Funeral in Memory of Matthew Conley
Donation protected
As many of you are now aware, my best friend, my better half of more years on this Earth than not, the Father of my children, and the man that I have always truly held onto the hope of one day calling my husband, Matthew Ian Conley, was called home to the arms of our savior, Jesus in heaven on Tuesday, March 7th, 2023 leaving behinds our two sons (Tanner and Aiden). This was a very unexpected shock, to say the least. After all, we just laid his brother to rest less than 6 months ago. We are beside ourselves right now as Matthew's death was very sudden and lost far too soon. Matthew left this world in the position most of our loved ones that pass far too early in life sadly do which is without any savings for this day and no life insurance. Before I continue on, I would like to reiterate that as I make known what I am about to share, this is not in any way, shape, or form to be taken as a speculation on the cause or circumstances around Matthew’s passing bc we simply are still unsure of the exact cause of death at this moment since Matthew has had several health issues over the last few years. The following is shared as a means to directly touch base on a topic that Matthew knew all too well from his own personal experience. Though we are beyond devastated from his passing, we do our best to remember God’s word and try to find peace and comfort in knowing that he is now living free from all of the demons that Matthew has had to face here on this Earth for entirely too long. We know that now, our children will never have to go another day with daddy missing even one milestone, celebration, or big life event. There will be no more missed graduations or school plays. No more missed nights of seeing our son off to his homecoming dances, no more missed first days of school, and no missed wedding days. He will be there the day Aiden learns to drive. He will be with him every day there after every time he puts that key in the ignition and cranks the car. He will be there watching over him when those wheels pull out of the drive and every mile along the way until he returns back safely. And it will be the same for Tanner. The day that Tanner and Aiden walk the stage and are handed their high school and even college diplomas, just as any proud mother would be, I will be front row center of the stage but as I explained to our youngest son, Tanner..." your daddy will be even closer than mommy will be. Your daddy will be right there with you walking that stage every step of the way...both in spirit and in your heart. He will be there to watch over you always, because unlike the other kids in your class, you have something they don’t have. You have a daddy that’s cooler than any superhero on TV. You have a daddy that is now your guardian angel always looking over you and helping you remember that you are so very brave. You no longer have to be afraid bc daddy will now always be there with you to protect you. He is your guardian angel!!! You will never have to be without daddy ever ever again now bc he will be with you every single second of every single day. And you know how daddy told you and bubby about the human body and how it is just a shell? Well, think of it like this. Who made us? JESUS made us. And where does Jesus live? HEAVEN! and Heaven is such a magical place where you never have to fill pain again. And you know how you use armor in your Fortnite game to protect your body from attacks that hurt it? Well, our body is a shell just like that armor in your game only our body is the armor that protects our soul. And our soul is who we are. So, when Jesus calls us home, he is calling our spirit home to Heaven. And our Earthly body dies here on Earth but that does not mean that we die bc it is our spirit that makes us who we are. That is what goes on to live in Heaven. We are simply loaned our Earthly body from Jesus so that we can use it as a meant to protect our spirit which lies deep down within us just like the armor that you have protects the body of your character on Fortnite. And you know when someone calls you a really mean name or says that they are not your friend, that hurts our feelings right? And it makes your heart hurt. Or what about when you fall and scrape your knee, that hurts, right? Well, in Heaven, you don’t feel hurt or pain bc your Earthly body is what feels hurt and remember what mommy said? In Heaven, you feel no pain. That’s bc it is your spirit that’s in Heaven and not your Earthly body. So, where daddy is now, he feels no pain ever anymore. And I know it still hurts our heart here on Earth bc daddy went to be with Jesus and we will miss him, but that is only bc we still have our Earthly body here which is what feels pain. So, it is ok to want to cry if you need to and it is even ok to be sad but just remember that we don’t have to be sad bc daddy’s not sad at all anymore ever. Daddy no longer has to feel any pain at all. And we should be happy that we had the time we had here with daddy on this Earth bc our life is never really ours to own. Our life is a gift from Jesus so we should be happy he shared it with us at all. And since it is a gift, we shouldn’t be greedy and demand for more. We don’t demand for more when someone gives us a gift for our birthday do we? No! We are thankful that we got it at all. So just like that, daddy’s life was a gift shared with us so we should be thankful for it ever being shared with us at all....not demand more time from it." Though this conversation went on to touch on a few more topics to try to explain this sudden passing of his father to our 6 year old son, the main point is that Matthew is free of pain and all harm and hurt. He is happy and rejoicing in the arms of Jesus. We are thankful for the time we had with him, we know he is still forever here in spirit, and the main point...we will one day see him again! He will be there with arms wide open, and my family will finally be HEALTHY and whole even though it is hard to explain that to the 6 and 15 year old children that we share.
