For weeks, I went back and forth on it.
I had the idea earlier this year for a birthday fundraiser for Empower, a national nonprofit supporting children and young adults who have lost a parent. A night at The Boca Raton, in a room full of people I love, with a mission I believe in. Simple enough on paper.
But every time I thought about it, I hesitated.
The truth is, what I really wanted for my birthday night was a dinner with my parents and my kids. My mom (my kiddos’ Grandie), my dad (Pa Blue)… all of us around one table. But my mom passed in 2018, and my dad followed in 2020. And the dinner I really wanted wasn’t going to happen.
Empower, though, has spoken to my heart since I first learned about it from my dear friend and Boca Raton neighbor Patty DeMarco, who knew its founder, Cara Belvin, from Boston.
So I stopped hemming and hawing. And I went for it.
We gathered in the Mizner Room at The Boca Raton, a space with its own quiet history in a resort celebrating its centennial this year. My parents joined as members in the 1960s and 70s. I’ve walked those grounds my whole life, and there isn’t a corner of that property I don’t feel them in. It felt like the only place to do this. The DeMarco Family, The Power of Sports, and Casa de Montecristo jumped right in as sponsors. Provocativo poured the welcome toast. Grimes Events & Party Tents brought the warmth and color that turned a historic room into something that felt like home. Just Baked sent cookies straight from the oven. And our raffle table—anchored by Graze Craze Boca Raton, Gro Yoga & Wellness, Remix Pilates, FAU Athletics, and Marlins and Bush’s Boca Raton Bowl game tickets—gave guests a way to keep giving all night long.
But the real heart of the evening came from four voices.
Empower’s founder, Cara Belvin, flew in from Boston between her son’s lacrosse travels to be there. She lost her own mother to breast cancer at nine years old and built Empower around her dining room table a decade ago because she wanted no child to feel as alone in their grief as she did.
“I was desperate to meet another girl like me who could relate,” said Belvin. “The purpose of Empower was really simple. It was just to remind kids they weren’t alone in their grief.”
Today, Empower runs the only mentor program in the world specifically for kids in grief. Empower mentors are adults who lost a parent themselves and are willing to walk alongside a child going through the same.
Logan Husband, a Fort Lauderdale native, St. Thomas Aquinas alum and current FAU offensive lineman, lost his father at five. He spoke about a family friend who started taking him to a father-son camp twice a year for nine years. It was a quiet, profound act of showing up that shaped him.
“I wish I had something like Empower when I was five years old,” said Logan. “I’m just glad I can receive it now and give that support when that time comes.”
Jere Croke, a father of four and a real estate developer deeply embedded in our community, lost his beautiful wife Detra just over a year ago. So many in the room knew Detra through school and community circles and she was one of many who shared her story and her strength in Boca Raton Regional Hospital Go Pink Luncheon videos. Jere spoke with extraordinary honesty about what a normal day looks like now (“controlled chaos,” he called it), about keeping Detra present in so much of what they do and about the message he comes back to with his kids.
“It’s okay….Mama wants you to be happy. She didn’t fight this hard for us to be sad,” said Croke.
Skye Dyer, a singer, writer, mother, and daughter of the late, legendary Dr. Wayne Dyer, talked about how grief breaks you open, leaving an empathy behind that you carry into every encounter after. And she returned again and again to one of her father’s enduring lessons, the one that has shaped her own answer to what she wants her legacy to be:
“If you have a choice of being right or being kind, choose kind.”
I’ve read so much from authors who write about how grief and joy can work together. What I’ve learned though is that they must. It’s why a birthday party can also hold heavy conversation. And I think that’s the whole point of a night like this. You don’t have to choose between celebrating life and acknowledging loss. The most honest version of both is when they sit at the same table.
Empower is now in ten cities nationally and South Florida is one of the chapters Cara Belvin is most committed to growing. The vision for the next year is straightforward and beautiful: a Mother’s Day event and a Father’s Day event for local children, free of charge, where they can look around a room and realize they aren’t the only one who has lost a mom or dad.
From there, the goal is to build a mentor program here in Boca Raton and across South Florida, pairing adults who have lost a mom or dad with kids walking that same path. It takes a village… and our village is exactly the kind of place this can flourish.
You can donate, volunteer, become a mentor if you lost a parent yourself and feel called to support a young person going through the same, or enroll a child (up through age 24) who has lost a mom or dad. Visit Empower’s website, listen to Episode 94 of The Paige Kornblue Show to hear the event in full, and feel free to reach out to me directly to learn more. I’d love to connect you.
Celebrate. Empower. Repeat.
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