Honoring The Ones We Lost: A Memorial Day Special
Welcome to a special Memorial Day episode of the Battle Buddy Podcast, and our 100th episode! In this episode, we have a very special guest, Edward Murphy, a Gold Star father who shares with us his personal story of loss and how he and his family turned their tragedy into a foundation that provides legal services to military and veteran families in need.
Edward's son, Nick Murphy, was a dedicated Navy serviceman who dreamed of becoming a Navy SEAL. Tragically, Nick passed away after being struck by a car one night. Ed shares with us the challenges that come with losing a child, especially one who is serving our country, and how he and his family coped with their grief.
In honor of Nick, the Murphy family founded the Nicholas J Murphy Foundation, which provides free or low-cost legal services for divorce or custody cases to military and veteran clients in need. Edward shares with us how the foundation has helped countless families navigate the legal system during difficult times, and how they have donated almost $1,000,000 in assistance to date.
As we remember and honor our fallen heroes this Memorial Day, this episode is a must-listen for anyone who wants to learn more about the struggles that military and veteran families face, and how we can support them during difficult times. Tune in now to hear from Ed Murphy and learn more about the Nicholas J Murphy Foundation and their mission to help those who have served our country.
May we never forget those who gave everything for our country.
In This Episode We Cover:
Nick's Story
"The Man In The Arena"
How the family continues to be brave like Nick every day.
Ed's advice to anyone going through loss
What the foundation is up to now and what they are committed too in the future
How and who they are helping with the foundation
Battle Buddy Podcast Guest Links:
Transcript from Episode 100 with Ed Murphy:
Keith McKeever 0:01
Welcome back to another episode of the battle buddy podcast. This is the 100th episode of the battle buddy podcast, I couldn't be more excited to have hit this huge milestone in the podcast 100 episodes, it also happens to fall in some weird chance to fall, the the week before Memorial Day of 2023. And my guest today is, is the father of a service member who, who unfortunately tragically lost his life while serving in the military. He was in the Navy, we'll get into his story. But it's very inspiring story of how the family took this tragic loss and has turned it into something to honor their son and to give back to the military and veteran community in some really, really amazing ways. They have done some some truly incredible things in his honor. I very inspired by what they've done in his name. This is very much in my backyard. My guest today is right here in the local area. And so I'm very honored to have him on the show. So we're gonna dive right into it. Welcome to the battle buddy podcast with Keith McKeever. Welcome to the show, Edie? How you doing, Keith? I'm great. I'm glad to have you on here. Great. So go ahead and tell us a little bit about your backstory. Well,
Ed Murphy 1:25
as you can see, my name is Ed Murphy and my son, Nick Murphy. He was in the Navy and was killed back in November of right before Thanksgiving in 2016. And so I basically I'm the father of four children, and he was my third son. And I'm a divorce lawyer, and we do family law issues. So basically, Nick got out of high school. And he's got two older brothers that are both lawyers and a younger sister. And so he chose a different path. He wanted to help people. And so he, he basically came to us in high school and said, You know, I really don't want to be a lawyer, like all my older brothers are gonna be and maybe my sister, and my ex wife now is a lawyer as well. We met in law school 36 years ago. But so anyway, he just loved everything about the Navy and wanted to be a Navy Seal, basically. So, so Nick came to us and said, You know, I want to try it. And so we sent him after his sophomore year, we sent him out to Virginia to a camp called extreme seal experience. And it's put on by some former seals, and it's basically a two week summer camp, where they're jumping out of helicopters, and shooting guns all over the place, and rappelling down buildings and kind of having, you know, a fun kind of junior seal experience. And so I thought, you know, we thought maybe that would either get him to say, okay, that's really fun, but it's not what I want to do for a career or he's gonna come back and be all in. And he came back and was all in and from that point forward, we, you know, it was it was basically he wanted to go in so. So, you know, at that point, he's 1415 years old, almost 16. And, and next couple of years, he basically was still didn't change his mind much. So we finally got on board basically saying, Okay, if he's going to be a seal, or trying to be a seal, it's still gonna be one in a million shot, he's gonna make it, you know, it's kind of like being a pro baseball player,
Keith McKeever 3:23
it's really a little tough to get to get to,
Ed Murphy 3:26
