believe in your potential, I believe in this dream that you have for yourself, even though I never been on the state track, meet an individual race and, like usually the stuff is very progressive and she really didn't have like a ton of reason to believe in me, but she was willing to invest in me without knowing what the end result was going to be.

Tori Hope Petersen: 19:11

And so when I emancipated, I was a part of this church because of, really, gina taking me, I had come to faith, I had come to believe in Jesus. I had understood. You know, one of my big questions about God was that if he's so good, then why didn't you give me a dad? Because I would have had a dad to like, maybe protect me from my mom or prevent me from going into the foster care system. And then I realized that, like God was my father, god is my father and he's there, protecting me, loving me, always there for me. And so I accepted Jesus into my heart, still attending this church that my foster mom went to, and I had that community. I really looked to them.

Tori Hope Petersen: 19:50

A lot of people were involved in foster care and I looked at them and I thought, maybe if these people care about kids like me, then maybe God cares about me. And so I started to ask people you know, can I, can I live with you? There's this one woman who I tutored her daughter. Uh, she was, her daughter was like a second grader, and I tutored her when I was in high school and she just said if there's ever anything you need, you can come, you can just call me. And so I called her and I was like I need a home. And I came and lived with her and she had all the best intentions and her home was like a very safe and normal home.

Tori Hope Petersen: 20:22

I moved into her basement and then the first night that I went to go sleep in there, I started to break out hives and I didn't know what it was from. So we like went to the hospital and we found out that I was allergic to black mold. They had black mold in their basement and like their home was like very nice. It was just like they had black mold in their basement. So I had to move out of there. And then I went to go live with just like this person from my high school and I was sleeping on the floor. It was their house was like super cold. It's going to have heat. Of course we're like in February and like late February at this point, so it's cold in Ohio and I went and I bought a space heater because I had worked here and there throughout throughout my foster care experience.

Tori Hope Petersen: 21:00

So I had like a little bit of a savings account, went and bought a space heater and I was like sleeping by the space heater, like stay warm. And I woke up and I like burns on my arm, on the side that I slept on, and my track coach was like what are those? And I was like they're burns from a space heater, because I'm like trying to. I'm sleeping by the space heater because it's really cold in the house. And he was like you need a place to sleep that is stable, you need a place where you're going to get good sleep, because you're not going to get, you're not going to win this, like if you aren't getting good sleep.

Tori Hope Petersen: 21:29

And so there's someone from my church, another person from my church that I asked um, she was this woman, her name was Tanya, and every Wednesday she would come pick me up, me and my sister up, when we live with my mom, and she would take us to her house, feed us, and then she'd take us to church every Wednesday. And so I had not really like kept a relationship with her throughout my foster care experience, because my mom had some jealousy of her and she had told the county my case was not to let us be in contact with each other. But once I had emancipated, I was like can I come live with you? And so she let me live with her, and she was someone that I'm still very close with today. She's like my mom, she's like my mother figure, and so I lived with her and went to the state track meet that year and became a four-time state champion in track and field.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 22:14

Amazing story, amazing story, but I know that's not the end of the story.

Tori Hope Petersen: 22:19

I know that's not the end. There's a lot to the story.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 22:21

There's a lot.

Tori Hope Petersen: 22:26

My track coach was driving me to and from track practice. My track coach was driving me to and from track practice and there was one time he was driving me home and he said, tori, when the track season is over, because the realities of the school, the technicalities of it all, my family, my daughters and I have talked about it and we want to welcome you into our family, and we want to welcome you into our home, and so that would be like a really cool ending to the story.

Tori Hope Petersen: 22:54

It really would. But I heard him and I thought yeah, I've heard that before. And so I kept training with him and we became super close. He became this father figure in my life and I never really I had a lot of great moms, mom figures in my life, but I never really had a father figure, and he was the staff that I felt like I always needed and, as we were in between this track season, and, it being over, he would invite me to his house that he would cook for me.

