While I'm living with an impending visitor of death, while I'm still alive, I'm going to live.
He looks like a boiler maker who's going to fight no matter what, right? That courage. It's just incredible.
If you don't have your health, it's going to look different. And how are you going to respond to that? That's the question.
What lessons did Tyler leave you guys that still impact you every single day? From South Bend to Evansville and everywhere in between, this is Get In, the show focused on the Hoosier State and the incredible stories happening here today. I'm Nate Spangle, founder of Get Indiana, and I will be your host for today's conversation. Before we get into today's episode, one of our partners, Pence Media Group, has been working to help elevate a few local brands into the national spotlight. Nicole, what have y'all been up to?
We have a lot of cool things going on right now at Pence Media Group, but one of the neatest clients that we've had for a long time is National FFA. And since school's starting up, I thought I'd bring it up. Like, not everybody realized that National FFA, the largest youth leadership organization in the country, is headquartered right here in Indiana. More than a million members, so a million students are a part of National FFA chapters all over the country. A lot of chapters here in Indiana. And you know them because they wear that blue jacket, right? the I was just going to say a million members like the corduroyion the corduroy jacket business has to be good
it it is very good for FFA and I think when people say to me oh our youth have nothing to do and in high school and they're not motivated and they need to be good leaders and they can't look people in the eye say have you checked out national FFA so we've been doing a lot of PR nationally for national FFA for a long time and one of the stories we recently did was with Parents magazine and we talked a lot about how you got to put your kid in something that helps them think on their own, communicate on their own, learn on their own. And so partnering with National FFA is absolutely one of my favorite things we do at PMG.
I love it. And we're getting ready for national convention. It's going to be coming up in October, right?
That's right. And talk about quarter jackets. They're like everywhere.
Oh, they take over downtown. It's great.
They do. And again, it's cool. I mean, it's a big deal that we have that headquartered right here in Indiana and agriculture is booming. So, it's really neat to have it all connected back to the Hoosier State. I love it. Well, hey, keep up the good work and we'll talk soon.
Sounds great.
Now, let's get into the episode. Today, I'm joined by Tony and Kelly Trent, the parents of the late Tyler Trent, a Purdue University student whose courageous battle with osteocaroma inspired millions. Through the Tyler Trent Foundation, they have continued Tyler's mission to raise awareness and funding for pediatric cancer research, honoring his legacy with events like the annual Tea Off for Tyler golf outing, this upcoming concert that they're going to have, and a few other cool things that we're going to talk about later in the show. Their work through the Tyler Trent Foundation has helped raise over $500,000 and continues to make national impact in the fight against cancer with a total of more than $3 million raised in Tyler's honor so far. Uh that that's incredible. I'm excited to dive through the story of oh my gosh from when Tyler was 15 um all the way through his time at Purdue, the Ohio State game that's just iconic and legendary and being on college game day.
This is a really really uh I'm just really excited for this episode and I appreciate you guys coming on and and joining us.
Thanks for having us Nate.
I went to Depal so D3 school. I was on the football team there. U but I've been like a life I always like say in Indiana you either kind of lean towards IU or you lean towards Purdue and I'm one of the guys that no offense to my IU fans out there but I lean more towards Purdue.
Oh good choice.
So yeah exactly right. So I remember uh being a senior in college and seeing and hearing about this story and learning about Tyler and it is just a a truly inspiring story of his courageous battle with osteio saroma is is that a pediatric bone cancer
and then to see the legacy continuing to live on and you know the Tyler Trent Foundation on all the money that's been raised for for cancer research is incredible. Before we talk about the impact that's going on today, I'd love to start with kind of like this first Frisbee toss that set off this chain of events over the last six years.
Tyler had been complaining about his arm hurting. He played a lot of basketball, so we were just kind of thinking maybe he pulled it in basketball or something, but he threw a Frisbee and fell to the ground in pain and it turns out it was broken and the tumor was actually holding it together. But that is essentially how we found out. We went in for, you know, sports medicine clinic at Methodist. And I'll never forget that day when the doctor walked back into the room and he was looking at the X-ray and shaking his head. His back was to us. He was shaking his head and I knew something was wrong and he was like, "See this?" And he circled the tumor. He said, "That shouldn't be there."
What grade was Tyler in at that point? A sophomore. At a at what high school?
Well, he was homeschooled.
Homeschooled. Okay.
He was in a co-op. So,
okay. Got you. So, sophomore in high school, like talking about playing lots of basketball, playing like being pretty active and then obviously like you know this this tumor is holding his broken arm together and and what does the process from like doctor circles this tumor on a X-ray like what is the next months to years look like of this journey for you all? that same day. We're about 10 minutes away from the sports clinic and I was maybe halfway home and the doctor called me personally which also made me realize he looked at it immediately like after they did the MRI and he again I'll
never forget he said Mrs. TR um while I can't be 100% sure I am quite certain your son has he actually said you saroma and it ended up being osteo but he was in the car with me he had a friend with him and I I was speechless like I didn't even know how to respond or what to do and basically just drove home in silence he really never asked
how do you guys as parents like go through that conversation you know like cuz you're learning about this for I'm presuming the first like you're like online, researching, talking to people, then also having this conversation with your 15-year-old son.