especially at 18, you know, right out of high school, you know, you look at those statistics, and it's tough doing it your first time through when you're 18. But he read everything, he was a very good athlete, and, and they and very smart, smart, did great on the ASVAB tests and everything. So he could have done whatever he wanted, basically, in the Navy. But he was guaranteed to have a seal contract if he goes in and listed versus going in as an officer, you know, after four years of college. So he ultimately convinced me and my wife that, you know, this is the time to do it. So we were all in with him. So he got out of high school. And he had about I guess about eight months before he went in, went in in January of 2016. And so over that eight months, him and I were training and he had a local local guide, teaching him all the swim strokes and all the good stuff, you know, for the SEAL training, went up to Great Lakes and did great and then got a great lakes for the next couple months. They did all the pre sale training. And then he went out to Coronado to try and be a seal. And kind of the cool thing about it. Keith was two of the guys in his class actually went to the SEAL training when they were sophomores in high school on Virginia. One guy was from Florida and one guy was from out and out east and they literally ended up being in their same class trying to be a seal. They all do the same thing. Wow. So that's coincidence. That's pretty unusual. So anyway, so he went out there and he made it through the first two weeks and everything was going great right before all week. And then he cut his foot. And he went from billing great to barely been able to run. And so literally the Friday before Hell Week, hell week starts on Sunday and, and he ended up you know, almost drowning trying to swim and getting dunked and everything and after a couple days where he was in pain and couldn't do it anymore, he basically, he told me, he goes, I touch the side of the wall. And then you know, you can't touch the wall or touch anybody else when you're swinging another trying to drown him in that training. And he says, I just was drowned and I couldn't do it. And I grabbed the wall, and I was done. And he goes, the minute I did it, 10 seconds later, I'm on the sidelines saying what the hell they just do. And he regretted you know, doing it. So, so he came home and he had about 10 days with us at home. And then they shipped him off to Pensacola. So he went to IT training for you know, for the his class because he, he wanted to do it again. But he had to wait a year or a year and a half to go back in. So one of the cool stories, my son was not a huge guy, he was only about five, seven and 150 pounds. And so over the two weeks of SEAL training, he went he lost 11 pounds. That's how crazy you know, the SEAL training stuff is? Yeah, the he went got down, he weighed 139 pounds when he dropped. And he came home for those 10 days and he looks beat up and skinny. And you know, he was he was depressed.
Keith McKeever 6:25
I mean a five seven in that way that's pretty small. Yeah.
Ed Murphy 6:29
And he was ripped and in shape and stuff, but still. So anyway comes home and he wants to get a tattoo never had a tattoo, or a bunch of bald guys and kind of conservative. So we're like, no long hair, no earrings, no tattoo was kind of our family motto. He goes, alright, I need to get a tattoo because I'm going back. So he searched a bunch of tattoo things and he came up with be the man in the arena is speech, you know, from 1908 about, you know, being in the fight and failing basically is better than to never have been in the fight at all. So that's where be the man in the arena, which we'll talk about more later came in as he was going to put that as a tattoo on his arm, but it ends up being kind of a long speech. So he didn't get it done. Right that. So he headed out to Pensacola for a few months did great. And by fluke accident, you know, he ended up he was on a Friday night, they were off base and he's having a couple beers with his buddies, and they're all young 19 year olds, you know, 1819 year old kids at that point. And they're walking across the street, and there's three of them, and he's in the middle. And a car comes around the corner going 50 miles an hour, and they car doesn't see the three of them and he doesn't see them. So the last seconds the car, he the woman in front of them was also a sailor, he pushes her out of the way and saves her life. And then the guy behind them was about five feet behind them. So the car missed him. He's the one that told us what happened basically, because it happened right in front of him. But my son got hit right in the middle of the car. And you know, ended up being brain dead and and had a traumatic brain injury, which caused him to be, you know, brain dead. So, so he saved the other sailors life. And then he you know, he was dead, but it took a few hours. So we got the call a little bit later that night. It was about 12:05am on a Friday night. And so we flew down there and so I got to see him and then he did organ donation. So one of the cool things, you know, yay, to have your son get killed, obviously. But the woman that he saved ended up being a friend of ours now and we still know her in contact with her and she recovered Foley, his heart recipient is down in Florida. And he's became a good friend of our family. And he works in the nonprofit world. And he was a he's like a 50 year old guy at the time, literally on his deathbed. And now he's six and a half years later, going great. And his double lung transplant was a woman who had who was 49 years old who had cystic fibrosis and literally was going to die the next day. So when she got his two lungs, I mean it was a new lease on life for her. And she's we haven't met her in person, but we are Facebook friends with her and so we're in contact with her and she's doing fabulous. So So you know, despite the fact he was killed, you know, there's been some positive stuff come from it where he saved, you know, the female sailors life. Our name is Breanna and then he saved he's a five other people. We only know two of the five reached out to us, you know, to get a hold of us. But that's been you know, I feel like at least when a bad thing happens, at least you feel like there's been something good come from it, you know, with the organ donation in that part.
Keith McKeever 9:47
Absolutely. I'm sure I mean, I can't imagine how needing a double lung transplant and literally facing death the next day, you know that the finality of that knowing that your death is coming the next day and the emotions that can come around of like, hey, unfortunately, somebody has passed away and you're going to get their lungs. I cannot even fathom the idea of the roller coaster of emotions going through that.