Tori Hope Petersen: 23:19

Him and his daughters would cook for me. They would teach me how to cook. There was this one time, me and his daughter. He had a grill like still in the box in the garage and he left and we're like we should put the grill together as a surprise for him. And so we put the grill together and he came home and I guess it was backwards. It was completely backwards, but he he kept it like that and he's used it backwards till this very day because he says it reminds him of when we were becoming sisters and so I went to the state track meet and it was, I was just so grateful to be there.

Tori Hope Petersen: 23:56

I was like, if I don't win, that's okay. I made it here, I have my family.

Tori Hope Petersen: 24:02

but that day God had his hand over my life and I became a four-time state champion in track and field. Thank you, Till this day. It is one of the most memorable days of my life. I became the 50th girl ever in history of Ohio to win four state titles in one meet, which is as many as you can win in one meet. I became the first individual woman at my high school to be a state champion. All the other state champions still at my high school to this day are men, and I became the first woman of color at my high school to be a state champion and it was, to this day, one of the greatest honors and it is what allowed me to go on to college and get a full ride scholarship.

Tori Hope Petersen: 24:50

I graduated from Hillsdale College in 2018 and only three percent of foster youth go on to get a bachelor's degree or higher. These things that I was able to do were because of all of the people. I know that I just I told you a story, me but really my intent was to tell you a story about a foster mom who was faithful in taking me to church and showed me community, A Tanya who came and picked me up and established a relationship with me from a very young age so that I could eventually live with her and she could show me what it was like to be a wife and a mom. It took Scott, who didn't know what the end results were going to be, but placed this lofty dream in front of us that we could chase together. It's all these people who didn't know what the end results were going to be, but they invested anyway and it didn't just take one person.

Tori Hope Petersen: 25:44

You know there's this idea If you're in the foster care space. You've heard it a lot. It takes one adult to change the trajectory of a child's life and I like that sentiment. But what we lose is that it really takes the community. It takes all of us, and if we say it only takes one, then only one of us has to give today. Only one of us has to walk out of here and do something to really make an impact. But really it takes all of us to change a child's life. It takes an entire community. What I love about Tanya and Scott is that they were models for me and they're a huge reason I am who I am today. Now I get to do this. I get to advocate for kids who are in the position that I was in.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 26:34

I know we were talking about it in the car. I would lay there and just listen to your voice talking. The book is called Fostered. You can download it, I think, on Audible, Audible any place.

Charles Bender: 26:45

You can get it on Amazon.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 26:47

It's a great read. It really is a great read. It's a great story and, of course, it's interesting to me too, just because of the line of work that I'm in and what we getas.

Maya Elias: 27:33

Did you know that April is when we recognize National Child Abuse Prevention Month and the importance of communities working together to support and strengthen families and prevent child maltreatment? I would like to share with you all some stories in regards to Child Abuse Awareness Month. In the year 2020, Florida's Child Protective Services faced an alarming reality. They received approximately 185,000 reports of child abuse and neglect. Can you imagine the weight of those numbers, the weight of those young lives? Approximately 36% of all children in Florida's foster care system are under the age of five. These are tender years where a child should be wrapped in love, not tangled in a system they can barely comprehend. And, what's even more heartbreaking, almost one out of every five kids in this situation are dealing with serious mental health problems. These statistics reveal a story that's hard to hear, but one that must be told. They illuminate the tough emotional and psychological struggles that these children face every single day. It shows us just how hard it is for them and for the foster care system to cope with these challenges. Is for them and for the foster care system to cope with these challenges.

Maya Elias: 28:59

But amidst these stark realities, there is hope. There are beacons of light in the darkness. Like Place of Hope. We are the guardians, the protectors, the ones who refuse to let the numbers define our children's futures. Together, we can be part of that hope. Together, we can combat those staggering numbers, and it is crucial, now more than ever, to continue advocating for these children. I invite you to be a part of this challenge. I invite you to make a difference today. By donating to organizations like Place of Hope, you're ensuring that all children have access to safe, supportive and stable family environments. Let's rewrite the story for these children. Let's give them the childhood they deserve. Donate today at placeofhopecom/ donate.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 29:55

Now what?

