LDS Podcast "Latter-Day Lights" - Inspirational LDS Stories
Tragedy, Trials & Loss vs. Love, Blessings & Miracles: Tammi Garlick's Story - Latter-Day Lights
Tammi's life is an incredible story - marked by both profound trials and tragedy, and incredible faith, inspiration, and miracles.
She has faced and overcome many things in her life, from her father dying in a plane crash, to being abused by a neighbor as a child, to having a son born with a hidden brain tumor that ultimately caused him to take his life. But through it all, Tammi has learned to rely on God, and his love and grace to give her peace and understanding.
At the very end of this episode she shares an incredible story about two ducks they adopted, and how God helped her young daughter to know that He was watching out for her brother who passed away shortly after. You don't want to miss it!
** Please SHARE Tammi's story and help us spread hope and light to others. **
To WATCH this episode on YouTube, visit: https://youtu.be/l7TBOjbV0Fs
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To WATCH Tammi's YouTube Channel, visit: https://www.youtube.com/@tammigarlick1234
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Also, if you have a faith-promoting or inspiring story, or know someone who does, please let us know by going to https://www.latterdaylights.com and reaching out to us.
Tammi's life is an incredible story - marked by both profound trials and tragedy, and incredible faith, inspiration, and miracles.
She has faced and overcome many things in her life, from her father dying in a plane crash, to being abused by a neighbor as a child, to having a son born with a hidden brain tumor that ultimately caused him to take his life. But through it all, Tammi has learned to rely on God, and his love and grace to give her peace and understanding.
At the very end of this episode she shares an incredible story about two ducks they adopted, and how God helped her young daughter to know that He was watching out for her brother who passed away shortly after. You don't want to miss it!
** Please SHARE Tammi's story and help us spread hope and light to others. **
To WATCH this episode on YouTube, visit: https://youtu.be/l7TBOjbV0Fs
-----
To WATCH Tammi's YouTube Channel, visit: https://www.youtube.com/@tammigarlick1234
-----
Also, if you have a faith-promoting or inspiring story, or know someone who does, please let us know by going to https://www.latterdaylights.com and reaching out to us.
Hey everyone, Scott Brandley here, before we start this podcast, just wanted to let you know there are a few topics that are sensitive in this particular episode, but there are some incredible miracles and it's an amazing story of faith and hope After tragedy. Also, at the very end of the podcast there's a special bonus story that Tammy told us after we ended the podcast, but it's so good we had to include it. So at the end of the credits, make sure you stay tuned and listen to that story, because it will definitely touch your heart. Hope you enjoy the podcast. Hi everyone, I'm Scott Brandley.
Alisha Coakley:And I'm Alisha Coakley. Every member of the church has a story to share, one that can instill faith, invite growth and inspire others.
Scott Brandley:On today's episode, we're going to hear how one woman's traumatic past helped her develop an everlasting trust in the timing of the Lord. Welcome to Latter-day Lights. Hey everyone, welcome to another episode of Latter-day Lights. We're so glad you're here with us today and we're really excited to introduce our guest, Tammy Garlic. Tammy, how are you today?
Alisha Coakley:Doing good. Tammy, I heard just a minute ago you were just crying all day in church, Don't you hate that You're always like oh, my eyes are so puffy.
Tammmie Garlick:My face is red. Yeah, it's a common thing in our household. It's kind of a joke.
Alisha Coakley:Yeah, Mom likes to cry. I know it's almost like a game, isn't it? Sometimes they're like ooh, can we get mom to cry?
Tammmie Garlick:No, they can make me cry at a drop of the hat.
Alisha Coakley:It is just one of those things being a woman sometimes.
Scott Brandley:Yeah, my kids don't think I ever cry.
Alisha Coakley:Yeah, I don't think you do either.
Scott Brandley:When I was a bishop, I did, I cried all the time. I must have missed that.
Alisha Coakley:Maybe I was too busy crying. To see you cry, oh goodness. Well, tammy, we're so excited to have you here and we're so thankful that you reached out and are willing to hop on and share your story with us today. You kind of mentioned, when we were getting things set up, how you came across our podcast, and we always love hearing these little stories because it's just so interesting for us to hear like where it's gone and how it's got out there. Would you mind sharing just what you told us about how you found us?
Tammmie Garlick:Absolutely. I actually was kind of perusing YouTube because I had had some friends and close acquaintances who have been had some materials about the church and about the gospel and they. It just has been a hard thing for me for to be able to combat that, and so I was actually looking online for faith filled, faith promoting stories and came across your podcast. So I really am grateful for what you're trying to do.
Alisha Coakley:Well, that just warms our hearts.
Scott Brandley:We are so happy that you are making a difference.
Alisha Coakley:We hope so we hope so. You are Well and really it's not even us right, it's the, it's our guests, honestly, it's it's people like you who are willing to get on here and to share your stories and share your struggles and and then share the beauty that you've been able to find throughout all of those. So thank you.
Tammmie Garlick:It's a collaboration for sure, yeah, but I appreciate the opportunity Okay.
Scott Brandley:Great. Well, we're excited to have you on the show and we're really excited to hear your story. But before we get to that, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Tammmie Garlick:I am a lifelong member of the Church of Jesus Christ with Latter-day Saints. I grew up in the church. I was very fortunate that way. I have four beautiful children, three of whom are living still, and they are the light of my life. I'm married and we live in Utah and I love, I love making things beautiful. I am an interior designer and I just enjoy being able to work one on one with people and having that connection and and helping them to make their surroundings beautiful.
Alisha Coakley:I am going to need to hire you. I'm going to have to come out to Texas and you can see behind me. I don't even know. I just threw stuff up there and I was like I'm totally game.
Scott Brandley:It looks good.
Alisha Coakley:That looks beautiful Alisha.
Scott Brandley:I like your background, it looks beautiful.
Alisha Coakley:What's funny is I have nothing on the bottom shelf there, because I just don't know. I know what I like but I don't know where I like to put it until I see it there. It's almost like I just need inspiration from people, so yeah, I'll just fly you out.
Scott Brandley:You can just come hang out with me and Texas and fix my home.
Alisha Coakley:It's a date. I love it, oh perfect. Well, tammy, we are going to go ahead and turn the time over to you, and I will let our listeners know this one is is going to be filled with some, some hard things, and so you might want to grab some tissues. I want to turn off any other distractions and just kind of get cozy, because, because Tammy has a story With that, we will turn the time over to you.
Tammmie Garlick:Okay, my story starts. I was born in California. My mother was pregnant with me. She has five children and I am the fifth. Her husband, my father, was in a plane crash with my older brother my oldest brother, who was 12. And he was thrown from the plane. But he received burns all over his body and shattered legs, and so my mother, who was pregnant with me, had an extremely traumatic experience in that she had just lost her husband and then her 12 year old boy was severely burned and was in the hospital on morphine and a 12 year old he became an addict. So when I was born, I kind of was thrown into that environment of trauma.