So yes, this GoFundMe is a way of asking for assistance in the expenses of the burial of their father which I deeply would like my children to have as a means of a final closure for them, but I also want to utilize it for more than just that. I want Matthew’s life to mean more than just a tragic end. I want to take this time to shed light on a very dark demon that lurks in many families just like mine but all too often, it seems to have become normalized more and more these days. I want to tell Matthew’s story in all of its rawness bc Matthew, though often saddened by some of the choices he made, was not ashamed to tell his story himself in hope that it would reach simply even one person. He told it without the mentality that it would reach just one person and magically move them to the point that they would want to get help and suddenly be magically cured. Instead, he told it with a realistic perception that if he could simply reached one person and moved them to pray, if it could lead them a little closer to knowing Jesus, then they were no longer fighting the demon of addiction all alone and his story had made a difference. But I want to take it a step farther than just that. I want to shed light on the ones that are all too often overlooked when you think of an active addiction. When we think of addiction, most of us focus on the addict. We need to get the addict the help that they need. We need to get the addict into a good treatment program. We need to rehabilitate the addict so that they can be better for themself and for their family. But what about the children of the addicts? What about the children out there that are children just like mine? What about the children that all too often have to be uprooted and removed from negative situations such as the daily living environment that addicts create? Those are the ones that have to be pulled from the only "safe" place that they have ever known bc they loved an addict that unfotunatly was fighting demons that were bigger than they could control. I personally moved myself and our children to an entirely different state than Matthew as a means to provide a safe and healthy upbringing in a world where addiction is not normalized so often. It didn’t mean that I abandon Matthew or didn’t love him. It meant that I was protecting our children and we talked about this often. Matthew wasn’t angry for that. He actually appreciated just how much I loved the children that we shared and was able to pick up where he lacked though it hurt him not having us with him. He still understood why and was thankful every single day for that love. He always told me that their was not another soul on this planet that he could have ever wished for to be the mother of his children. He always said he thanked God daily that he chose me to be their mother bc they couldn’t be a better mother out there for his children. I will honor that role and cherish it with every ounce of my being! But sadly, that’s not always the case. There are many children not as fortunate as mine. Some children do not have even one addiction free parent to protect them from the dark demons of addiction. Those are the children that are uprooted in the worst of scenarios. There are kids that are sometimes yanked from their beds in the middle of the night by men and women in business attire with only enough time to pack a few items in a small backpack before being relocated to the home of complete strangers without the comfort of mommy or daddy at all sometimes indefinitely!! There are those that bounce from place-to-place bc mommy and/or daddy can’t keep the rent paid as a result of all of their funds being spent first on the addiction. Those are the kids I speak on behalf of. The ones that are told that they “can't play t-ball or do cheer this season...but maybe next season bc mommy/daddy just simply do not have the money this time but maybe they can play next time”...BUT WAIT!!! They had the money to feed the addiction???!!!???!! Those are the kids that I want to speak up for. And the worst of all (and i am personally guilty of this one), the kids sometimes told "mommy/daddy love you very much so do not ever think that they don’t. They love you so so so so much. It’s not mommy/daddy. It’s the addiction. They love you very much. They just love the drugs more right now bc that’s what addiction does." NO!!! THATS INCORRECT!! That is not right at all!!!! Again, I personally have said this very thing to my children and done so even recently I am sad to admit. The thing is though, that is not the case. It is not that the parent(s) love the drug more. They have most likely always loved the child more. Love is an emotion. It is an emotional connection made. A feeling! Addiction is not the same. Addiction is a physical dependency that has chemicals that are, over time, mind altering to make you believe that you cannot physically live without it, or you may die. Yes, perhaps you chose to use the drug in the beginning but never with more love for it than the child. The first few times you did it, it most likely was bc you thought that you had control over it. You did it bc it felt good and was fun so why not, right? You had a mentality that led you to believe that you could stop at any time, right? No addict ever goes into an active addiction with the open acceptance to the idea that " I think this is fun. I think I’ll just do it until it kills me!" No addict goes into it thinking, "I think I want this to control my entire life taking away all of my say so and control". In fact, most addicts that I personally know or have known are quite the opposite actually. They are more narcissistic than that and most of the narcissists that I know usually are the ones that hate not having total control over everything. They cannot stand to be told what to do or tied down in just about any form. That’s why so many narcissists do not get married I would think or if they do, often, it ends in divorce. They hate not being the only one in full control of everything. So why would someone that cannot stand the idea of being controlled even a little bit enter willingly into a lifestyle that leaves them with literally absolutely no control what so ever? They don’t! Not intentionally anyways. It is at the point of a true addiction once it becomes a dependency as a result of the drug now chemically altering their mind to think that they have no other choice and must have the drug bc they physically do not know how to live without it. Just as legally prescribed antidepressants change our chemical balances to make us feel happy or less anxious, street drugs do the same! They alter the mind to form this conception that there is no other way to live bc you "need" the drugs to exist or breath so to speak. That is not loving the drugs more. That is not love at all. In fact, who hates being controlled yet loves the very thing that yanks that control from them? Most addicts that I know do not even want to be addicts at all and have tried to get help to escape from the addiction and just like most, they have tried and have failed sadly bc that’s how tight of a hold addiction takes on them. It grips onto you with such a strength that you are actually considered one of only a few in the larger scheme of it all if you somehow, someway manage to escape it in the end. It is pure evil. That is not love at all. And it destroys any and all good in its path!! So, it is not that the parent loves the drug more. It was never that the parent ever did love the drug more. Bc addiction is not love. One is an emotion that we feel and the other is a dependency that we believe that we cannot live without.
