Are you feeling sad, angry, depleted, overwhelmed, anxious, scared? Yeah, us too. We just wanted to check in and say hi. We’re living it, too, and sometimes it just helps to get together and talk it out. We hadn’t seen each other all summer and it felt so good just to melt into a long overdue hug, get organized, and focus on what’s ahead.
Patty’s article is especially poignant as we face these challenging times. In her very “Patty way” she reminds us to focus on the stars that shine through the darkness. Be thankful. And to never underestimate the power of hope.
Hugs,
Joy
Our second attempt at video
Quick correction for our new Irish friends: Patty’s people are from County Mayo in northwest Ireland, not County Cork.
Living a “Thank You Life”
By Patty Wetterling
Thank you.
Two words that mean the world.
In today’s world, we take so much for granted. Our comforts—housing, food on the table, warmth, having a bed, friends and family.
Then we witness the unimaginable, horrible acts of violence committed by human beings.
June 14:
The assassination of Minnesota Speaker of the House Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark.
Serious gunshot wounds to State Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette.
August 27:
The mass shooting at Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis. Two children dead, 21 people injured. The 23-year-old shooter dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
September 10:
The assassination of political activist Charlie Kirk in Utah.
The mass shooting at Evergreen High School in Colorado. Two students injured. The 16-year-old shooter dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
According to the most recent statistic I found, there were 309 mass shootings in the United States with 302 deaths and 1,354 injuries. That was as of August 31st.
My mind can’t wrap itself around all the pain of these high-profile cases, and yet I know there are even more that don’t get the national attention.
Our family knows and lived the experience of having our lives fine and “normal” one day, and then forever changed by an act of violence. We know the difficulties of trying to pick yourself up again, and trying to build happiness and meaning after such senseless killings.
Yet through the darkness, we also witnessed the amazing stars that came shining through—the searchers, the doctors, the counselors, the food that was provided, the survivors. We were often carried by the kindness of so many people who reached out—some that we knew, and many others that we didn’t. It truly speaks to the good side of the human spirit.
We need that back.
My brain always seeks to back things up and see if there is a way to get ahead of the violence problems. We need to prevent violence from happening in the first place!
What do we need to do to raise children to be healthy, happy, productive grownups and prevent “growing” them into people who go out and commit these crimes?
It’s a good question to ask in trying to reduce violence.
Three of my favorite resources are:
The Search Institute (searchinstitute.org) has many research-based tools, including their Developmental Assets Profile, that measures the strengths, supports, and social emotional factors that influence the development of young people. It helps us learn what young people need to thrive.
Minnesota Children’s Mental Health Association (macmh.org) has many fact sheets, resources and tools to support kids impacted by violence.
Jacob Wetterling Resource Center, a program of Zero Abuse Project (zeroabuseproject.org), works to prevent crimes against children.
These organizations have a history of positively impacting children, and continue to help me often when I don’t have the words to deal with what I am seeing.
My suggestion for today is to say a few thank yous.
Thank you to all of the police, firemen, and first responders.
Thank you to all the nurses, doctors, and cleaning people at the hospital.
Thank you to all of the dedicated staff at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) who are having to shift their budgets and adapt to new rules and timelines due to the new leadership in Washington. The work you do helps so many people!
Thank you to the parking attendant who has a smile and nice greeting every time I leave the hospital parking ramp after visiting my sister.
Thank you to my sister for hanging in there through so much pain and so many setbacks.
Thank you to my brother for his hilarious retelling of our dad’s silly jokes.
Thank you to my kids for their caring checkup calls to me and my sisters.
Thank you to my husband for picking up a rotisserie chicken last night, even though I had stated I would try and start some dinner when I got home.
Thank you to my dog Penny Lane for always being ready for a hug.
I believe that a really good counter to negativity in the world is to show gratitude. Say thank you for all that’s going right. Thank you for people being kind. Thank you for caring for one another. Thank you for support during the hard times.
Living a “Thank You Life” just feels better. And for me, it brings back hope.
With hope,
Patty
“As long as we have hope, we have direction, the energy to move and the map to move by. We have a hundred alternatives, a thousand paths, and an infinity of dreams.”