Tori Hope Petersen: 29:56

because I don't remember what happened to your dad so my biological father passed away a month before I was born oh my god. I didn't know that until I was so. My mom had always told me that mom had always told me your dad passed away before you were born. But I think I didn't know if I could believe her and I always wondered if he was still out there somewhere.

Tori Hope Petersen: 30:18

Um, and the things that I did know about him weren't necessarily good things, but I still had a desire to meet him, if I could like just to be. There's this little part of me I know this is sounding really bad, but there's this little part of me that I just wanted to like go to him and be like I don't want anything from you, but I do want you to see what you missed out on. So I took an ancestry DNA test and I actually took my ancestry DNA test, because everyone always asks me what my ethnicity is and I always said I don't know. And then people look at you funny and they're like what do you mean?

Tori Hope Petersen: 30:47

you don't know, and then you got to tell them your whole life story. The second that I meet them, like these strangers on the street like not, strangers on the street don't always want to hear your whole life story, but they ask. And so you're like OK, here's the story. So I took an ancestry DNA and DNA test to find out my ethnicity and I ended up, of course, finding a relative from my dad's family side and I messaged them and I was just like hey, if you do not want to open this book, that's totally okay. Like, if you don't want to talk about this, it's okay. But I'm pretty sure I am your brother's daughter. My mom had told me his name and when I looked at the family tree there was his name. It had said that he passed in January of 1996 and I was born in February of 1996. And so I was like I think that's him Like it's matching up.

Tori Hope Petersen: 31:42

For a while no one messaged me back and then so the way that Ancestry DNA works is the people do not pop up unless they also take the test. You can have a family member out there, but they're not going to pop up unless they've also spit in the little thing, sent it out. You know, someone else, like the person that I initially found never messaged me back and I was like that's fine, you know it's. It's like someone's messaging you saying that they're possibly your niece, like that's, that's weird. Like I don't know if I'd respond. I don't know, I probably would, but I get that people, some people wouldn't. So I didn't take offense, it Just kind of like let it, let it lay, let it rest.

Tori Hope Petersen: 32:16

There was another lady that popped up and she actually messaged me and it also said that she was my dad's sister. Cool thing is that my dad had like 11 siblings. I was like I wasn't worried about it because I was like eventually one of them has to find me. There's so many of them and she messaged me and she's like asked who I was.

Tori Hope Petersen: 32:34

I was like well, I think I'm your brother's daughter and this is like the story that my mom told me, and we had kind of talked we probably talked for about a year and just over text message and just would be like, hey, hope you're doing well, kind of give each other updates. And then after about a year she said I want to fly you here and I want to throw a family reunion for you. Oh yeah, so she threw a party for me and this is, you know, the African-American side of my, of my family, my. I grew up with a white mom and I don't know much about the African-American side of culture side of who I am, and so it was really cool because she made us all comfort food, like all.

Tori Hope Petersen: 33:12

Southern comfort food and it was just such a sweet family reunion and I think that God's hand was. I just see how God's hand was over that time as well, because I had a friend who I was friends with. We became friends in college and there wasn't a lot of people I graduated from Hillsdale college in 2018. And there wasn't a lot of people who went there that were adopted. There weren't a lot of people who went there who were African American. So, but she was. She was both adopted and African American. So we just like became friends.

Tori Hope Petersen: 33:40

You know it's like, oh, you know, you just like. It's like you see each other in the cafeteria and you're like like there you are like the one person and like who had a similar life as me, and you just feel like a little less alone. And so we, we became friends and she actually met her biological part of her biological family, probably about just a few, like three months before I met mine, and I remember asking her. I said what can you tell me? Like she went into it so stable and then her biological mom didn't show. So she met her biological grandparents, but her biological mom didn't show and she was supposed to and but she came out so stable and OK.