Ed Murphy 10:15
Well, you know, the interesting thing, we're sitting down in Pensacola that morning, and we had said goodbye to him that night before and, and we, you know, so we got a phone call on Monday morning that, like at 8am and, and they said that the transplants had all been taken place. And so it was all officially done. And I literally a weirdest thing to me, I remember I was with my, his older brother, and we were going out to get coffee and, and I looked up at the sky, and I said, Okay, it's the weirdest thing that right now there's five people sitting here this morning, where their families are sitting around their loved one, thanking God for the gift of life, and our families destroyed from that tragedy, you know, looking up saying, you know, why did this all happen? And you know, it's a terrible tragedy, obviously. But, you know, it is it's pretty crazy. And, but it is what it is. The only other thing I'll tell you just, you know, kind of interesting for me, as a dad, you know, you never, you know, it's hard gone when you get that phone calls a parent, but when I talked about him losing 11 pounds, so when I had seen him a couple times, I went down to Pensacola in September in October, and so I'd seen him once a month, basically. So when we fly down at Thanksgiving to see him after he gets killed. So I see him in the hospital room, and he's on a ventilator, he's brain dead, but his body is still alive. And, you know, he looks just beat up a little bit from the car wreck. But he, but anyway, he weighed 167 pounds, though, so he had literally gained 30 pounds of muscle between July and November because he was working out and he was getting ready to go back in and try again. And so to me, the lat one of my last memory of CNM physically laying there in the hospital bed as he's, you know, a big guy ripped and ready to go back into, you know, try and be a seal again. And so now I'm really glad I have that opportunity to see him versus you know, a lot of parents don't have the opportunity when someone's killed away from home. It was it was a blessing in disguise for me to be able to say goodbye to him and see him physically and touch him and hold him with his body was still warm and stuff like that. So kind of weird stuff like that you don't think is important, but it is when bad things happen. Sure,
Keith McKeever 12:34
and to see that he's, you know, put on the muscle and he had been working, you know, after that injury and a setback from the SEAL training, I'm sure that was devastating for him to I mean, I can't imagine all that years and years of wanting to be a sealed, to just cut your foot and not be able to swim and to fail out of it and look at like, Man, I gotta wait a year, year and a half and four, I get back into it, you know, and all that training, but for him to, I'm sure he was probably working out like a maniac trying to trying to get right back to prove himself.
Ed Murphy 13:07
Yeah, and the two guys that he went in with both of them failed out the first time too, because that's usually when you're 1819 first time through, your chances are really low. So one of the guys ended up getting out of the Navy after his, you know, four year stint. The other one though, went did go back, just like Nick was going to do, he went back and tried to be a seal the second time and he made it. So he's actually on one of the SEAL teams today. And his dad sent me a picture of him, you know, after he made it as a seal. And so I've got a picture of him, you know, in all his seal garb and looking pretty badass, you know, so it's kind of cool to see that he actually made it and, and one of Nick's good friends, you know, was able to get through it. So that was kind of neat, too
Keith McKeever 13:51
good for him. Good for him, definitely makes a lot of sense that he a lot of 18 and 19 year olds aren't going to get through it. You know, I've taught I've had a couple of seals here on the show. And seals are a different breed. You know, there's obviously there's a physical aspect to it, but a lot of its mental. And I think, you know, in most cases 18 and 19 year olds may not have the mental strength, necessarily resiliency and strength built up to not not not in all cases, but I mean, I know at 18 or 19 I would not have made it that far. Then again, 99% of us at any age would
Ed Murphy 14:33
have like 670 guys start and you know, 20 make it it's kind of crazy each class,
Keith McKeever 14:38
but I mean then again, you know, the whole drowning simulator thing and you know, you lost me right there. I mean, you know, I wouldn't I wouldn't even sign up for that in the first place. So yeah, it was in the Air Force and, you know, that I didn't want him doesn't do with water floating on tin cans. And anyway, so you mentioned the Man in the Arena. And so that was Teddy Roosevelt quote, and it's it goes, it is not the critic who counts not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by the dust and sweat of the blood Who strives valiantly, who airs, who comes up short again and again. Because there is no effort without error and shortcoming. But who actually does strive to do the deeds, who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best, who at the best knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who had the worst if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with the cold, timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat, which I think is great, by the way, Teddy Roosevelt's like, my favorite president. Badass dude. But I think that's a great quote. And you're totally right, that wouldn't fit on an arm very well on a tattoo.