That has to be really challenging.
It's one of those things that you never forget where you're at. The thoughts that you have going through your mind. I was driving on 465 and Kelly called me crying and said, "The doctor thinks that Tyler has cancer." And so I drove home right away. You know, Kelly fell into my arms. We're healthy people. We've never been to the children's hospital before. Or we'd never we didn't even know what we didn't even really honestly I didn't even know like kids got cancer.
Oh that's like someone else's family right
it never like I don't know it gets in your like immediate circle like you don't have that experience until you have that experience.
Exact. Exactly. You know today
uh there will be 50 more kids get cancer
today.
Today every day. Every day 50 kids get cancer. And actually I think the number is higher than that. Man,
I mean statistically that doesn't sound like a lot,
but it's a lot if it's your child
for sure.
Oh, yeah. Like I just can't even imagine. How does the dynamic between being the parent and then the doctors talking and having a child like I think that that dynamic of how you're having that conversation cuz I mean everyone that knows the story like Tyler becomes so inspiring and like it's crazy the like um level of
I think I think David Blau says it in one of like he looks like a boiler maker who's going to fight no matter what, right? And I think that that courage
it's just incredible that that came like were there conversations that you all had where he was talking to you and saying like I'm going to beat this thing and you know like how does that dynamic work?
Yeah, I think initially he very much was you know ready for the fight and Tyler always acted older than he was. He was very mature early and in regards to treatment, everything, he was very much a part of the conversation and wanted wanted to know everything. It didn't always stay like that. You know, there was a point where he wanted to take his own life.
Oh man.
Yeah. And I think a lot of it had to do with chemotherapy and what it does to your brain that people don't realize.
Oh my gosh. Yeah. Yeah,
my um so so my mom passed away back in 2017 from cancer and I was kind of like her and I were a unit and I had driven her to all this stuff like all the treatments and I would not wish that on my worst enemy like it is it's like a necessary evil but it is an evil like it is is so hard so I can only
imagine and being a 15 16 year old kid but but how that first bout with cancer goes like it seems to go as well as it could right like he is he like ever technically cancer free or like how's that?
They call it no evidence of disease,
right? But it's it's there, you know, it's there. And there's a thing called chemobrain and Tyler got chemrain. At 15 years old, you have a child who was the leader in his school. Everybody followed him. He was super involved with everything. And you take somebody that um loses their identity. It's kind of like the Jersey Effect, right? I don't know if you've ever read that book. It's called the Jersey Effect. Basically, it talks about NFL players that have their name on the back of their jerseys, but when they retire, they don't have their jerseys anymore. So,
they lose their identity. So, Tyler's identity was rooted in his faith and got chemo brain and uh his friends didn't understand why he was behaving a certain way.
The really the first round was the hard round. I say Kelly and I did better the first round and then he got to ring the bell and and basically committed his his faith and saying, you know, God, if I get this, I I didn't do it well the first time and for some reason I get it again, I'm going to live out my faith the second time.
And so the first time it was harder and and he's probably easier for us. We kind of flipped roles and the second time was easier for him and harder for Kelly and I. And I know where throughout the journey did he know that he wanted to go to Purdue? He
always wanted to go to IU, ironically, initially. Um, and I think he he did it because he bantered with Kelly or with me because
I was an avid Purdue person. I went I went to Purdue.
Like what part of the state?
Indianapolis.
You're from Indianapolis?
I'm from a small town uh up by Deli.
Oh, what small town?
Uh, Flora.
Flora. Carol High School.
Carol High School.
Come on. Cougars.
Yeah. Come on. There we go. That's like kind of my shtick is knowing all the small high school mascots.
We visited IU. We visited NC State and and Clemson and
and a whole bunch of other schools, but uh he he decided against IU and and he got offered a really big-time scholarship at NC State. I think it's important to say in regards to NC State, uh, Jimmy V, you know, was a big NC State guy and
Tyler always used to write on his on his hand every time we were in the hospital, don't give up. Don't ever give up.
So, I think he really changed his direction from IU to NC State and was pretty set on it. And then, yeah,
Tony,
yeah. And then he he got a really substantial scholarship. Even at one time they offered him a $100,000 stipen for why he studied while he studied there. and and then they reached back to him and said uh well we actually I think we've made a mistake and they reduced the uh offer. Purdue didn't have at the time data analytics major and uh he came to us and said I mean he was excited and he said man hey look Purdue has offered this data analytics major now I think I'm going to go to Purdue and so that's how he ended up at
how he ended up at Purdue. So throughout the journey there when he makes his decision to go to Purdue had the second bout with like where did that pop up at?