Tori Hope Petersen: 34:18

And I said, how did you, how'd you come out like that? Like, why are you not like more emotional or more worked up? And she said, you know, I just went in with no expectations and I was just grateful for whatever came of it. And so for me, I that's how I went in. When I met my biological dad's family, I was like I'm going to go in here with no expectations and just be grateful for whatever comes of it.

Tori Hope Petersen: 34:38

And and I think it helps you because I had, I had a family. My track coach ended up bringing me into his family. He, his family, ended up becoming mine. That's who my kids call grandpa, that's who walked me down the aisle at my wedding. So at this point, you know, I'm not feeling like I need something from them.

Charles Bender: 34:56

Right.

Tori Hope Petersen: 34:57

And I'm just grateful I just see that God's hand was over the situation and it was such a healthy reunion, it was such a healthy meeting and it was just exactly what it needed to be.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 35:08

That's a great story. Not all kids are as I mean I want to lightly use the word fortunate, but you were fortunate because there's a lot of blessings that came out of some of the things that you've been through. But not not every young adult who ages out or emancipates at 18 has the same story.

Tori Hope Petersen: 35:31

Yeah, you know people ask me all the time what can I do, like once kids age out of care, like how can I support them? And I think what people don't realize and like I'm for any you know, obviously you guys were an organization that helps kids who emancipate out of care, but you're also an organization that helps kids before they emancipate. And I think that that's really important before because, like when we only help kids after they emancipate, what that is, that's a reactive, that's us being reactive. But when we put all these parameters and boundaries and help kids before they emancipate, what that is is that's proactive. We're being pro, it's proactive help. We're building a support system for them before they emancipate so when they emancipate they have a support system. We're giving them the tools that they need before they emancipate so that when they emancipate they have a support system. We're giving them the tools that they need before they emancipate so that when they emancipate they have the tools they need.

Tori Hope Petersen: 36:28

That was why I was so fortunate. I had a community in my church. I had a vision for my life that was track and college, again before I emancipated. I had a plan I had. I remember my church sponsoring me to take, like the Dave Ramsey course when I was in high school. I don't really remember a lot of it and I remember thinking like I don't know what a lot of this stuff means. But then when it's coming at you as an adult, you're like oh, I remember that, I remember that, and so we can give kids the resources before they emancipate. Even if they aren't getting it in the moment, when they become an adult they're going to be like oh, I remember this, I learned this, and they're going to be able to use the tools and the skills that they learned. I was so fortunate because I had these people invest in me before kind of the rug was pulled out from underneath me, in a sense.

Maya Elias: 37:14

Today we're diving into a critical issue that affects us all, child abuse. Did you know that preventing child abuse isn't just about doing the right thing morally? It's also a strategic move in breaking the cycles of poverty and homelessness. Studies have shown time and time again that children who experience abuse are at a significantly higher risk of facing economic hardship and even homelessness later in life. But here's the good news by investing in their safety and well-being today, we're not just changing lives. We're investing in a brighter tomorrow for everyone. Imagine a future where every child has the opportunity to thrive, where the cycles of poverty and homelessness are broken and where our communities are stronger because of it. Join us in this mission. Come together with Place of Hope as we work tirelessly to break these cycles, one child at a time. Together, we can build a future where every child has the chance to reach their full potential. Visit our website at placeofhope. com to learn more and find out how you can make a difference today.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 38:28

We were talking about, like what Place of Hope does, and you were asking me about the campuses and you know who we're serving and where we're serving and what we're.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 38:36

You know what we're doing, the campus we've got a couple of different campuses but down in Boca specifically, we're serving kids who have, you know, been with Place of Hope maybe, or they've been with another agency. They've turned 18, they've elected to stay and continue in the program. We've had kids that have come to us that you know, covid, perfect example, florida Atlantic University is right in our neighborhood and those dorms shut down and the kids that ended up homeless or living in their cars were all former foster kids. And I think our first three or four young adults that came to live in the, in a two-story apartment that we opened the week before everything got shut down all or out of the foster care system and, um, you know it's, and it's pretty remarkable when you look at the statistics of what happens to kids or what can happen the homelessness, the pregnancy, the drug and the human trafficking, and that's something I want to.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 39:43

