WACO, Texas — October is now known as Fentanyl Poisoning Awareness Month in Texas, but for parents who lost a child to the deadly drug, they say the state still has a lot of work to do to protect our children.
Stefanie Turner lost her son Tucker in 2021 after he took a pill laced with fentanyl. She started Texas Against Fentanyl shortly after to prevent other parents from experiencing that same heart break.
"He was a brilliant and beautiful boy," she said of her son. "He was training for a triathlon with his dad. After four months of sobriety, he made a really terrible choice. He was struggling with sleeping, purchased a pill on social media and was found dead ten hours later."
Stefanie said Tucker’s decision cost him his life and now her mission is to raise awareness and save as many lives as she can.
"We are in this culture where pills are easily accessible, a medicated type world where if you're pain, you take a pill, you have anxiety, you take a pill," she said. "What they don't understand, is that pill they are taking is 50 times stronger than heroin."
Texas Against Fentanyl played a part in HB 3144 passing, which labeled October as Fentanyl Poisoning Awareness Month, but Stefanie said more still needs to be done.
"We need more. We need more from our state leaders," she said. "We are currently developing curriculum. We pushed for House Bill 3908 requiring fentanyl education for grades 6 through 12, that was named for my son Tucker."
While it's important for children to learn about the dangers, parents should also be doing research on their own.
"I don't think there's really a full understanding of what fentanyl is and how it's affecting our communities," Stefanie said. "There's still this idea of 'not my kid' or 'I talk to my kid about this', but that was my son Tucker's story."
Texas Against Fentanyl is also releasing a campaign of their own for Fentanyl Poisoning Awareness Month.