Ed Murphy 16:00
Yeah, it's tough. Now we have like, you can't see it real good here. But like that, we have wristbands that basically, we had, because we started a foundation afterwards, but basically, that just says on it, Nicholas J. Murphy foundation, but then it has to be the Man in the Arena has been, you know, the phrase for us and, and basically, we interpreted the same way that you know, go to go do your best, it doesn't matter if you fail. But you got to get in the rain, you got to go try. And it's better having tried and failed and never having tried at all. And so that's kind of been our motto with our son's foundation that we started right after he was killed. So So basically, what happened on that Keith is, you know, we're down in Pensacola and obviously, we're devastated. And I think every parent that I've talked to, that has lost a family member, and specifically their kids, or it could be a sibling, you know, their first thought is, and mine was to was like, Oh, my God, Nick's gonna be forgotten. You know, it's just a weird, overwhelming feeling that, you know, no one's going to remember my 19 and a half year old son. And so I sat around, and we were like, you know, what can we do, and because we own our own law firm, and we do family law, and, and there's a lot of veterans that we would represented, you know, and a lot of issues with custody cases and child support cases, just everyday things. And so we're like, you know, one of the things we can do is start a foundation, and we can help veterans and members in the military and active duty members, and we can do family law services farm. So basically, that's what we did right after we got back to Illinois, we started a foundation in end of 2016, and got it up and running within a matter of a couple of months. And so we started through our law firm, we started doing legal services for veterans and for active duty military members. So that's kind of morphed, I don't know, you know, you're supposed to as a lawyer, do pro bono cases, you know, one case a year and help somebody out. And most lawyers do a little bit, but not too much, you know, and so, so in the last six and a half years, though, we've we've through our foundation, we've opened up 222 cases, we've done over 10,000 hours of work for free, and we've done almost we've done $961,000 worth of free legal services. So some point in the next year, we will pass the $1 million mark of work that we provided. And so we're real proud of that, you know, we're most of it now is not totally free, we'll get guys that are working, you know, and have jobs and things like that. So we give basically every military veteran now at least a 20% discount off their bill. And then if if they really can't pay, and they're really suffering, then you know, I do the whole case for free. We look at each case individually, but But it's been amazing. And all six that we have six lawyers, all six of our lawyers participate. All the paralegals participate in the cases. And it's, it's it's been very satisfying for us to, you know, be able to give back and honor Nick, but also honor, you know, give back to veterans for their service and sacrifice too. Because one thing we have come to know is it is, you know, I didn't have anybody in the military before NEC and you don't really realize the sacrifice that the whole family makes, you know, when you have a family member joining the military, it's it's a huge commitment.
Keith McKeever 19:26
Absolutely. And I was I was just kind of blown away when I saw those stats on your website to us, like wow, you know, almost a million dollars over that time period. So that's incredible. And yeah, I mean, the military members are sometimes going through a lot of things themselves, physical issues, mental health issues, the accent deployments and the family issues but in their own right, you know, going through a divorce or custody issue, that's that's difficult what you do in that kind of work. I mean, you kind of set it before we started. Doing your kind of line of work is for kind of As young attorneys to kind of do that kind of stuff, it's you don't hear of those cases normally being nice, easy, on argumentative type, that type of cases, they're usually seem to be pretty confrontational and aggressive, it kind of seems like, but, you know, those people are going through a lot themselves in their own little ways, you know, personally, financially, those kinds of things. So, you know, 20% off, or, you know, maybe more than that, less than that, whatever every little bit helps, you know, to those fit to the family members to ease some of that burden. So that's great.
Ed Murphy 20:37
It's rough, you know, we've learned a lot over the last seven years to have of just, I didn't I mean, I will tell you, you know, I, I'm one of those believers, my kids were all athletes, and I was, I played sports in college. And, and so we're used to that competition. And you know, and being trying to be a seal, obviously want to be the best you can be, and as a competition to meet that and exceed that goal. The thing that I found crazy now that we've done these cases is, you know, I never realized how much PTSD was so prevalent, literally, and most veterans, at least, that we've dealt with, you know, it may be small amounts, it may be large amounts, but in our, we see that so much, because if we have a custody case, you know, involving children, you know, you'll see that come up where the spouse will say, hey, look, this, he's got issues, or she's got issues and, and so they shouldn't, you know, should have restricted parenting time or things. So it's comes up all the time, basically, or if we're doing a child support case, you'll see you know, somebody where they can't keep a job because they have, you know, PTSD, and they're struggling just to get through the day, let alone be able to show up for work every day and stuff. So, it it's been eye opening for me personally, to see what people go through. And I mean, it makes sense. I like when I talk to the guys we represent, you know, to me, I can't imagine you sitting in Afghanistan on one day, and your buddy next to you is getting killed, and you're getting shot at. And then two days later, you're back sitting at home, you know, like life is normal. I mean, it's not, it's just crazy. And the, you know, just having to be able to do that is it's amazing that anybody walks out of the military that's been, you know, seen combat or been overseas. It's pretty crazy what they go through, obviously,
Keith McKeever 22:27
yeah, one thing kind of hit me kind of recently, when I was really thinking about it, because I think probably most of us have PTSD. Alright, few years ago, kind of had to come to terms myself with with mine, and like how I suffer, because I kind of had blinders on that I even had it. But it is weird, you know, the military, you know, we need a military, for obvious reasons. Our military needs to be mission focused, it needs to be different than the way the civilian world operates. So people have, you know, we have to go to boot camp, we have to go to tech schools, and it and in a schools and all that stuff. So the system has to be different. But everybody has to come out of their system and come back into the real world. But the longer you're in that system that's different, the more you come back into this real world, and everybody's different, because you're only one of like, I think the total population of veterans right now, you're like five or 6% of the entire population. And so no matter where you go, you're one of, you know, 5% or less of the people walking around, and you have all these experiences in his different world that you've lived in for a part of your life, that's totally different than everybody else. And you just never quite feel like it completely connected back into it. You know, and then you complicate it with, you know, if you did deploy, you did see combat, or you did have those other situations, it just, you know, complicates it even more than that. And it just never really feels like it all the way connects back in like, you know, maybe over time, some things do, but it's a
Ed Murphy 23:59
lot. It's tough to world's a crazy place to I think young people, I don't know, at least I'm older. I'm 61 now. And so I just feel like back when I was younger, people in the military had a lot more respect as like police officers and first responders. And I think there's just a lack of respect for authority period. And there's not as many people joining the military doesn't feel like you know, and so I do think when you say it's a small percentage of the population, I think that other 95% has a tough time understanding what you've been through, you know, and, and they take it for granted, or they don't like it, you know, that's the hard part to me. I I feel like you know, Vietnam was before my time even because I was born in 1962. But, you know, I look at those old movies and you look at those times where people came back from Vietnam and they were not liked or, you know, being treated poorly. I feel like we've kind of came full circle a little it's not as bad as that probably, but it's still not a positive necessarily why I like him, you know, After World War Two, you came back as a hero, and everybody respected military members and veterans. And now, you know, it's just a crazy world. I mean, being a cop being a first responder, being a veteran, it just doesn't have the same respect. I mean, anybody, it's just, it's a crazy world right now. So we're all trying to survive it.