Tammmie Garlick:I was born with a birthmark on half of my face, so my mother also had that to contend with and the struggle of that. I wear makeup, but you can sometimes tell that there's a, that sometimes there's a difference in the in my face on both sides, but that's been something that has been a challenge in my life. But I've also learned that it has been this beautiful gift that has taught me intense compassion and being able to see people for who they truly are and with eyes different eyes. So even though it's a challenge, it's been a blessing and that childhood of having a family who was very reeling from the trauma of losing their father and then having a brother who, who was, it was almost a natural, a natural, a natural thing for him to become an addict because of the morphine they had put him on and then having his father, who was his best friend, taken. It was, it was, it was just a almost a given right.
Tammmie Garlick:And so going through that as a child, and my first memories being of a lot of violence, my mother moved us from Torrance, california, to Utah. When I was three years old. My brother was kind of heavy in the midst of that of the addiction, and she was attempting to try to get him away from his friends and the influence of in California, which was during the 60s, the late 60s, early 70s, when this was happening, and you know LA in the 70s, was kind of the drug, you know the drug chain, and so she was trying to get him away from that. Well, it just it didn't. You know anyone who knows him dealt with addiction. It doesn't, doesn't. Environment doesn't always change that. So my earliest memories were the police frequently at our house and a lot of violence and a lot of the family trying to, trying to resolve that and trying to have some bit of normalcy.
Tammmie Garlick:But it was for me as a child. It gave me this undeniable education in the contrast of the dark and the light, because my mother was an angel and she was the most faithful person I think I've ever met in my life and I consider her to be one of the greatest gifts that war could have ever given me and she did everything in her power to bring the light into our home. We had family home evening, we did scripture study, we went to church religiously. You know all of church, young women, you know. You know it used to be that there was three meetings on Sunday.
Tammmie Garlick:And then a couple on Wednesdays, and so we were fully engaged. And yet there was this dichotomy in our home of this huge contrast of the dark and the light. And so as a child, I developed this very keen ability to be able to discern spirits very clearly. I think when you're fresh from heaven and you are in a situation like that, I think that it just, it's just a very you're pure, you know you're pure, and so you're able to see that very clearly when you're given both. And so even when my brother, before he, would even come home, I could feel when he came home, even if he, even if no one knew he had there was this, there was this ability that I had acquired. I consider that to be one of the greatest gifts that the Lord has ever given me is to be able to discern and to see truth and to be able to discern between truth and and lies, even even really, really creative. You know deception. So that was a gift in my life.
Tammmie Garlick:I also, as a child, had an experience where I was, I was raped by my neighbor at five years old and that was a really hard thing in my life and I and I frequently. You know, as a child I was taught this beautiful love of our Heavenly Father and and of our Savior, and I and I knew it, I felt it, I felt that was true, and yet in the same sense, I I couldn't understand why everything bad seemed to happen to me and my family. You know, we were living, trying to live the gospel, we were trying to be valiant and obedient, and yet it seems that God was kind of silent in our life. And my mother was such a beautiful, faithful person. She taught me that, in spite of the trials and in spite of the things that don't make sense to us, that the Lord is completely aware and to just keep having faith and to see the blessings right. That was a constant. It was like a Pollyanna type of exercise in our home Me complaining as a child and her pointing out the blessings, Me complaining about other people right, and being the victim Because I was teased. I was teased beyond belief with the birthmark, and so I would come home with those experiences and my mother would teach me why do you think someone would treat you like that and and so that education and what she taught me, I feel, was a huge blessing in my life as I became older and started to become a teenager. I was. I really struggled with that and was questioning the Lord.
Tammmie Garlick:And the Lord gave me this beautiful gift when I went to EFY when I was a child, when I was a teenager of the person that was speaking changed his talk and said I feel very prompted. I had gone there fasting, wondering why the Lord had been silent in my life. I knew he loved me and I knew he loved my family, and yet I I couldn't understand why I felt I felt like I was just thrown to the wind pretty much. You know, born into the trauma and just not having any safety or or protection or blessings. And you hear stories in church about people who you know pray and they find their watch, and you know, you know, those stories of just those were hard for me because they couldn't make sense of it, because I knew God loved me. So when I went to EFY, I went there fasting and with a prayer in my heart why have you, why do you not care about my life and my family? I know you're good and I know you love us, but I don't understand.
Tammmie Garlick:And so when he changed his talk and then proceeded to, proceeded to talk about how the trials that the Lord allows us to go through our an education to help us to be able to understand our mission and the things that we will need to gain strength for Later on in our life. That it was a part of our tutoring and that if we allowed the Lord in and didn't shut him out, that he would tutor us and bless us through those trials to where, later on, we would be able to see his hand. And I will tell you that that that talk for me was life changing it. It completely gave me a new perception of my trials and a new understanding of why we're here. You know, my mother had taught me that this is a school room that we're here to to learn and to grow and to become the souls and the people that the Lord knows we can become.
Tammmie Garlick:And but but hearing that and having him say that he changed his talk for me was was a complete answer to my prayers and I felt the Lord saw me Right, he saw me, and that was a huge thing for me as a child. Well, fast forward. Well, let me. Let me just share this. So afterwards, after he he gave his talk, I was so moved by it and I just I wanted to share with him. I was like I wanted to tell him you changed my life. This talk was exactly what I needed. Thank you for answering my prayers. And I went up there and he there was a long line of kids that wanted to, you know, talk to him and I'm sure that his talk touched all of them, just like you know, like like it did me. But he saw me and he flippantly kind of said is did someone spill Kool-Aid on your face Because I didn't cover my birthmark very well?
Tammmie Garlick:at that time and and my face kind of dropped, you know, and and I said, no, it's a birthmark. And he, just his face, just I could see that he felt horrific, he felt horrible about what he had said. And and he said to me will you please, please, just wait, just wait. And and I need to tell you something. And so I waited and waited with my girlfriend. We were, we were waiting, we were needing to go to another class, but we waited for a little bit and then finally my girlfriend said, hey, we got to go, we were going to be late. So we left and fast forward.
Tammmie Garlick:Six years later I was dating a young man and we've become pretty serious. But because of my history, because of the stuff that I went through as a kid, I really didn't know if I ever could get married. I didn't know what that relationship was supposed to look like. I'd never seen it healthy. I and I just didn't know if I could have that kind of a relationship. So it was a kind of an on and off again type of a thing. You know where we would date and we get close and then I would break it off, and then we get back together and I break it off.
Tammmie Garlick:And it was kind of that kind of a thing. So one day Michael's brother, the man that I married to now, was sitting at the table with his mom and dad and my husband to be, and they were talking about some girl that Michael was dating and and as they're talking they said and she has a birthmark on the side of her face. And Scott, my brother, stopped, he didn't say anything. They said he just put kind of put his head in his hands and he just was quiet for a while and then he said where does she work? And so the next day I was working at ZCMI. I don't know if you know it's. I'm an old soul, I work at ZCMI.
Tammmie Garlick:So and this man comes up and he, he just sits, stands there and he puts his hand like this on the counter and he just stands there and looks at me. Can I help you? And you're a bit creepy, you know, he just didn't say anything.
Tammmie Garlick:He just kept looking at me and I said do we know each other? And he said I think so. And he said did you used to have blonde hair? And I said yes. And then he just kept staring like this at me, like this, and I said OK, you look really familiar, but I'm not sure how I know you.