I kind of want to go in that direction with you because I know that one of the things that I remember, I hear you saying the words at the end of a chapter, I believe, and you said I was being groomed and that was like shocking. I wasn't expecting to hear that in your story, but these kids are so vulnerable to that, you know, and there's so many ways now that these predators can get to our kids I mean, social media and technology is just unbelievable. Tell us a little bit about kind of that experience and kind of you know, if you feel like you want to share that.

Tori Hope Petersen: 40:19

I feel like one of the tricky parts about that experience and about and this is just true for a lot of human trafficking survivors, and I think it's why I'm hesitant to share it is that, like I was saying, yes, you know, I was willingly going about and doing it, but I didn't realize what was being done. Vulnerable youth who do not have stable homes, who do not have a consistent, loving family, become so vulnerable to trafficking. Because that's what we're looking for. We're looking, you know, men, these people who prey on children and the situation I was in they come and they promise, they promise home, they promise stability, they promise love, they promise marriage, they promise all these things that you know would be a dream to have, and I think that that's what I wanted. That's what I wanted.

Tori Hope Petersen: 41:16

I think that's why it's so easy to just fall into it and not realize what is being done. And yeah, I mean, that's really what it was. I was promised marriage, I was promised to be with a person together forever, and that was all like wow, that would be a dream to not have to keep fighting for love to not keep fighting, for someone to take care of me, for me to stop fighting.

Tori Hope Petersen: 41:38

You know being in the same place, and so I did these things, and then I didn't realize what was being done until it was on a college campus, actually, and one of the roommates you know roommates told me what was being done, and so it's just such a hard situation, I think, for people who are already have so much trauma that they haven't healed from to recognize what trauma they're experiencing in the moment they're experiencing in the moment.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 42:13

Another thing we were talking about is just your willingness to tell your story and how important that is and how healing that is for you, and you know that you were so excited to know that we had some of our young adults in the audience today. And then you told me about a course that you're teaching to kids who've come out of these situations kind of how to tell their story. I would love to know you know more about that and and, um, maybe share like a success story or some some that you've worked with.

Tori Hope Petersen: 42:39

Like my greatest passion, this is my whole heart, because when so there are synopsis in our brain, there are literally nerves in our brain that begin to change from shame to pride when we tell our stories to empathetic listeners. So, when we tell our stories to empathetic listeners, you know about something that's been done to us that was hurtful, but we share it with someone who responds compassionately who responds and says, wow, that helped me.

Tori Hope Petersen: 43:09

We begin to change the way that we view ourselves and the ways that we view our stories, and what my job has become right has. What my job is is telling my story to hundreds of empathetic, compassionate listeners, and so my brain has literally completely changed the way that I view my story. It's changed the way that I view myself. It's been so healing and I think people always ask like, how have you healed? And I think you know. Of course, there has been therapy, there have been times where I have taken medication and there has been my community. There are so many different modalities to therapy or different modalities to therapy and healing. However, I think one of the most underrated modalities for healing is telling your story, and I don't think people think of. We need to give people opportunities to tell their stories to people who have compassion, uh, so that people will respond to them in in ways that heals them. You know, it's not, it's just not like a typical way that we think about healing, but for me, it has been one of the most healing experiences ever, and so I want to offer that experience to other survivors. And so what I started doing was I started hosting retreats for survivors of abuse, trauma, former foster youth, human trafficking survivors, and we just walk them through. How do we tell our stories, how do even unpack our stories, how do we know our stories and how do we communicate them?

Tori Hope Petersen: 44:36

Because we've all been at that fundraiser where a child or a young adult has been put on a stage before they are ready to and they are uncomfortable and they are crying. It doesn't make the the audience cry. It doesn't make the audience like want to, doesn't make the audience like want to give. It makes the audience uncomfortable. It makes the audience pity someone that we should be dignifying, right and so which I'm just. I'm so grateful.