Keith McKeever 25:21
Exactly. I think there's some some factors there with social media and video. And, thankfully, mental health awareness is is much higher now than what it was. So I think people out there realize that if these are tough jobs, and you're going to be exposed to things, you're gonna deal with things. And just well, like through this podcast, and other podcasters, we talk about these things. Whereas generations past, we all know how the Vietnam veterans are treated when they came home, but there wasn't a medium for people to talk about their experiences, really. Now a lot of veterans are speaking out saying, Hey, I love my time in the military. But look how the VA treats look at, hey, we need legislation for we need rights for this, we need rights for that, whatever. And a lot of people in the, you know, in the population look at it and be like, that's how you really treated. You know, this is the benefits that you get, or you don't get and like, why would I want my kids to join the military? Why, you know, why would I want to join the military? If I'm leaving high school right now, you know, and then you get some kids? Like, I mean, if I had to do it all over again, I probably would. I think you you get so much by joining, but you also, you know, I look back at it, like, you're gonna get your bumps and bruises. And you're gonna live with a lifetime of some pain and some things, but at the end of day, some of it's worth it. But, you know, can't blame for some kids for looking at it saying, why would I want to sign up for all those long term things and not being taken care of?
Ed Murphy 26:51
Right. So until I get to Keith, one of the things I was thinking about, you know, as far as veterans benefits and things that are out there that like I never even knew until the last year, I just joined our goodwill board, and Goodwill's you know, an international organization. But I had no idea I, you know, to me, I always thought a goodwill, you know, you don't know your clothes. So you can get rid of some clothes, you don't have to, you know, you take them over there and donate them. But now that I've been on the board, I mean, a lot of the goodwill stuff is, you know, nationally, and internationally and locally. There, it's geared toward veteran training. And there's a ton of veteran stuff available for free through the goodwill organization too. So I that's one of the reasons they asked me to be on their board was because of MCs foundation and what we're doing for veterans, and it's been an eye opening experience about what they do from, you know, basic computer training for IT training and getting people ready for a job could be as simple as learn how to write a resume, you know, because guys have been applied for a job before because they've been in the military and the need to, you know, but there's a lot of stuff out there that you just don't even know about. And I think that's where, you know, guys listen to this podcast, like our foundation, you know, if you weren't here locally, you know, we've had, you know, you gotta get the name out, and you got to get people knowing that you're even there. I still have people all the time, call us just because they were gonna hire us as a divorce attorney, period. But then they find out oh, you're doing that for veterans. I didn't know that. And so it is hard to get the word out that, you know, services are being provided. And there are a lot of free services out there. So it's pretty nice.
Keith McKeever 28:29
Ya know, they do a great job. I've actually talked to our local Goodwill a couple times. And even I was amazed at some of the services, the hiring events and what they do for the homeless population and bringing people in it's, it's for the homeless vets. It's amazing. It's one of those like, hidden kind of things like you don't really know about it unless you know about it. But then when you find out, you're like, wow, there's a lot going on here. So
Ed Murphy 28:55
we actually have a local we're one of the few in Peoria that we have a veteran's home that's actually ran by goodwill, and it's, you know, a permanent residence for 16 veterans and, and it's, it's a pretty neat facility. And you know, really, really been good.
Keith McKeever 29:11
Now, I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, I believe that's like one of the only ones in the country isn't.
Ed Murphy 29:16
It may be the only one I know. And but it's it's been a very big success.
Keith McKeever 29:22
Yeah, that's pretty neat. So a couple other things I saw on your website that I wanted to get your your point on is you had three words on there. And I think it really kind of sums up a lot of these things really good. First one was bravery. So how do you and your family carry on Nick's legacy and bravery every day and what you do?