Tammmie Garlick:Did you use to speak, do public speaking, or something like that? And he said yes, and he said like religious classes? He said yes, I do. And then he said can I tell you a story? And I said yes, and he said six years ago a young girl walked in late to one of the classes I was teaching at EFY and he said I've never had such a strong impression to speak about a specific topic and I knew it was for you. And then I said something really stupid afterwards and he says I felt like I've let. I felt that I let the Lord down and I didn't deliver the message that the Lord wanted me to deliver to you. And then he said I've been putting unknown girl with birthmark on the temple prayer roll.
Scott Brandley:Wow.
Tammmie Garlick:And you believe.
Scott Brandley:Oh my gosh, and we knew you could do that Well, he did. Oh, apparently he did.
Tammmie Garlick:Wow, and I said to him I said you don't understand. I said you didn't fail me. That completely changed my life and we just embraced and cried and shared this really beautiful experience of coming full circle to see how the Lord had touched both of us. You know what a beautiful miracle, right, I'm dating the brother and Michael and I eventually got married. It took some more miracles for me to be able to trust him enough, because I actually had to receive an answer about that, because I just didn't know, like I said, I didn't know if I could do that, if I could be married and if I could have that relationship, because I'd never seen it. All the men that I knew in my life had not been healthy, they hadn't been healthy relationships, and I even had some friends, fathers as I was growing up, being appropriate with me, and so I just really didn't trust that. I didn't trust men. So I needed the Lord to give me that confirmation and he did, and so Michael and I have a beautiful relationship and we have, like I said, five beautiful children and it's been really a truly beautiful blessing in my life to see how the Lord, when he answers prayers, usually does it for several people, right, it's not, it's like the loaves and the fishes, right it's. We contribute what we can and what we're able to and we give him our gifts and what he does with those usually blesses so many vices and they're usually intricately entwined beautifully. And that was one of those beautiful miracles in my life was to be able to see that come full circle.
Tammmie Garlick:Well, as I had my children, my beautiful five children, my number two boy, Joshua, was born with, I would say, this unbelievable intensity, right that I used to call my mother when he was a baby and say I've never seen this in another human being, this kind of intensity. And just when Joshua decided something, there was nothing that we could do that would dissuade him, it was, he was unbelievable. I mean, at two years old I would say, ok, I've tried Positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, chore charts, you know everything that I could think of to try to, to try to use that as a describing. You know, he just, he just was so adamant that I, I like, I said I'd call my mother and I would say I've never seen this, I've never seen this in another human being. And she said it's just our children nowadays.
Tammmie Garlick:They just are really strong willed. You know they're gonna. You know I'd have people say well, these were the kids that led Satan out. You know what do you expect? Right, yeah, you take away a bit of their agency and it's so in their core that it just brings out this. You know, whatever, even if it's something good, they're going to fight you against it because it's going against something that they want.
Alisha Coakley:So anyway, I just feel like you just psychoanalyzed my entire relationship with my teenagers. Yeah, okay, that makes sense.
Scott Brandley:I know.
Tammmie Garlick:Wow, they are that way. Wow, they're strong. They're strong this generation. They are like amazing kids, amazing kids, and I have had witnesses of who they are, that people would be just blown away by how amazing they are. The key is channeling them, you know, in giving them the tools that they need to be able to navigate and to make the right decisions. Well, it was kind of that way and I had, I actually had some experiences with Joshua when he was a child that really were hard for me.
Tammmie Garlick:When he was a, he was a very, very, very angry child, or what's the word? Just intense, and he very much. He and I had this connection that he couldn't be separated from me. There was this it wasn't sad or or it was mad, like when there was a disconnect between us. He would just get enraged and scream and scream and scream and and I couldn't quite understand what that was or where that was coming from. But I mean, I he didn't have a babysitter for the first five years of life because he wouldn't stop. There was no consoling him. We tried everything and anyway, so I would.
Tammmie Garlick:I developed this little thing where I would wrap him up like a pupoose really, really tight when I was holding him, trying to get him to go to sleep, and then I would put him. We had a car seat that because it was shaped like this, you know, like a like I was holding him and we would put him in that while I would push a tape recorder of me singing songs about Jesus and I would sneak down after I put him in that to try to get maybe an hour of not holding him right. So this was like this, this battle that we had, and and once he would wake up, he would just scream like like rage scream, not sad, like rage scream. And and so it was. It was, he was. He was a tough kid.
Tammmie Garlick:Well, one time, when I went into his nursery and he was crying like this, I went in there and and because I had the gift of discern discern in spirits, okay, I had. I had an experience, several experiences as a child where I literally put my hand in the square and cast out spirits, spirits because I knew I just developed a very keen understanding. I had some experiences that I won't go into, but I was very aware of the difference of the two spirit and and the things I had to do to be vigilant in maintaining, maintaining, maintaining a good spirit with me. I was vulnerable, right, and so I learned those tools. Well, I went into his nursery and it was filled with evil spirits and I put my hand to the square and I cast them out and.
Tammmie Garlick:I was angry. I was angry at the Lord. I could not understand, because I thought my son would be protected, right Aren't we told that they will, before the age of accountability, that they will be protected. And so I was contending with the Lord and asking why he would not protect my child. And what was told to me? I had a scripture come into my mind and it was when the young man and the father took his child to Christ and he asked for Christ to cast out the spirits and the Lord, and and he said, how long has he been afflicted? And the father said, as a babe, and so this understanding that my son, what he was contending with, was the same thing that I contended with. And so I did everything in my power, as he was a child, to try to enlist the spirits that would protect and to fortify him and to give him the tools that he needed.
Tammmie Garlick:The house was continually, always, we had good music and tried to have good, you know, positive things in a home, because I realized, oh, my son is susceptible, like I was, and I think that that in itself, I will say, is an education, for in itself I think that a lot of people don't realize how real that is, and a lot of times things are cast off as being weaknesses or things in our lives that we can't overcome, and trials and things that you don't.
Tammmie Garlick:You look at people and you wonder why they're doing certain things. If people would utilize what we have, what we've been taught about that, to be able to overcome, and because we are stronger we are, we have way more positive and righteous influences in our lives than they and than they could put against us. But I think in not recognizing and understanding, because they like to work in cognito, I think it's really a detriment to people and that's one thing that I wish that people would start to recognize is use, utilize the resources available to you, use the priesthood, use the use the things that will bring light into your life. If you're struggling with things, I guarantee you probably have spiritual gifts you're not aware of yet, I agree, and that in not understanding what you're up against is defeating and it does not give you the tools that you need, and that that's one thing that I am very passionate about is trying to help people to recognize you have the tools, but you're not recognizing what you're up against.
Scott Brandley:Yeah.
Tammmie Garlick:You know anyway. So that's a story in itself. But so I thought, okay, my son is going to be susceptible, he's going to be, we're going to have to really try to bring things of light into the home and make sure that he is continually flooded with things of light, right? Well, I didn't sense them again. I felt that that that had been taken care of and so I felt that my son was healthy and that he just was really strong spirited and didn't think much about it. Much about it, you know, because I hadn't sensed. I felt very keen to those, those feelings and I hadn't sensed anything.