Tori Hope Petersen: 45:03

Of course, y'all did not do that at all and I was so thankful because I see it at fundraisers all the time and I'm just like, oh, we can't keep doing this to survivors. It hurt, it doesn't help them, it hurts them. We need to prepare them before we do this and if we prepare them, then it's healing, then it's powerful and for them and for the audience, and then for kids who are coming after them, and then it's just the cycle, because what's happened is I've gotten to share my story when I'm ready to share it. And then I get to hear four years later, five years later, six years later, again and again, how my story helped another kid tell their story.

Tori Hope Petersen: 45:38

And then it becomes a cyclical right, like just cyclical way of healing, and it's so beautiful. But I and then I've done courses, so like just like zoom coaching, kind of like big groups of survivors who want to tell their stories, and it's just been so powerful. I think probably the most powerful story was there was one time I was hosting a retreat and these are afford. We make these affordable retreats for survivors because so often if survivors aren't yet ready to tell their stories, they can also be in positions where they can't afford something like to go to a retreat where they're getting this kind of like training. And we bring other speakers and other storytellers who have told their stories professionally for years and so we bring them in. And the most powerful story was there was this human trafficking survivor who decided to attend one of our retreats and she had been trafficked by her parents and her parents had also used the videos to exploit her and she was a kid. She was just a kid and it was very so.

Tori Hope Petersen: 46:52

Cameras recording all of that was very traumatic for her. But we did bring like a video camera, a videographer, there to show what we had been doing, so that we could continue doing it, so that we could show other girls. You know other women, other survivors. This is what we're doing and we want you to be a part of it. Part of it. And we we had like a consent form.

Tori Hope Petersen: 47:13

She signed the consent form but then when we got there she was very triggered and she was like I don't think I can do this, like I don't think I can do the camera.

Tori Hope Petersen: 47:17

So we're like that's fine, we're going to shut off all the cameras and so the rest of like the thing, we had like very minimal cameras. We were only really doing them when she wasn't like around, if she was like in a different small group or off group. And then we got to like the last day where, like at the beginning of our last day at the retreat, and she was like I think we should make a video, and I was like a video of what. And she said I think we should all make videos of this experience and what it means to us. And so I was like, okay, let's do it. So we got the videographer and they all started kind of talking about their experience and their testimonies of what it meant to them and she that specific girl got in front of the camera and she shared and then she pulled away from the camera and she just started weeping and she said I did it.

Tori Hope Petersen: 48:08

I did something good, I did something good in front of the camera and that is just something that that is how you know like God is in something, because we could not have planned that, we could not have manufactured that. Anyway, it was nothing like I was expecting, but it was just. It was so powerful, it was so amazing and, yeah, I think it, it was the power of her. The the wild thing is we literally gave her the training to share her story and then she said I'm going to share a story on camera and that was a part of her healing experience. That's tremendous.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 48:41

It's great to see how God has taken your story and you're now using it to help other kids. You are definitely a voice for the voiceless and countless generations. Your light is so bright, you know, so bright. I've listened to so many. I think I've I don't know I've. I've watched a lot of videos, so I just think it's great that you're using that. But that's biblical, that's what God wants us to do with our, with our pain and and um. I remember speaking to one of our kids who told me his grandma said don't waste your pain, don't waste your pain.

Tori Hope Petersen: 49:31

Use it.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 49:32

But I think that that little workshop or retreat or class or whatever you call it, would be really something neat for some of our kids to maybe experience, Because if you have the opportunity to put them in front of a group of people to speak, um, they're the greatest storytellers. But you know, I don't ever want to do anything that's going to make them upset, um, or trigger them or cause any kind of issue, because you know we don't want that.

Tori Hope Petersen: 50:03

We don't want them to feel that way, but it is such a good opportunity. You know, it was my church when I was 17,. They gave me my first ever speaking engagement and I think that we should we should give those kids opportunities.