Ed Murphy 29:45
Well, I would say, you know, and we'll go through all the words that are on there. I I just felt like when Nick joined and you know, the bravery, the sacrifice, the commitment and those things. Those words just got me at what a big deal. otherwise, you know, you'll look at, then we'll talk more about sacrifice and stuff too. But, you know, I didn't realize what a sacrifice it was to join the military, not just on him but on our family. The bravery part, to me just don't realize, again, I mean, I don't even know 99% of what happened with Nick going through boot camp, going through the SEAL training, because he can't talk about obviously, the SEAL training stuff. But, but when when I did listen to what he was talking about, and you just see the the commitment and sacrifice and how brave all these guys are, I don't care if you're trying to be a seal, or you're just joining, you know, the military and one of the branches of the armed forces. I think there's a huge amount of bravery, I don't care whether you're doing it work, or you're literally overseas, you know, in the middle of the mix, I think it's just, it's something that you don't really appreciate, you know. And so we're just proud that Nick was able to do it, I think that we just really want to honor him and just get back to the guys. And that's really our goal.
Keith McKeever 31:04
So for sacrifice, you know, your family, just like any other goals that our family has, obviously made a huge sacrifice. So how do you keep moving forward? And what advice would you give to somebody else if they were going through something, going through this as well,
Ed Murphy 31:21
from a family standpoint, like us or from ourselves
Keith McKeever 31:25
from it from a family standpoint? And you know, if somebody has just lost somebody, or they're going through, they're struggling? What advice would you have for them?
Ed Murphy 31:31
Well, I will tell you, it time does help. There's no question that I am a lot healthier now, six and a half years later. I think just to give you a kind of a timeline, I remember the first couple of years, that first year, you're just going 100 miles an hour. Because you know, you don't realize how much you're grieving. And it's just you're in survival mode just to survive, you know, losing your son or your sibling or your parents. It's rough. And I read every book under the sun about losing a child and, and they were all pretty depressing, honestly, because they were all about how they couldn't function. And, and I came back to work, I to me, this foundation that we started was a was a blessing for me, because it gave me a reason it gave me a reason to get up in the morning and do the family law and come to work because I was honoring Nick. So I would say get, you know, figuring out what you want to do. I mean, it's not unusual to start a foundation, if you've lost a child, you know, and whether that foundation does whatever we I would say choose something that you can help. You know, like, we chose family law, because that's what our business was, it was just something easy. We could say, okay, what are we good at? How can we get back in what we know, instead of trying to create something different. So that was big to us was doing something we know. I will say as time has gone on, though, life does go on. And I would tell parents, for example, you know, like my, a couple of years ago, and about the five year mark, my Nick's older brother Ali got out of law school and joined our firm. And every person that would walk in and hire us, I would tell him Nick's story and, and it would get me physically upset. You know, I shed a few tears, even with clients, you know, talking about Nick, it wasn't that easy. Like today, I can talk about it a lot stronger. But I remember my son came to me and he was joining us and he said, you know, Dad, because we had Nick's picture posted all over the place and the foundation logo here and the law office. And he said, You know, I want us to help veterans but he goes, I can't walk in the office door every single day and look at Nick's picture. He goes, it's just too much in my face. And it reminds me every single day that I lost my brother, and I can't stand watching you start crying, you know, in the office and I'll get all teary eyed talking about it, probably but he said, You know, I don't think it's healthy for you to talk to tell every veteran that walks in the door. Oh, do you know why we're doing this? Because we lost our son and brother and you know, tell him what Nick's whole story. He said we can do all the work. But he goes the one comment he made sometimes he said you know, I just it's not like Nick's coming back he's not and at some point we have to look forward instead of backwards. And so we made a change about the five year mark and we said okay, we're gonna do all the work, but it's not going to be in our face as much and so like when we help a veteran now we don't I don't go into the whole story about how we lost Nick and what happened. We just tell them hey, we got you know, I might mention that we have next foundation look it up and you can see you know what we're doing and why to honor Him and to honor them. But I don't go into the whole story and get all teary eyed and rehash that every day. The other thing is I I just think life goes on. You know. A lot of negative stuff happens. You know, I read a statistic when I first NIC first died about 82% of you know families couples get divorced within five years, if you lose a child, and I was married 32 years and had a strong family and a strong faith, we're Catholic and, and we raised our kids in through the church and, and I remember I ended up getting divorced, like two months before the five year anniversary. But about six months earlier, it went fast. And my ex wife and I are very amicable and it was as good a divorce as possible, especially considering the doors attorney but but I remember thinking, Oh, we made it four and a half years, we're gonna make this five year mark, and then boom, it didn't work. And so, so you know, it's, it's one of those things. But even with that, even with Nick Dion and getting divorced, my other three kids, I've had to go through both of those things, you know, the same as I have in my ex wife. But there's still a reason to get up every day and be positive, you know, we're all very blessed. And I think that's the best thing I can say is, you just gotta find a reason to get up. And you know, whether it's honoring your child or your sibling through doing something for them. But it just takes time. And when I got through my divorce the same thing. I think death and divorce are two of the most stressful things, you know, you can go through as a person. And I remember after my divorce, about six months afterwards, somebody had mentioned to go to a class, and there's a national class called, I think it's called divorce care.org. But anyway, it's at a local church, and it's like a 13 week class, and you watch a video and you talk about it in a group setting. And that was the best thing I ever did. Because I thought I was healthy, I thought I got through my divorce all worked great. But then you realize you really haven't grieved that loss, just like you grieve the loss of your child, you're grieving the loss of your marriage, and that's a failure of that relationship. And, and so I think I would tell parents going through a divorce or going through, you know, which is likely they're probably, unfortunately, it's the statistically at personnel are gonna make it. So I just think they have to know there's light at the end of the tunnel, you know, I'm happy as much as can be, despite everything we're functioning while my kids are doing well. You know, it's just, it's just part of life, you know, I don't care if you have $1 to your name, or a million dollars, I don't care if you're a movie star, or average, Joe, every family goes through death, every family goes through divorce. It's just life, you know, and we all just get through it every day. And I think that's, you just got to, you know, do that. And last thing I'll say is this, whether, you know, a lot of people don't believe in God or have a faith based system. And in my case, my ex wife, I joined the Catholic Church when I was 25, when we got married, and she was a lifelong Callie, when Nick died. She turned away from God, kind of blaming God, okay, why did God take our son away? And she was, has been very negative. But it's, you know, she just
Keith McKeever 38:02
doesn't understand why they don't understand understandable reaction. Yeah.