Tammmie Garlick:And so I felt that we were good and when he was, that that continually, that continued intensity was, was a constant, it was a constant in our home and I just kind of wrote it off as strong willed kid, that he was a good child, he was a good boy, he lit up the room and was just a beautiful, beautiful, wonderful spirited kid and made a flap and was, was a jokester and he, just he was a beautiful child and he chose.
Tammmie Garlick:He mostly chose to do what was right. So we didn't have there wasn't drug addiction, there wasn't, there wasn't doing things bad, he was a good kid, but when he was preteen, I had one day I had this voice that came to me that said love this little boy as much as you can, because when he becomes a teenager, you will lose all influence over him. Well, that terrified me. You know, I immediately this is something that I do frequently, that I have to watch myself I immediately went to fear. Right, the message was not a message of fear, it was just knowledge, but I immediately went to fear, and that blocks further information.
Tammmie Garlick:Yeah because the two spirits can't coexist Right? So I, you know, I consist consistently words like I've got to figure out what's wrong with my son before he becomes a teenager. You got to figure out. That was my you know, and so that was my goal and my constant prayer was I need to know what's wrong with my son and help me figure out how. Teach me. I know you can teach me.
Tammmie Garlick:And one thing I don't think that I shared was that, as, because of, I think, because of things I went through as a child, I had this compensatory gift that the Lord had given to, given me that I have always received these very clear sentences in my head, and they're usually words I would never use, and they're there. Sometimes there are things I have to go look up that I'd never thought of before. So I knew the Lord could tell me. Right, I had had so many experiences with that. I'm like I know you can tell me and I'm going to keep praying and I'm going to do the things I can to draw close to you and I know you're going to tell him.
Tammmie Garlick:And Joshua was 15 years old and things started getting really bad. We started seeing these unbelievable bouts of rage that were just just intense, like you would not believe, like a pressure cooker, almost right. No one else thought, no one single person ever thought we had doctors say this is puberty, right it out, he's going through puberty late. It's the intense rages that's, that's just because it's late and he's has extra, you know, testosterone raging through his body. Just just ride it out, he'll be fine. And so, as a mother, you know, I kept feeling like no, I know, in fact I'd say you've never seen this. This is not normal, this is there's something going on. But I could not get him to a doctor. Now, remember he was, he was like this kid, that was just intense, the unfulf, and once he had made a decision on something, it was like back off Because it would be, it would be the fight of your life. And Michael and I, we, we chose our battles very, very carefully with him because we knew that it would be, that we would have to follow through right and and those battles were very carefully chosen and they were usually very significant purposes in those and or that it just was something we couldn't, that we had to in, you know, apply.
Tammmie Garlick:So 15 and a half, 16 years old, rages kept getting more severe, but they were few, they were, they were. It wasn't all the time. Joshua wasn't depressed, he was a happy kid. But we noticed that these rages were getting closer together and the night before Joshy took his life, we had a battle and we had taken his phone away, which the phone had become a real detriment to our in our home, because I think he used it to escape. And when we felt that he was unrighteously using it or using being on there too long or having too much time, we would take it away. And and that night we had a battle of because, like I said, the intensity of this kid was was just beyond us. It was, he was far stronger than we were in in those battles and so we had taken away and it was an ugly scene.
Tammmie Garlick:And the next morning went to get up, he had locked himself in the bathroom and we told him we're going to church and that we loved him. And he said I have a headache, I'm not going. And I, just before I left, I said sweetie, I love you, I love you, it's going to be okay. And when we came home from church, my sweet little daughter found him first, and then the rest of us found him and it was horrible.
Tammmie Garlick:The reason why I tell you that is because the Lord gave me that compensatory gift and while I was in church taking a sacrament, I did what I always did, and that was pray for my boy to help me understand what was wrong, how I could help him, what I needed to do, and that was the time that he was ending his life. And so when I came home and the years after that, that was a real struggle for me, because normally I feel things so intuitively. I get warnings from my neighbor at three o'clock in the morning with very clear messages to go and to meet them in the parking lot of the temple, and so to not receive guidance or knowledge of my son, when it was a righteous desire of a righteous mother, it was a real struggle for me in not understanding why the Lord would remain silent and why he would help that vital information of how to help my boy. And so for two years that was my prayer. Heavenly Father, I know that you loved my son and I know you love my family and I know you're going to tell me I know you're going to tell me why you withheld this information and why my son, what happened to my son? What happened to him, how, what happened? You know, we took apart his computer. I went to the school to see if there was bullying. I looked for signs of maybe things that he was involved in, maybe that we didn't know about, because I know that that kind of rage is not for young men, that's a sign of some deep distress. Rage, rage, is the common place that they go right. And so I knew there's something going on and I couldn't pinpoint what it was. Anyway, that was my prayer. I know you're going to tell me and I'm going to stay faithful and I'm going to do everything in my power to remain strong and be faithful and do the things that I need to just keep this connection.
Tammmie Garlick:And so, when Josh died, I was given seven things very clearly to do. That I did religiously, because whenever I've received this kind of knowledge or guidance, I know where it's from and it's factual to me. And so I did all of those things very religiously. One of them was making sure that I got the sacrament every single week, so that Sunday I was there and I continued to be there every single Sunday. A mess, but every Sunday, and because I've learned that that is a real power. That's not pretend, that's not a nice little thing that we do just to remember. That's a power and I'm a witness of that. So those seven things I did religiously and I continue to do those for two years with a constant prayer.
Tammmie Garlick:And then one night, as I went to bed saying my prayers, I heard in my mind Tammy, you need to let this go. And I'm telling you I did not. I could not understand that. I wasn't angry at the Lord, I just knew I had the ability to understand and that Lord had the ability to teach me. And so that was my constant desire and I felt that I was entitled to that because I had stewardship over my son and that that would be a gift that the Lord would give me to comfort my soul. So but that night it was very clear, and so I said to the Lord. I said I don't understand. I don't understand why I have to let this go. But I know you love my son and I know you love my family, and so I'm going to let this go. I don't understand that. I'm going to trust you, and I meant it.
Tammmie Garlick:And that night, about three o'clock in the morning I was awakened with a male voice and I could feel a presence in my room. I didn't recognize the presence. I didn't. I knew it wasn't my son. I thought it could possibly have been my father, who I never knew that died before I was born. But I didn't recognize the voice and I heard just Tammy. Joshua had a brain tumor.
Tammmie Garlick:And I asked is this true? Is this true? And what happened to me was I'll never be able to explain or describe, but from the toes to my, throughout my whole body and up to my top of my head just surged this unbelievable light and knowledge. And I can't explain it, but it just, it was just knowledge flowing through my body and I absolutely knew it was true. The joy and the light and the pure, radiant truth would just radiate it through my entire body and I saw where it was and I never I did not know a thing about the brain, had no idea, never even considered it. I never entered my mind that something physically wrong or something physical was wrong with my son. It was beyond anything I had ever thought of.
Tammmie Garlick:And I woke up, my husband and I said Joshua had a tumor and we just wept the entire night and in the morning I woke up and I ran downstairs and I started googling rage disorder, brain tumor, because I knew he knew there was a correlation there, and what I found was like a diary for my son, all of these things that I thought were random, that I could not put together, that I had talked to doctors about, that everyone kind of just blew off as being nothing.