Charles Bender: 50:16

We should give them speaking engagements.

Tori Hope Petersen: 50:17

Obviously, I was one of them, and what it did for that very first time was that it showed me that I had a story to tell. It showed me that I had a testimony. It showed me that God had done something in my life that could influence and impact other people, and that what I had been through you know it's not, it wasn't going to be wasted if I shared it.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 50:37

That's amazing. I might have to get you to um do that with some we've. We just formed, actually, a youth advisory council for place of hope.

Tori Hope Petersen: 50:46

Oh awesome, those are so important. Yes, you should explain like cause. I'm sure you have other nonprofits who listen to you and who want to learn from you. A lot of nonprofits don't even know what that is and why it's beneficial, so you should explain that.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 50:57

Yeah, so this was our CEO's idea. He's, I think he's been wanting to do this for a long time, but it's finally come to fruition. And we've met twice now. We just actually had, um a breakfast meeting this past week and, um, not all of the kids were there because they have jobs and they're busy. I want to say there was probably nine or 10 of them were there and the first hour was like all business. We were just kind of giving them updates about our campaign and this and that and this was going on a place of hope, and then it was.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 51:28

Then we turned the tables and I'm thinking I'm going to get out of here fast, we're almost done. Well, then Charles asked them a question and, um, you said you know, here's, here's one of the things that we're facing as an organization, here's a here's a challenge that we're having with. You know this or that, and you know what would you suggest? Like, we put it back on them. And these are all kids who have grown up here, who all experienced unimaginable trauma, all different stories. Um, and a couple of them are still with us, they still live with us and yet they're serving in this capacity and, wow, the ideas that were just rolling off their tongue. I mean, they had so many great ideas and just I just love it. It was unbelievable. It was so encouraging, we were all so excited.

Tori Hope Petersen: 52:22

I was like cause you know what you're doing, you're teaching them, you're showing them that it's not just us serving you, you're serving us. You're not a charity case, you are an investment, and I think that that is just like. That is one of the most powerful things that a nonprofit can do is saying you're not a charity case to us.

Tori Hope Petersen: 52:41

You are an investment and we believe in your voice as much as we believe in our work. We know that you have value to it. I just love youth advisory boards. What it communicates to you is just, it's just irreplaceable. You know that message that you're sending them is so good.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 53:01

Well, I'm excited to see where these kids take us, because I mean this the ideas that they had and in our program, at least for the over 18, their expectations there are. There are it's accountability tied to it's not just move in and play video games all day long there are. There are expectations clear and the kids are given you know agreements to sign and they know these are the expectations you have to apply, you have to be accepted. It's great to get their feedback once they've gone and moved on on suggestions and things that we could do in our program now, because it's a different world we live in right now. I mean, things have changed so much in the last, even five years. I mean, just so, what are you doing now? I know those days are behind you, but you're taking your story on the road. You've written a bestselling book and you told me in the car you were writing another book.

Tori Hope Petersen: 54:01

Thank you so much for asking me that, um. I'm on podcasts a lot and a lot of people don't ask me what are you doing now, um? And that has been something in my adulthood that has irked me a little bit, because I'm more than my story. I'm more than a former foster youth, and being a former foster youth will always absolutely be a huge part of who I am today. I am who I am today because I am a former foster youth and because I am my mother's daughter and because I have had the experiences that I did as a kid, and because I have had the experiences that I did as a kid. But at the same time, I am other things too, and I appreciate that you see that and that you ask that I am a mom to two biological children, an adopted son who is a young adult. We said that we're Gen Zs, who are parents of Gen Zs, and then I have a 16 year old foster daughter.