Ed Murphy 38:06
And I went the opposite way. I, I literally, I would have never made it. You know, there are many days I cried myself to sleep and, and I just felt like I woke up and I was like, you know, if I didn't have that faith, I don't think I would have made it through as easily. And I think that's part of the reason I'm pretty positive. And that doesn't mean you know, you have to believe in any specific thing. But I do think when I really think about faith, I think you just can't do everything by yourself. And if I'm a pretty kind of a badass kind of guy thinks I'm hot shit, when it comes to life. And I can, I'm an old school guy, you don't cry, and I can do everything. And I'm a tough guy. And then you realize, you know, you're not so tough after all. And it's okay to ask for help. And whether that's help with God, whether it's help with your friends and your family, you know, you just can't get through this process by yourself. And that's the best advice I can give to parents or people that have lost a loved one, you know, in the military especially, is you just gotta let people help you, because then they will help you and they will be there. But you got to ask sometimes, you know,
Keith McKeever 39:13
I some, that's some great advice. I couldn't agree more with some of that
if my wife watches this, she's gonna she's gonna she's gonna let me let me probably hear it. But she's, she's been telling me for years, you know, like, especially on the spiritual stuff, but she's like, you know, you have to take care of, you know, your physical health and your mental health but your spiritual health. I was not good at taking care of any one of those three. But, you know, I, you know, a few months ago, started trying to make purposeful changes in all three of those categories myself, and it really does help. When you do find whatever that is for you. purposeful effort in that category. Like I don't, you know, whatever, whether it's God or Allah or Buddha or whatever, you know, whatever you're following, like, when you're putting that faith, or you're putting that effort into that spirituality. Like, I think that there's a lot of things there. It's one of those missing elements, like, if it's just not there, it's just not there. And I, you know, for me, I think it was missing. And obviously, it was helpful for you to, to kind of like, double down on that. So
Ed Murphy 40:30
no, we're never gonna know. I mean, my kind of my theory is this, I've always loved the idea of God, and the idea of, of having something else that maybe we're just not, this isn't all there is right? You hope that there's something after this. But who knows, you know, my theory is this, that if I, if I believe that there's a God, and there's a heaven, and I die, and I go there, let's say that happens. I'm ahead of the game, because, you know, that's the turtle life is gonna be great. If I'm wrong, I'm still dead, right? Just like everybody else. So to me, there's no downside to hoping for the best and hoping there. And, and to me, it's always been one of those things where, you know, and I don't have a family, like, my sister's has struggles with that. And, and she, I think a lot of people like view God and education that if you're smart and intelligent, you shouldn't believe in God. And to me, I'm just the opposite. I think, you know, what, if, if I just find it hard to believe we're all sitting here and everything around us is just happened by chance, it just seems awful perfect, to me mathematically perfect. how life is, you know, amazingly crazy, great. It's hard to believe it's just happened, you know, but I could be wrong. Who knows. But I will tell you that, I do think when you're just able to like go to anything else and say, You know what, I need some help from somebody else. There's no downside to it. Because I think especially with all this mental health stuff going on in the world, you think about it, if you try and solve your mental health problems by herself, you're not gonna get anywhere. So whether it's, you know, talking to a therapist, or getting some counseling, or talking to your friends or family, or read the Bible, and having a little faith that somebody's out there looking over foot, you know, out for you. None of it hurts, and you just got to be willing to say, I'm just not strong enough to do it on my own. And that's one of the best things I've learned these last six years is it's okay to rely on others.
Keith McKeever 42:32
Well, we're definitely not built as human beings to do any of this on our own. Right, you know, we're designed to live together in communities, and be together, you know, we're not, we're not designed to be nomadic animals floating around this world by ourselves. Right. So like, we do need each other. And last couple of years definitely haven't been good with us. You know, everybody in our house is not really together. But anyway, we're going down a rabbit hole. And I'm expected to
Ed Murphy 42:59
get a follow up email from your wife about six months from now saying, you know, and when you talk to Keith, he really appreciated what you said, I liked all of it.