Tammmie Garlick:There was there was two case studies that I found, but the first case study that I found said a young man who has this kind of tumor, if they go through puberty with this kind of tumor, will experience uncontrollable rage, because what's happening is there's extra, that the testosterone is raging through the body, causing additional blood to go to the body and it will feed the tumor, causing the tumor to expand and push up against the amygdala, which is the emotion center of the brain. The amygdala is what kicks in when a mother has a, when a car falls on a child and a mother lifts up the car.
Scott Brandley:Right.
Tammmie Garlick:That's the amygdala Right. It's a. It's a. It's a fight or flight, it's a. It's an instinct that kicks in that is uncontrollable, and that's what was being triggered in my son.
Tammmie Garlick:And then it said something that just was a unbelievable witness of that and it said a young man who has this kind of tumor will have constant nosebleeds. Well, joshua had nosebleeds his entire life and we just I had taken him to the doctor a couple of times and his pediatrician had said oh yeah, it's common. It's common for Utah. Yeah, the kids constantly have them. There's dry air and high altitude and they'll probably continue. And your son has overactive capillaries, they're thin, so he'll probably have to have them stripped a couple of times in his life.
Tammmie Garlick:And I never looked at it again. Can you believe that I there was? Steering is right in the face. And after I found this out, I was like really angry at myself because there was staring me in the face, the constant that the whole time and and I had gotten so used to it, we all had gotten so used to it that we just blew it off as being normal. It was normal, josh was used to him, he had him all the time and the only reason why I knew he still had him was because I'd see the blood. That was the only. He never complained and I found out later that he went out. He went to prom about a month before he took his life and his girlfriend said yeah, he went out three times during prom with bloody, with a blending ounce, so they were getting worse, but he didn't say a thing because he was used to it.
Scott Brandley:Right.
Tammmie Garlick:Anyway, after that guess what? I got angry at God again.
Alisha Coakley:That's what we do, right, that's what we do, and that's that's a part of grief too, isn't it? It's just, it's so funny how it can just come right back around. Thanks for giving me the answer now. I'm going to be super mad at you.
Tammmie Garlick:I was so mad. I'm like really, really. He had a tumor. You gave me this compensatory gift and you chose to withhold that information. I, that makes no sense to me at all. In fact, why would you give me that gift? This was a. I had stewardship over my son. This was my stewardship. I, if anyone had the right to know it, was me Right. And not only that, but you had given me enough information to know that I needed to help him, and yet you did not tell me how. So I was a little perturbed at the Lord, and yet I knew enough. Honestly, I have. I have developed the relationship that I. A lot of times.
Tammmie Garlick:When things don't make sense, you just have to kind of plow through it and and and know that eventually it will. But I, I just was. I was kind of mad, and so I kept doing researching. I kept studying, trying to figure out what would have caused a tumor on my son's amygdala Right, and what I found was to case studies and there's not a lot. There's not a lot of information about this. In fact, you have to plow through a lot of conspiracy theorists to get the actual studies, because I guess people have gotten a hold of some of these studies and they've kind of They've, they've, they've used them in their conspiracy theories, right. So what happens is you get, you lose the studies through the garbage, through the people who take it to the extreme and become extremists. And not that I don't believe conspiracies are real, I do Right. But when you're trying to find studies on what would cause tumors and why your son would have had a tumor, and you have to weed through months Of data to try to find two case studies, that's pretty bad. So, anyway, the first case study was a man in the 1960s who actually wrote journals. He kept journals and he talks about nosebleeds and the rage that he can't control and erratic emotions that he doesn't know how to. What's wrong with him? He says I'm feeling love and then I want to kill someone. He, he, it's just erratic of of trying to understand what's going on any any sense. There was something wrong with him, but he, no one could tell him. And the night before he performed this horrific act, he actually went to the police and he said there is something wrong with me and I want to hurt people. You need to lock me up. And the police said well, you haven't done anything wrong, there's nothing we can do. And he was the first mass shooting in United States history, wow. And on his after he died because he was, he took his life he had written a letter and he said there is something wrong with me. Do an autopsy on my brain, because I want people to know what happened to me, I want people to understand. And when they did the autopsy, there was tumor on the middle.
Tammmie Garlick:The second case study was a young father who started having erratic behaviors and his personality completely changed and became. He started rage at his family and his, his wife, said you either go get help or your brigade and divorce. And so he went in and they put him on a antidepressant and he had a seizure. After like a couple months on the antidepressant he had a seizure and they. So they ran, they rushed him in and they didn't.
Tammmie Garlick:They did a scan and they found a tumor on the amygdala. Well, because of where the tumor was, it was inoperable and so they decided to do spot radiation and they targeted it down with a laser down onto the tumor, trying to shrink it, because there wasn't any therapy for it. So they shrunk the tumor. But what happened was they shrunk the tumor, but they damaged the amygdala, which now remember. The amygdala is the emotion center of our brain, so it is. It is empathy and love and compassion and anger. It's intense emotion, right Is the? It's the thing that that causes us to have those emotions and to feel those things in. So, because the he was like a zombie, the family said let's stop the radiation, maybe we'll get some of him back, you know, maybe he'll have some quality of life before the tumor takes his life. And so they stopped the therapy. But what happened was the tumor grew back, the amygdala didn't. So because the man didn't have the compassion and the love for his family, the rage took over and this man performed a horrific act on his entire family.
Tammmie Garlick:And so the reason why I tell you such an ugly story like that is because, after I got that final bit of information, I realized this could have been worse. The Lord was not going to intervene for my family, which he very often does not. We often don't get the miracles and the things that will will be the beautiful miracles in our lives. We don't get those, and sometimes we question the Lord and say why are you? Why have you abandoned me? Why do you love other people and yet for me it's. Those miracles don't apply to me, they aren't in my life.
Tammmie Garlick:But what I realized from getting that final bit of information was the Lord was going to allow this and allow it to happen to where it didn't take out as many as it could, and that it could. It could affect us as many as it could have affected. And I think something happened to Joshua where he lost control. And you know this is not a glorification, because I that was the one thing that I do never want anyone to ever think that there's any justification or any reason or any reason that suicide could ever be good. It can't. It's not. And honestly, joshua, if he would have known and it could have come, if he could come back, I know he would say the same thing, he would have chosen differently. But in this full circle of coming to understand what happened to my son, I came to understand the love and mercy of the Lord that if we would have known, we would have done everything in our power to try to stop that and to try to fix the tumor. We could have made it worse Right Now.
Tammmie Garlick:One thing that I know is going to happen from this podcast is there is going to be people who are going to hear this and they're going to recognize some symptoms because I've had. I have not shared this story massive like to a large audience because, for one, I don't want to ever glorify it and I don't want people to think it's okay, that their family will be fine, but for another thing is I don't want to instill a lack of hope for people that, because my son's tumor was inoperable, that if their children are experiencing things like this, that theirs are not inoperable because I do not believe that for one minute. I believe my son's was on the amygdala. But, having said that, I've had some experiences since this coming to know what happened to my son, where the Lord has sent me people and I have had messages given to me about that. I need to share this with them and inevitably guess what. They always have a child or they've had. There's something going on where they have the exact same symptoms.
