Bereaved Sister Finds Healing, Helps Others

By Luke Schmaltz, VOICES Newsletter Editor 

Mary Powers is the Director of Community Engagement at JPH (James P. Harrington) Organization in Marshfield, “...a nurturing and inclusive community of wellness, healing, and transformation. 

For the last four-and-a-half years, Powers has navigated profound grief over the death of her sister, Carroll, while sustaining her recovery and helping others in her community. Powers shares her loss and how she found support, hope, and her future in a repurposed barn on the grounds of the JPH Organization.

Lost and Found

“I started my recovery journey 12 years ago,” Powers begins. “I grew up with alcoholism in my home, and I am the middle child of five. Thankfully, sobriety has been found by some of my family members and some have thankfully not needed to find recovery. I lost my older sister to suicide, and the loss is still really fresh. She struggled with substance use and mental health issues – some of which I believe are related to childhood trauma, which we all suffer from.” 

“My sister lived in Southern California, in an area that is affluent and very much a culture of ‘keeping up with the Joneses,’ and I felt that she was not around many people who could show up authentically. She was married with four kids. Several years before she died, she was in and out of treatment centers for a condition that they were unable to diagnose. Her youngest was in middle school while all this was happening, and her oldest was in high school.” 

“Both my mother and father passed away 13 and 14 years ago. I dealt with their deaths through drinking, but soon after, I found sobriety. My sisters and I used to do sisters’ weekends, and we got together in Maryland in October of 2021. Carroll was the best she had been in years; she seemed like herself, and she was present. In December, she told her family that she was going for a walk and never returned.”

“It took us five-and-a-half weeks to find her,” Powers explains. “That was really traumatic. A week after we found out Carroll was missing, my younger sister moved in with me. We were posting on Facebook, putting up billboards, and talking to whomever we could. I was reaching out to boyfriends from 35 years ago.”

Turbulent Times

“My sister had numerous failed suicide attempts in the years prior,” Power continues.

“Those were her cries for help, but I don’t think the intention was fully there. Obviously, she learned how to do it the right way. At one point, a divorce attorney in Southern California reached out to us. She had a side hustle of looking for missing children, and she said that she would like to help. We got on a Zoom call with her and told her everything, and she went and spoke with my brother-in-law and the kids.”

“She used all of her resources to send out detectives, drones, and search parties. My sister was finally found in LAX long-term parking. She had taken two prescribed medications, which she had stockpiled, with alcohol. There was a note in the car, but all it said was that she was appointing her husband as the executor of her will. It said nothing to her kids or her family, so there was no closure for any of us. It was brutal.”

Ground Zero

“I was so grateful to have my younger sister with me,” Powers says. “She was about 10 years ahead of me in her recovery journey, and we kept each other as sane as we possibly could. Regardless, venturing back out into the world became very traumatic for me. Nobody said the right thing, but to be fair, nobody knows what the right thing to say is. When my parents both passed, that was hard enough, but this was a tragedy.”

“I remember going to a local store, and the woman working there was in recovery. She said, ‘Oh, you must be so relieved you finally found her.’ That was not what I was feeling. Each time I ventured out, I was met with people who meant well, and I knew that, but I just couldn’t do it.” 

“Thankfully, I had a dear friend who told me about a recovery meeting. She said, ‘It is in a barn, there are people there who will understand, I think you should come with me.’ The meeting was facilitated by JPH, back before the organization had nonprofit status.” 

First Steps

“My sister’s memorial service was in February of 2022. I went to my first meeting in the JPH Organization barn in the spring of that year. All I could do was say my name and cry. Through that, I met Diana Scolponeti, who is the Executive Director of JPH. She told me about her brother, who jumped off the Tobin Bridge in 2006. He was a diagnosed schizophrenic and was in and out of treatment centers but had nowhere to go and no support besides his home when he wasn’t in treatment.” 

“Diana was further along in her healing journey, and within the first few months of going to that group, I met four other women who had lost a loved one to suicide. When I thought there was nobody out there who would get it, I found people who understood. So, I kept going – I kept showing up. In the beginning, there were just men’s and women's recovery meetings. But we gradually started adding more programs.”

A Place for Healing

“The JPH grounds are nine acres,” Powers continues. “The main structure was a dairy barn in the 1800s. It is still intact, but there was a lot of facility work to be done to get it up to code. I kept showing up and helping, cleaning, doing all the things that needed to be done because I could go there and be however I was and be met with love and space. I could breathe when I was there. The property is on a marsh, and on a clear day, you can see out to the ocean.”

“The grounds have profound healing qualities. You can feel it when you are on the property, in the space, and in the barn. People who get it know what it is. Other people say things like, ‘I don’t know what it is, but when I walk in here I feel like I can breathe.’ Grown men will walk into the barn and just start sobbing. They will say, ‘I don’t know why I am crying,’ but we do. The land lends itself to healing.”

“After I started going to the JPH property, I simply kept going back, and I was fortunate enough not to have to work. It felt like I found my purpose, like I was drawn there, and I was supposed to be there. I am a teacher by trade, I have a master’s degree in education, and since then, I have become a Reiki master. Katie James Sheerin, who is the Director of Events and Programs, along with Diana, encouraged me to pursue Reiki. It is a healing modality that I never knew I would have been drawn to.” 

Pain Into Power

“I talk about my grief and loss a lot,” Powers explains, “Because when I do, it might help someone else. Since I have been with JPH, I have had several people who are volunteers or visitors to the center lose loved ones – some to suicide and others to sudden death. Because I am further along in my healing journey, they know it is safe to talk to me. They see me thriving and not curled up in a ball. They see the same hope I saw in Diana when I met her and some of the other women.”

“Anything you suffer through or go through, you can do two things with it: you can wallow in it, or you can turn it into a superpower. By doing that, you are helping others, you are still healing yourself, and you are showing people that they don’t have to stay stuck. There is a big world out there, and there is so much more. I just turned 60, and to think I am working harder than I have in a long time blows me away. But I wouldn’t want to be doing anything else.”

“Through JPH, I have found a gift in grief,” Powers concludes. “It sounds like two wrong words to put together, but honestly, I have a whole new circle of women, and some men, whom I call my family, who are here for me, who support me, and who listen to me. We hold each other up, and that is a gift. Carroll’s passing was a gift that led me to this opportunity to grow, heal, and change, and then turn around and help others.”

In Part Two, Mary Powers dives deeper into the JPH programs, her practice of Reiki, the meaning behind the organization’s name, her recovery journey, and much more. Please stay tuned to the July 2026 issue of VOICES for the rest of the story…