Keith McKeever 43:07
Yeah, you know, she, she was kind of pounding that over my head for years. Like you need to get in touch with your spiritual side. And I'm like, you know, and then one of these days, you know, it's like, kind of started doing and I was like, I guess I'm taking your advice.
Ed Murphy 43:23
Crazy things happen. My dad is 85 years old. My mom died a couple years ago. And, and he was not a churchgoer. And you know, and so three weeks ago, literally, he spends winters in Texas, he gets back home. And he says, Hey, I went to church a few times down in Texas, I'm like, really? And I'm like, well go on Sunday, you want to go and so the Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday, last Sunday, he went to church with me, and, and I'm like, you know, it only took me five years. But he's, he's saying, You know what, I want to learn about it. And I want to, I want to find out about it. So the nice thing about is it's never too late. Doesn't matter how old you are.
Keith McKeever 44:02
That's good point. Definitely good point. And you can get committed to it. So that's our last key. So speaking of that, you made it you guys made a commitment, you know, with doing this to helping people and we already kind of talked about the numbers around it, but you know, what kind of commitments do you guys have? You know, going forward? Is there any certain goals you guys have with with the foundation or anything else that you're looking at doing in the future?
Ed Murphy 44:30
Yeah, I think the foundation has kind of morphed into just legal services originally when we started, like, Nick played baseball. And so we raised $75,000. His baseball coach, high school baseball coach, was instrumental and he so we built a press box behind our high school field name, the Nick Murphy Memorial press box at Dunlap, high school, and that's been wonderful. We donated money to the Children's Hospital. We gave a bunch of scholarships, college scholarships and stuff to kids. So That was the first few years because, you know, right after he died, it was pretty easy to raise money because everyone's sympathetic to him dying. And then we had a golf outing every year up until this, there'll be the first year we had six of them. And then, but as time goes on, you know, it is a lot more difficult. I mean, most nonprofit foundations funds, find a niche, it's hard to keep going forever, you know, and, and I think what ours is gonna do, it's like this year, we decided not to have a golf outing, because it ends up being the same people. And it's more like a family event, even though it was big, we'd have 140 golfers playing and but it was a lot of work to put on. And we really don't need the money to raise any money. So we're doing volunteer services now for the legal services. So I think that's where it's gonna go here in the future. My oldest son grant Murphy was the president for the last few years. But he ended up taking a job up in Chicago at the Pat Tillman Foundation. And so he, so he left about six months ago to do that. So that's kind of changed, where we're going to now I'm back being president, it's a part time thing, you know, where we just do legal work, basically, there's not much really going on. So I think that's where it's gonna end up is, we'll keep doing the legal work indefinitely and provide services to the veterans and it won't have anything to do with money, it'll have to do with literally just us making a commitment to honor these veterans and, you know, keep the legacy alive. And it'll be mostly, it's one of those things where it's a labor of love that we just liked doing it. And we think it's worth doing to help the veterans out and honor their service.
Keith McKeever 46:35
Awesome. Well, it's an amazing thing you guys do. And I know, being from this area, you know, you guys are one of the one of the veteran focused nonprofits that I, you know, immediately think of the did some amazing work here in the area. There's quite a few. But, you know, it makes me proud to be a veteran from this area, when I look out there across the landscape and be like, there's a lot of great organizations that are doing some things I've been involved with the Honor Flight here for years. Freedom, pause. I mean, there's a there's a lot of great organizations here in this area that are doing different things in the veteran space. And it, it always warms my heart. It's like man, you know, if you're a veteran in need, and in one way, shape, or form, there's some great resources here that can get you taken care of with with your house or divorce, legal issues. whatnot, whatnots you know, glowing endorsement, you know, on this podcast is nationwide, but it's a glowing endorsement for the greater Peoria area. Yeah, well, wonderful, caring people here in Peoria will say,
Ed Murphy 47:37
so we appreciate you, you know, inviting us on and being able to tell Nick story a little bit. I mean, that's, you think about one of the comments I've made is, my first thought when Nick died was I just don't want him to be forgotten. And, you know, we're sitting here talking about neck and it's been six and a half years and, and his legacy continues to live on and his sacrifices, you know, continue to live on. So we do appreciate you having us on to just as much as you know, we like telling you our story and being able to get back. It's nice for next, you know, name to get out there and people remembering to so we sure appreciate that.
Keith McKeever 48:10
Absolutely. It was definitely a pleasure to have you on.
Ed Murphy 48:14
All right, great. Well, you have a great rest of your day. Okay, Keith.
Keith McKeever 48:18
Thanks, you too. I'll
Ed Murphy 48:19
Talk to you later.
Keith McKeever 48:21
There you have it, folks. I hope you enjoyed that. Remember, if there's any resources not on my website you think should be on my website. Reach out and let me know website is battle buddy podcast.net. And if you're struggling for any reason, remember the suicide hotline number is 988 Press one, or you can text 838255