Tammmie Garlick:But what we found is there has been one that's had a tumor that was removable and another one that had a pituitary gland that was acting exactly like a tumor because it had expanded because of extra blood flow and the pituitary gland was pushing up against the amygdala, causing the same kind of rage. So that one the daughter actually she was they had put her in an institution because they couldn't. They had to watch her 24 seven. She was on suicide watch and I met this woman who immediately said nosebleeds, that's it, that's it. Got her daughter in that the scan. They saw the pituitary gland. They put her on a medication. Well, guess what? Within a week her daughter was back.
Scott Brandley:Wow, oh my gosh.
Tammmie Garlick:So my story is not going to be everyone's story and it's not going to be the case for a lot of these kids who are experiencing these kinds of disorders with the rage, because there's a lot of young men who are on a lot of kids who they're on antidepressants and they're it's not going to be the case for all of them, but there will be people that are listening to this that they will see symptoms and they'll start to think that that might be a possibility. Yeah, get a scan, go scan. And and it's not inoperable that the people that I've met has not been inoperable. I met a woman on the plane coming home from coming from home from where we lost Vegas. We had gone to a concert on the plane home. It happened to be my son's 10 year anniversary to his birthday, right, or 10 year anniversary of his death, which happened to also be his birthday because he was born on Mother's Day. And I was sitting next to this woman and she looked like she was a mess. She just I could tell she was really emotionally, just having a real struggle and I just said to her is everything okay, are you all right? And she just started sobbing and I said tell me what's wrong. She says well, my daughter has been suicidal, they've moved her to an institution in Utah and it's her birthday and I'm flying out to see her and I don't know what I can tell her because I don't know how to help her. And I immediately knew exactly that the Lord had placed me right by her for a very specific reason. And I said oh, it's your daughter's birthday, it's my son's birthday too. Can you believe that? The coincidence of that? I mean, that's not a coincidence, that's a miracle.
Tammmie Garlick:And so I proceeded to tell her. I said I think I know why we're sitting together, because it was a happenstance that I even got put there. And I asked her. I said tell me about your daughter, tell me kind of what, what she's experiencing. And she says well, we've been afraid of her for a long time. She has these rages that are uncontrollable and we, we don't know how to help her. And now she's suicidal and we just have run out of options, we don't know what to do. And I said tell me, does she have a lot of nosebleeds? And the woman just started sobbing she's. How would you ever know that? And then I proceeded to tell her my story. So her daughter. There's a possibility of getting her daughter help Right.
Tammmie Garlick:And I don't think that the Lord would ever have given me this knowledge if I wasn't supposed to give people hope, because I think that there are specific people that are being affected by this and no one's looking at it. No one's looking at the brain, you know and I don't want to go into this now but after I found out it was a tumor, I became kind of a radical in trying to figure out what happened and how my son would have developed a tumor. Well, I found lots of information that's really troubling about our environment and the things that are causing this that you know this is. This isn't the place, but that's where that's actually where I ran into a lot of conspiracy theorists, because this information has been pretty readily available for a long time, but it's been buried. So our kids are being affected.
Tammmie Garlick:I believe the Lord is wanting us to be aware of this, but here's my testimony Okay, after, after it's all said and done, this is what I want people to take away from this. The Lord is so fully, fully aware of each of us. He is intimately, intimately orchestrating so many things that we just don't see that make no sense, that sometimes are really, really ugly. I mean when you are, when you're dealing with mental illness and you're dealing with all kinds of abuse, even drug abuse. The Lord is fully aware and he can put things in place and in in our pathway that will be instruments in our growth and in our development and in the miracles that will one day happen. And if we can just hold on and we can strive to bring ourselves closer, in alignment with Him and do the things that will draw Him in and remain faithful, I promise you with everything in my heart that he will bring things full circle and that you will see the beautiful miracles and the love of the Lord and how loving and kind and how he has not abandoned any of us. I mean, I'm looking at my childhood and looking at the things that people go through. If I could say one thing to children who are going through trauma and feeling abandoned by the Lord is that he trusts you. This is part of what your mission is going to be. He is. He is allowing you and trusting you to go through these things so that you will be better qualified and better capable of doing His work.
Tammmie Garlick:I don't know full circle yet what exactly the Lord wants me to do with this. I've had some inclinings and I've had the 10-year anniversary of His death. I had an incident where I realized that this is what the Lord wants me to do, that I'm supposed to share this story now on a larger scale, but I felt for a long time I didn't know. I would ask Him what do you want me to do with this? I'm just a crazy mom who's had this vision and I have no proof. I just have this experience and this gift that you've given me and I'm not sure what you want me to do with that. But the Lord in His mercy, I absolutely believe this that I will see exactly why this all was allowed to happen and that the Lord will make good of it. That's a hard thing to say, but the Lord can turn things into beautiful, beautiful miracles that come from really ugly things. I am a witness to that.
Tammmie Garlick:My brother, as a side note, my brother, who was a meth addict from the age of 12 to 28 years old, came home and decided that he wanted to clean up and went on a mission, and he now witnesses and testifies and ministers to people in Texas in the prisons and he's been cleaned and he's a beautiful, beautiful example and a miracle.
Tammmie Garlick:My brother is a miracle when you look at where he came from and what he is doing now and just what good the Lord made out of that. Trust him. Trust him. Trust him and ask him to give you strength and ask him to show you what he wants you to do. With that, I had a phrase that continually came into my mind and it was take up your cross. Take up your cross. And that's what I see you guys doing is you are trying to use your gifts and your abilities and your talents to try to bring light and to try to share goodness with the world. The world needs goodness and the world needs faith, promoting beautiful stories of how people who have remained faithful and trusted in the Lord and my witness is that he is ever present and he's ever mindful of you and just do the things that dry him closer to you and sometimes you will feel vacant, but just continue forward and I just testify of that with all my heart in the name of Jesus Christ in him.
Scott Brandley:And Tammy, you're an incredible person.
Alisha Coakley:Yeah.
Scott Brandley:Thank you so much for sharing that Wow.
Tammmie Garlick:Thank you. I hope it comes across the way that the Lord wants it to.
Alisha Coakley:Oh, I'm sure for those who came across.
Scott Brandley:You definitely will hear it For sure. Oh well, it sounds like you've already helped quite a few people, just from the experience that you've had so far. Right, so I think you're you helping people is just getting started. You're going to, you're going to help a lot more people.
Tammmie Garlick:Yeah, that would be my greatest desire. I wanted to share one quick little thing. I have a rug that I found in a thrift store that was a complete disaster. I was looking at it going what is that? Complete mess, and it intrigued me because it was just like this bowl of spaghetti, right, it just looked like awful and and I turned it over and it was the most beautiful, intricate rug that I had ever seen, and every, every thread was just completely beautifully put in its perfect place and and I I heard in my mind, tammy, this is, this is your life, this is what you don't see, this is, this is what I'm doing with your life, and I would say, I would repeat that for every single person out there. Sometimes it's so easy to feel completely vacant and void and and spiritually dead inside, especially when you've gone through trauma for a long time. But hang in there, have hope, have faith and just continually try to seek him, seek his face, and he will. He will give you beautiful miracles.