Tori Hope Petersen: 54:53

Me and my husband really value hospitality, just welcoming people in and from our community, whether that's you know to eat. I love cooking a lot. My mom was. I love my mom so much, but that was one. That was one thing she was not blessed with was making good food. And so I, when I got older, I was like, how do I make good food? And I just really value making good food and I think one of the things that this job has allowed me to do my work. I get to advocate for kids. I've helped change policy on Capitol Hill and I have been a part of policy change for youth in foster care and at-risk youth. And then I get to advocate for kids from fundraisers. I get to help organizations who are doing meaningful, impactful work for vulnerable children to raise funds so that they can continue to expand and continue to help kids. And then I help communities get their communities involved in foster care and adoption, whether that's helping their communities become foster parents, do respite become CASAs, safe families.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 55:59

You are a busy girl.

Tori Hope Petersen: 56:01

I'm a busy girl, but I love it.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 56:03

You've done a lot in your short life.

Tori Hope Petersen: 56:06

Any other way. I think that I'm so grateful for the mission that God has given me, but also, I had a friend that recently told me this and, um, I'm so grateful for the mission that God has given me, but I'm also trying to remember this truth that my friend spoke over me recently. She said uh, Tori, if you wouldn't have ever helped anyone, God still would have redeemed your story.

Tori Hope Petersen: 56:31

God still would have died on the cross for you. And so trying to live in this full, abundant life, trying to not, I don't think we can. I don't know. I don't know if we can waste what God has done for us or not, but I don't want to waste it. I don't want to waste the suffering, so trying not to just throw away his goodness and walk away from it, but also resting in the idea that his love for me is enough and I don't have to work for it. But I think the thing is, when you have experienced God's love, you know, when you understand that you truly are loved. After going through so much brokenness, after you know, I know what it's like to not feel loved, I know what it's like to not feel safe, and then, when you experience love and safety, your compulsion is to give. That you know, and so that's that's what we try to do now, in whatever way that we can.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 57:28

Well, I love following you on your social media and you do share your kids and all the things that you do with them at home and your activities and the hospitality, and there was a post about a chicken in a pot or something.

Tori Hope Petersen: 57:42

I saw.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 57:43

I remember seeing something in the chicken and you had invited people over to your house. That's just. That's so amazing. What's your book that you're writing now, before we finish up, so people can look for that?

Tori Hope Petersen: 57:55

So when you write a book, like you don't actually know the title of it till the end, so I can't. I'm kind of sad because I wish I could tell you the title of this, but I actually don't even know the title and that's really sad, but the book is going to be about um breaking patterns breaking patterns in our lives that are destructive, so that we can break generational cycles um and live healthy whole lives where we are able to create a safe place for others and where where we're able to healthily love others.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 58:25

That sounds great. I can't wait to read it. And when will that be out?

Tori Hope Petersen: 58:27

It'll be out February of 2025. So, people, if you, if you will follow me on social media, then they will, then you'll find out what the book title is. Probably, when I find out what the book title is, you'll figure it out, it's going to come to you, it's going to come to you.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 58:42

Well, I have like.

Tori Hope Petersen: 58:43

So when you are an author, you like have, I have titles I just have to. They just haven't approved them yet. So we'll see.

Lisa Inman McDulin: 58:50

There you go. Well, thank you so much. We appreciate you and it's just such a joy to meet you and just keep doing what you're doing, and I'm just an honor to be able to meet you here and thank you, amy Kazma, for making it possible.

Tori Hope Petersen: 59:03

Thank you, amy. Someone needs to tell Amy that I did not leave her. Someone needs to tell Amy that people, all these people, came and sucked me in and then I was gone, and I'm sorry, amy, but thank you, amy, and thank you Place of Hope for having me.

Charles Bender: 59:18

Thank you for listening. Please be sure to subscribe and share with your friends so you don't even miss a thing, and if you really gained value today, please be sure to give us a five-star review so, of course, we can be put in front of more listeners. For details and show notes about today's podcast and how you can connect with and support our guests, please go to place of hopecom, forward slash podcast, and please don't forget to email us at P O H podcast at place of hopecom and, for sure, follow us on social media. Ambassadors of hope placing hope in a child's future.