In Fall 2025, the journalism department presented the “Motherhood and the Overdose Crisis,” panel in collaboration with the Denison Museum. The community dialogue featured three women who have brought their stories of personal loss and advocacy to public conversations about dignity and care in the face of substance use disorders and the overdose crisis.
Chi Nguyen ’27 and Jack Richards ’25 (above) lead the panel discussion; Chair of the Journalism department and JOUR 300 course faculty Jack Shuler (pictured below) with panelists Blyth Barnow, Beth Weinstock, and Patricia ‘Trish’ Perry.
Against a backdrop of an exhibit titled “M[otherhood]s,” with historical and contemporary works that reflected themes of love, labor, identity and connection across time, two Denison students, Chi Nguyen ’27 and Jack Richards ’25, led the discussion.
Three panelists discussed their work as leaders and advocates for saving lives through harm reduction efforts in Ohio.
Blyth Barnow is a minister and founder of advocacy group HEAL Ohio. Patricia “Trish” Perry is a co-founder of Ohio CAN (Change Addiction Now) and the Newark Homeless Outreach. Beth Weinstock is a founder of Birdielight, a program that provides education on fentanyl and distributes life-saving tools.
Harm reduction is a pragmatic approach toward addiction that contrasts with prohibitive penalizing practices. Harm reduction focuses on meeting people where they are, with an emphasis on safety, such as distributing safe use supplies and naloxone.
Barnow, Perry, and Weinstock are well acquainted with the tragedy of this crisis and the inadequacy of current efforts to address it.
Weinstock lost her youngest son Eli to an overdose in 2021 when he unintentionally ingested fentanyl. Barnow has lost friends as well as her partner to overdoses. Perry has a son who struggles with addiction. She devotes her life to helping and serving the Newark community and continues to lose people whom she has come to care for greatly.
During the Q&A, one woman raised her hand to share her own experience of loss and grief. She had lost her son to an opioid overdose a few years ago and fears that her other son might soon suffer the same fate. After the event concluded, the panelists gathered with her to talk and offer the hope and healing of the community.
The event was held in conjunction with a journalism course, “Get off the Hill,” that focused on the overdose crisis and substance use disorder.