Alisha Coakley:Yeah, you know, I have so many, so many thoughts and so many questions and and and now that we're kind of wrapping up and I can ask them and I don't even know which one to start with. Well, but I I, if you're open for just a few minutes more of conversation, I'm sure that Scott probably has some thoughts too. But you know, I was thinking about and when you and I had spoken on the phone, originally I was thinking about the, the saviors saviors of suffering that I had mentioned.
Alisha Coakley:I'd read it in this book and and I talked about, this book talked about how sometimes there are things in this life that we have volunteered for suffering in this life that we volunteered for so that we could better understand and help to maybe not correct, but, but maybe it's just maybe just help in some way, to to be a light to others who are going through that same suffering. And just as you were telling your story, that just kept coming back in my head over and over again that not only you know, were you, someone who you very well know, you very well could have stood up, you know, before even coming to this earth and saying, hey, I've, you know, let me go through this, let me go through this. And you said that Heavenly Father trusted you. You know that. You said that sometimes Heavenly Father just trusts us to do what needs to be done with our trauma. And I loved that. I thought it was so, so beautiful.
Alisha Coakley:And then I thought about just your brother and then your son. Even you know, with his short time here on earth, how, how many people he can affect for good. Even though he's not physically here with you any longer, his story still remains and his light still remains and I, my heart just goes out to you, because I couldn't even imagine what that would be like to lose a child and then to have that information come to you and to keep you know, feeling that frustration of like what could I have done more? You know, like I was already trying. What could I have done more? Why didn't you answer me? And I just I keep coming back to that. Maybe this was something that was that you guys volunteered for as a family. You volunteered to be together to become those savers of suffering, so that you could understand a little bit more about the Atonement and you could understand how to love the way that our Heavenly Father loves and so I just I think that's really beautiful and I would hope that the Lord has come to trust me.
Tammmie Garlick:I mean, that is my greatest desire is to come to where he knows that I'm his friend and that he can trust me. With hard things, you know, as, as going through these hard things, my, my heart like I said, I cry a lot, it has is extremely sensitive, because my heart breaks for anyone who who is in that whole right of either side of being someone who loves someone with depression or someone who's struggling with them, with that with themselves, and not understanding. And one thing that I have come to know through my experiences is that the adversary tried to get me when I was young right when I was young and vulnerable and I did not yet know who I was and what my mission was and and and tried to destroy me as a child and my. You know, one thing that I would really like to tell people that they're not, that I don't feel that they're fully aware of, is that if you have, if you're struggling with, depression and anxiety, if you have a debilitation, that is, a mental block or something that you don't feel connected to the Lord, or that you feel broken. What I would like to say to people is that I truly believe this. I feel you have an untapped spiritual gift you are not aware of yet. I completely believe that if you were born right now, in these last days, you have a very specific mission. You already promised that you would do it, and so if you are going through really horrible things, if you're struggling with depths of despair and hard ugly there's some really ugly things that can happen in this world and you can have ugly influences in your life Know that you probably have a gift here that is untapped and that if you can just strive to get closer to the Lord and that means do your part, do the work, do the work he will. He will give you that compensatory gift of coming to understand what that is and you will feel so empowered and so loved in the ability to understand and to see what that gift is and to be able to develop it, to be able to benefit and help his children, his other children who are desperately in need. We need people, we need those testimonies. We need people who can stand up and say I know who Christ is, I know him and I know that he is real and that he has power and that he can help you through whatever trial you are going through.
Tammmie Garlick:But don't jump off ship. Don't jump ship. You know, sometimes I'm telling you, sometimes it looks it makes. I had some things told to me after Josh died that made me really mad, like I had some things that sentences in my head that made no sense at all and I was like that just makes no sense. And I, how dare you say that to me?
Tammmie Garlick:But now, as I come full circle and I and I see that I am like oh, oh, not only that, but I see that even the, even the second time, even the sexual abuse as a child, it tutored me, it gave me tools, it gave me a relationship with the Lord because I was in the closet, frequently Right, and not in the closet per se, but well, literally in the closet, because I was hiding Right and in those moments of despair and and reaching out, trying to connect with the Lord. I had experiences that I that cemented my faith and cemented that for me to where I had a foundation. I had a strong and a foundation. So build up that foundation If you're going through really hard things and you can't see what the heck the Lord is doing. Build the foundation, build it, do the things that you know and you've been taught to do to where, when you finally, when your mission is finally visible, you'll be able to draw on that and you'll be able to say oh, I see, I see why the Lord had me go through that. I see why he allowed that to happen.
Tammmie Garlick:I don't think the Lord ever causes our trauma. I don't think he ever gives us trials. I really truly do not believe that. But I believe that he allows the effects of this fallen world to have full effect on us and sometimes we see a miracle in that building of our testimony. Sometimes he will give us these beautiful miracles so that we can have this faith promoting experience, so that when he doesn't, we will be able to have something right.
Tammmie Garlick:And I didn't have that a lot when I was a kid. I didn't have a lot of faith promoting. But guess what the Lord gave me? He gave me a mother who was unbelievably righteous and beautiful and good and taught me discipline in my mind to be able to work through things instead of going directly to victim right. That's the natural place to go. It's the victim. It's easy. And once we become the victim, the Lord can't speak truth to us. It's like it blocks that. It's almost like we have to be broken to the point where we finally let that victimization go to where we're ready to receive and ready to accept what he has to give us. Does that make sense?
Scott Brandley:Makes perfect, 100% yeah.
Alisha Coakley:I just keep thinking, like you go from a victim and then you have to volunteer, to come forward and to eventually work your way to being the victor. Right, right, that progressive ladder, I guess right to get up there.
Tammmie Garlick:But you look at where Satan wants to keep us right. Who was the greatest victim of all time? Right, I truly believe that. I truly believe, because I had these reoccurring dreams as a child, that I remembered some things from the pre-existence of war, and so I, my feelings are is that the adversary didn't present a plan. What he did was accuse he accused the father and the son of lying, and that their plan was not going to bring everyone back and that the savior would not be able to do it, and that we were being selfish by following a plan that was going to not be edifying an equal, equal to our brothers and sisters. We see that today, everywhere. Yeah, do you see the same thing playing out? Equality, equality. Life's supposed to be fair. Well, it's not. It's not supposed to be fair. How?
Scott Brandley:fascinating.
Tammmie Garlick:It's the talents, right, it's the parable of the talents. It's it's if you're given one talent and you go and bury it instead of using it to edify and build others up, then you're burying it. And and if the Lord gives you 10 talents, well, they expect you to to to come back with, with more. And I and I believe that that parable is like completely linked to to what the Lord has given us and what he expects from us and what we're able to do with what he gave us.
Scott Brandley:Yeah.
Tammmie Garlick:Right, and that's anyway. Sorry, I'm taking all the time up. No, you're good.
Scott Brandley:I mean, I don't think any question I can ask is better than what you've already said. I know, honestly, wow, you've got so many good insights, and I mean just your. You can just feel your genuine love and sincerity and and thought in everything you say.