Addiction is real and it is raw. It is brutal, and it will sink its claws deep into you making it nearly impossible to escape most of the time. Yet, even knowing this, children of addicts are still left thinking that their parents do love them but just love the drugs more! These kids are usually already at a disadvantage in life compared to other children with addiction-free parents or loved ones. So why are we now putting them at an emotional disadvantage as well. Why are we telling them that they are not worth being loved more than some awful drug? I never want another child to be made to believe this lie again! And I’m ashamed that I was one of the parents that spread it.
So yes, I am asking for help now so that my children, who are of these innocent children in this battle that Matthew has fought for so long, can be able to properly grieve and lay their father to rest. They deserve that and if humbling myself to ask for help Is what it takes to give them that then so be it (which was what led me to create this GoFundMe to begin with). Aiden is older. He is 15 now. He saw the ugly battle that Matthew fought as it all emerged from the early stages before I made the realization of just how ugly it was. But unlike Tanner, Aiden got the good years too. He got the real "dad/bonus son” bonding experience. He got the fishing trips, the vacations as a family, and the nightly prayers we said together while holding hands as we all sat around the dinner table. And yes, that was a nightly routine. We had that structure, repetition, kept Jesus very much alive within our home, and we were a beautiful family what feels like not that long ago actually. So, Aiden has more of the good memories than bad. Tanner sweet only (our TannMann or baby TanTann) knows daddy as only perfect. Tanner did not have to see the ugly battle Matthew faced. Tanner got only sober daddy fun park days when we made the trips back home to GA to be with daddy(bc we would only come up if we had sober daddy), and he got the facetime chats alllll the time with daddy while daddy was being so so silly as he was making his super hilarious (yet drove mommy crazy) Donald Duck voices with the boys. My boys deserve to remember that version of daddy and to grieve his death properly knowing he was laid to rest in a way that honors the life of the daddy that they know him to be. With that said, I also want to help others in the process of this campaign. I want to be able to tell Mathew's raw and very honest struggle with addiction. And that is what addiction is. It is a constant struggle. It is a battle against demons that have the sharpest of weapons and destroys all in it's path...not just the addicts. It always plays dirty with a bad agenda. It takes innocent families and rips them apart just as it did mine. It will destroy all that is in its path. And for innocent children like my own, that is simply just not fair. Their voices are often left unheard, and their emotional wounds are often left unhealed. So, after the service is paid for Matthew, I want to donate any remaining funds back to a local charity that has a primary focus on assisting solely the children of addicts. One that provides scholarships for sports such as t-ball and cheer that the parents "cannot" pay for, and also provides counseling for the children of addicts as they work through all the emotional battle wounds that tags along with loving an addict. I want to do this for my children, as well as all of the other family’s out there just like mine. So please consider donating to this GoFundMe which has been created as an assistance request to lay my best friend and father of my children to rest as well as let our family’s story be heard in hopes that it might make a difference in some way all while giving those that truly do love Matthew comfort in knowing that his passing was not without more purpose than his addiction was. If you cannot donate, please share this link with others but above all and before anything, please just keep my family, my children, and all the other families that love an addict in your prayers. Our story is not over. There is still so much more to tell.
Thank you,
Tracy N Evans
Co-organizers (2)
Tracy Evans
Organizer
Woodstock, GA
Elaina Bogert
Co-organizer