Kathi and Chris Sullivan speak to students with a message of “hope, love, purpose and change.” As the Sullivan’s Message website details: 

Kathi Meyer began to speak about substance use, alcohol awareness, mental health, wellness, and the importance of making good choices in 2009 after her amazing 17 year old daughter Taylor passed away from underage drinking after attending a homecoming game and a series of underage drinking parties.

After enduring a three day search, Taylor was found drowned in two feet of water, after getting lost from an outside party in the woods at an abandoned airport in Norfolk, MA. 

Kathi somehow started Taylor’s Message only two months later. Her hope was to let her daughter’s passing have purpose.

She met her future husband, Chris Sullivan, at her first parent presentation. He was attending, not as a parent, but as a man suffering from substance use disorder, sober for only five weeks.

He graduated from Boston College in 1996. During graduate school he was drafted by the New England Patriots. He played in the NFL for six years with the Patriots and the Pittsburgh Steelers, playing in two Super Bowls and winning Super Bowl XXXVI. However, his years of not addressing his struggles with mental health, anxiety, depression and overall wellness ultimately led him down a path of destructive decisions prematurely ending his lifelong dream of professional football.

They say through tragedy, beautiful meetings can happen. That was the case with Kathi and Chris’s struggles surrounding substance use. Their powerful messages were destined to join forces in more ways than one! They were married two years later and have been driven by a purpose to spread awareness as a team and individually ever since. 

We hope that you will join us at 7:00 pm on Thursday October 5th for this important adult-only community conversation.  To read more about Sullivan’s Message, please click here to be directed to their website.