Alisha Coakley:And.
Scott Brandley:I mean just, I'm not a big crier, but I feel it. I really feel everything you've said and I'm incredibly grateful for what you've shared with us.
Tammmie Garlick:Yeah, thank you, absolutely Thank you. I love you guys and I love the work you're doing and I am so grateful for you doing it because it needs to. We need to flood the Internet with goodness, yeah Right, and people who are seeking and searching for hope. Absolutely so, thank you.
Scott Brandley:We'll do everything we can to get your message out, Tammy.
Alisha Coakley:Yeah for sure, and if anyone is listening and they're interested in contacting with you you know getting in contact with you to have you share your story, maybe on their podcast or at a fireside or something like that what would be the best way for them to get in touch with you?
Tammmie Garlick:They're welcome to. You can put my email on there. I've put it on a couple different sites. I'm perfectly fine with receiving whatever anybody would like to send me.
Alisha Coakley:Okay.
Tammmie Garlick:And, and I will reach out to all of them, okay, and try to help Awesome.
Alisha Coakley:Perfect.
Alisha Coakley:Well, guys, to all of our listeners, we just want to say thank you so much for tuning in today and for going with us on this journey of Tammy's story.
Alisha Coakley:We hope that you guys were able to feel the spirit as much as I know. Scott and I have definitely been feeling it throughout this whole episode. And and we want to encourage you guys to be sure that you like, share and comment on this video leave a little message for Tammy. Let her know what stood out to you the most, what helped you with your own testimony or with your own perspective. I'm sure that she would love to hear it just as much as we would. And if you guys have a story that you would like to share, please, please, please, head over to the Latter-day Lights and you can fill out the form at the very bottom of the page or you can message us on Facebook. Scott and I are both on the Latter-day Lights page on Facebook, so make sure you guys do that and, you know, do our little five second missionary work and push that share button and get the story out to the rest of the world.
Alisha Coakley:You never know, who might need to hear exactly what was said today.
Tammmie Garlick:I agree, yeah, and can I say one more thing?
Scott Brandley:Yeah, okay.
Tammmie Garlick:Sorry. I have actually started a YouTube page where I want people to share their stories of faith and hope and overcoming with Christ, and it's called Hope in Christ. So if anybody has a story they want to share with me, I would love to hear it.
Alisha Coakley:Perfect, we'll go ahead and add that link in the description too, so you guys can go find Tammy and email her, and you can look up for YouTube channel and get in contact. Thanks, awesome.
Tammmie Garlick:Thanks guys.
Scott Brandley:Yeah, thank you, and thanks everyone for watching, and we will talk to you next Sunday. Till then, see ya, bye, bye. Wow, wow, wow, you did amazing, you just so good, so many beautiful messages.
Alisha Coakley:Tammy, I know you said you have a friend that's helping you write a book. Writing your book right now, right, is it going to be like as a memoir, or is it going to be like lessons and thoughts?
Tammmie Garlick:compilation of not really everything that's in my life, but all of the things that were really significant, the things that really taught me principles and miracles that happened. We had an experience that was unbelievable about my daughter and my son with ducks. I don't know if I told you this story, but my son, when he was 16 years old, he was doing a school project and he came home with a chicken a baby chick, you know and it was heading into the winter and I'm like, absolutely not, we are not having a chicken.
Scott Brandley:You go back to EFA and you take that chicken back.
Tammmie Garlick:And so he came back with a duck.
Tammmie Garlick:That was my Josh and I'm thinking, oh, ducks are even stinkier than chickens, right? And I'm thinking incubation in the house, so great, you know, and I heard in my mind very clearly you let him keep it, and that was really startling to me. But I know, like I told you, when I hear those I'm like very obedient because it's just really it's very clear to me, it feels it's like someone talking to me, it's like it's just very clear. And so I did. And then his little sister in him, which he and his little sister were always antagonistic because he felt like his sister took his place, and so there was always this kind of like friction continually with those two and it hurt my heart because I felt like they, you know, they just never had a connection. And so I looked at the two of them and they were both playing with this duck and having this beautiful experience together. And she started saying I want a duck too, I want a duck. And I'm thinking so I let them go get another duck together.
Tammmie Garlick:So we had these two ducks and they named them Jeremy and Pepsi, and Pepsi was the girl. No, no, no, jeremy was the girl and Pepsi was the boy. Okay, and they were about as different as different could be. Jeremy was like a little mallard ugly, little dark duck, and Pepsi with this beautiful little white duck Right, and so they played together and we raised them in the wintertime where they were really, really stinky and gross, and we got all the lamps and every you know, all the stuff. And about a month before Josh and died, madison came screaming up the stairs hysterical, saying Pepsi is dead. Pepsi is dead. That was hers. Pepsi was her little duck Right, and Jeremy was my son's duck and, and so I went downstairs and, sure enough, pepsi's legs were straight up in the air and she was upside.
Tammmie Garlick:You know, she was upside down with her legs straight up and and I picked her up and she was cold, as cold as I. So I knew she had been dead for a while, right, and I heard in my mind you can ask for this. And I would have never in my wildest dreams, ever, ever, done this. That's part of life, yeah, and it's a. It's a perfect experience to teach your child about death, right, and and and just just the cycle of life. And I would have never challenged her faith by asking something like that, because it was kind of trivial, right, and I knew what that meant. I knew that the Lord was saying you can ask, you can ask for this. So I took the duck in my hands and I put Matty's hands and I, we put the duck in our hands and I said, matty, we're going to say prayer that this little duck can come back alive. And we said a prayer and that's what the duck came alive. And you know, I thought about that and I thought that was a very odd thing that the Lord would even be involved in that or think that that was. But this is what I learned from that those little ducks followed my little girl around. She was the one that found him. She was very traumatized by what she found and they followed her around and she was their little mother For that time, and it was her and Josh. It was something, it was a beautiful memory that they shared. And the Lord was saying, matty, I'm not going to take, I'm not going to stop this from happening, but I am a God of miracles and I'm aware of you and I'm going to give you this to know that I'm here and that I know you. And that was a beautiful, a beautiful thing to be able to have that little duck as they grew up and they got bigger and stinkier. But what a beautiful thing, right? Can you believe that that was important enough to the Lord to teach her that this I am, I do perform miracles. That was a miracle and that was this unbelievable beautiful thing that we, that we, that was a testimony of his love during that time period, right.
Tammmie Garlick:And then later on, later on, when they got bigger, we decided we got to take these ducks to get rid of them. So I decided to get a dog, a little dog, for them to try to replace the ducks. And so I told the kids we got to take the ducks to Adventure Learning Park and free them in the pond, right. So we made friendship bracelets for them and put them around their little legs and let them go. And when we went to the pond it was all of the mallards and all the white ducks were completely. They were segregated, right. So my daughter was like, oh, they're going to be separated, they're not going to be friends anymore, right? And the following winter we went to the park and guess who comes running up?
Scott Brandley:Oh.
Tammmie Garlick:Jeremy and Pepsi still together. Oh my God, isn't that amazing. Beautiful, yeah, yeah. So, like I told you, we've had some beautiful. You know, I've had some beautiful miracles and beautiful witnesses of his love.