Laozi, Chinese philosopher and writer
Upcoming Author Events
Additional events, links and details will be added as they become available. Dates and times subject to change. Please check back for final confirmation.
9/15/2025 - Patty, “Community Healing and Moving Forward,” Benson High School Performing Arts Center, Benson, MN - 6:00 PM
9/25-9/27/2025 - Patty and Joy, South Dakota Festival of Books, Spearfish, SD – 10:15 AM (Saturday)
10/10/2025 - Patty and Joy, Day at Home Mental Health Advocacy Event, Broadway Ballroom, Alexandria, MN – 9:00 AM
10/17/2025 - Patty, Central Minnesota Aging with Attitude Expo, Sauk Centre High School, Sauk Centre MN – 9:00 AM
12/4/2025 - Patty and Joy, Ashby MN – TBD
Book Clubs
We are visiting book clubs and discussing Dear Jacob: A Mother’s Journey of Hope on Zoom! In return, we ask that your book club make a donation of any amount to the Jacob Wetterling Resource Center. Message us for details. We look forward to sharing Dear Jacob with you!
Follow Joy at JoyTheCurious.com
If you’re not already following Joy’s Substack, you can find her at JoyTheCurious.com. Check out her latest story called “Sentenced to College: The Angel Hernandez Story.”
Now in Paperback, Dear Jacob: A Mother’s Journey of Hope
Order from one of these online retailers or wherever you like to buy books!
Excerpt from the new Afterword
By Joy Baker
Sometimes a person comes into your life for reasons you can’t possibly un-derstand. When Patty and I first started working on this book, Jacob was still missing. We thought we were working on a legacy piece that would bring attention to his case, highlight Patty’s advocacy work, and serve as a spark of hope for other families of missing children. We were wrong. It became so much more.
As we worked on those early pages together, we couldn’t possibly have known what was in store for us or what our friendship would have to endure. To see it through would mean going there together—through the darkness, the sadness, and the unfathomable grief. Could we even do it? Would people be receptive to it? Would our friendship survive it?
It has been a remarkable journey.
At that charity gala in 2013 when Patty and I first met, I was forty-six; she was sixty-five. I had just given up my dream of starting a new writing career and gone back to working full-time at what I knew—marketing. Patty was a well-known keynote speaker, a child safety advocate, a national figure in Washington, DC, and probably the most famous Minnesotan I’d ever met. She just oozed drive and purpose. Like everyone else at the gala, I was blown away by her powerful message of hope and her belief in the overall goodness of humankind.
So I was more than a little nervous about approaching Patty that evening and introducing myself as the blogger who had been writing about her missing son for the past two months. Did she know who I was? Had she been following my blog? Was I making a difference? I was desperately trying to figure out my own purpose in life and hoped maybe this was it. By writing about Jacob’s case and asking people to “think Jacob” with me, maybe I could somehow create change.
It didn’t go as expected. Patty saw my writing less as “making a difference” and more “like stalking or something.”
Audiobook
People often ask us if there’s an audiobook version of Dear Jacob and the answer is, yes! It was published by Dreamscape Media at the same time the hard cover was released last year. It’s narrated by Rebecca Stern who does an amazing job voicing this emotional story.
The audiobook has also been updated with the new cover art and afterword —which is read by Joy in her own voice.
You can find the audio version of Dear Jacob: A Mother’s Journey of Hope on all the major audio platforms, including Audible, Audiobooks.com, the Apple Books app, Hoopla, Libby, Libro.fm, Google Play Books, and Scribd. If you’re interested in listening to a sample of Dear Jacob, click the following link.
https://www.audiobooks.com/book/stream/717092
Rankings and reviews
If you enjoyed reading Dear Jacob: A Mother’s Journey of Hope, please give it a positive rating and leave a review on Amazon, Goodreads, Barnes & Noble, or wherever you purchased your book. We love reading your reviews!
Ask for Dear Jacob at your local library
We love libraries, and would especially love if every library in America had a copy of Dear Jacob on its shelves. Many times there’s an online form you can fill out to request a specific book, but of course it’s just as simple to pick up the phone and call your friendly librarian. Thank you for your supporting your local library!