When TikToker Kristina’s (@kristinarichie) dad was 15 years old, both of his parents took their own lives two weeks apart from each other around Christmastime.
He was the one who found both of their bodies. His brother was in the Navy, so he was the only other person living at home. After a year and a half of being passed around from one relative’s house to another, he eventually went to live with his grandmother.
“In fact, right after his parents had passed away, he heard some family members talking about it in the kitchen, saying, ‘What are we going to do with him? ‘Where is he going to go?’ And he was getting in trouble and getting kicked out of these houses because of his behavior,” explained Kristina.
One night, he came home to his grandmother’s and was so drunk that he couldn’t even make it up the stairs to his bedroom. He ended up passing out on the staircase.
The next morning, he woke up with a pillow under his head and a blanket draped over him. His grandmother was asleep on the stairs beside him.
“She could have chosen to wake him up and yell at him and tell him to get [himself] upstairs,” Kristina pointed out. “She could have lectured him, but she didn’t.”
“Instead, she met him where he was at. She lay with him on those stairs. She got him a pillow and a blanket, and she sat with him in his stuff and all of his grief and all of his mess. And that right there is the definition of a safe person.”
Recently, Kristina shared this story with her teenage sons because she wanted them to understand the true meaning of having a safe person.
A safe person does not just refer to someone who isn’t going to physically hurt you; it’s about being emotionally safe as well.
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When she asked them who they considered to be their safe person, they both told her that their safe person was her brother, their uncle Roman. These were two separate conversations she had with them, yet they gave the same answer.
In the comments section, several TikTok users shared their thoughts on the story and praised the safe people in their own lives.
“Grandma helped prevent a bad case of generational trauma just by being there and showing this badly broken little boy the love, compassion, and the understanding that he needed,” commented one user.
“I have a similar story. [I] was raised by my grandparents, and they both died around 14. I moved from family member to family member. Constantly in trouble. Never fit in. I didn’t realize how wrong everyone was until now. I just needed one safe person. I waited until I was 18 to get away,” wrote another.
“My mom is doing this for me now. I have CPTSD, and what she’s doing is healing my soul. It really is this simple many times,” added someone else.
By Emily Chan
Emily Chan is a writer who covers lifestyle and news content. She graduated from Michigan State University with a degree in... More about Emily Chan