He graduated his senior year.
So he knows that he's going but I know I remember from the video watching that like going to school on time was like so important to him even to the point where he has like his pelvis replaced.
Yeah. So he had to have a major surgery cuz with osteio saroma you have to get it out. Like if you can't get it out there's no chance. And so they had to restructure his pelvis um and hip bone and put in a cement block just to get they did something temporarily just so he could get to school on time. Then he came back later that fall to have the like permanent surgery. But he he was that serious about getting to school.
Yeah. He was super determined kid. Um, and it was five days, he went to school 5 days after the surgery and he later
How was that as parents? Like dropping off your child that just had a major surgery 5 days later to like like it's already hard to drop a kid off at college like let alone after a major surgery. How are you guys like having those discussions?
Yeah, it was it was not an easy discussion.
Impossible.
Um, but he later told us that it was so painful he could barely do it. But he did it
and we didn't find that out till much later.
Yeah, much later.
But I mean that is like the determination, right? If he put his mind to it, he was going to make it happen.
Yeah, that's who he was. I mean, honestly, he probably gets it honestly because I'm I was a lot like that when I was a kid. My uh other two boys have it as well. So, I don't know if it's genetic or not.
So, so you guys drop him off at college.
Uh but he has to come back at some point and have an even more major surgery. He does
like how did that first year at Purdue and where did he like fully become like entrenched in the boiler maker community?
Even his freshman year right away he got involved with the exponent which is the Purdue newspaper.
Yeah.
And he was following sports in doing that and and that's how he connected with David Blau initially
and like at this point when he steps foot on campus like he's just like a freshman, right? like when cuz somewhere during it he becomes like every Purdue grad like knows who Tyler Trent is but that's a little bit later in the story.
That's his sophomore year.
Okay.
Well, yeah, the camp out was what first got him on the map. He camped out before the first home Purdue football game and nobody camped out for Purdue football. Like it was not a thing.
And so, um the coach caught word of it and came by to meet Tyler and his friend Josh and um it just kind of went from there. Yeah, I think there's an important important detail when you circle back on the exponent deal. So Tyler,
he was also like a journalist and so he actually covered Purdue basketball initially. Uh so he traveled to New York City and covered the Big 10 tournament
and so he kind of got his he started his story started a little bit through the exponent and then started with football.
So he was like having interactions with some of the athletes. Yeah.
And then so it comes full circle. When is the other the second major surgery?
Just right before school.
Like he was sophomore year.
Yeah.
Okay. So, so sophomore year and then he goes back to school.
So, no, that was still his that was his freshman year when he had the second major surgery. It was right before his freshman year.
I got you. Okay, I'm following. Um, but so then he goes back for fall of his sophomore year and yeah, at the time and Purdue was
I'm trying to remember through like how would the team been like they're not like had been crazy good, right?
No, they were terrible.
No. Okay.
No. Yeah. Like Kelly said, no one camped out for them. Yeah.
And it's ironic. It's just like Purdue football needed Tyler and Tyler needed Purdue.
Yeah.
And you know, he needed something to hope for and dream that's that's not cancer.
Where did Where did this idea He's like, "We're going to camp out for this game." Like, where did that come?
Well, he he came home for treatment and he's at the house picking up all his camping stuff and and I'm like, "What are you doing?" And uh he said, "Well, Josh and I are going to camp out." And I'm like, "When are you doing that?" "Well, we're doing that tonight or tomorrow night." Uh, and I'm like, "You just had treatment and you just had surgery on your hip and you're going to lay on a concrete, you know, sidewalk to camp out." And he said, "Yes." And I'm like, "All right."
They wanted to be the first in line to get in the student section, like the first ones in.
Yeah.
I love that. I mean, that is like it's it's like the best kind of crazy. Like when people see that they're like that that kid's crazy, you know, like Okay. So he
and he loves sports. He was definitely a sports guy.
And and it's like anytime you're doing something
uh unique, right? Like or something that's like one of one, it's like, oh, people are going to like look and it's just like shows your excitement for Purdue football. And so coach got word of that. Yes.
And then comes and stops by their camp out.
Yes. Yeah. And then and then the local paper found out about it and came and did an article also. And those the first articles though, is that like is that just like these students are like they don't know anything about like what he's dealing with on the personal front?
And he didn't want people to know. I mean, he had a bald head. So if they ask him, he would tell them, but he would never say, "I have cancer."
Yeah. So he just like So really the whole way that he like kind of started to get some notoriety was through being a super fan for Purdue.
Absolutely.
Yes.
Oh, I see. I did not know that piece of the story.
So, he camps out all night. He and his friend Josh.
He and Josh are the first two in the student section and they're like right dead center. Okay.
And then from there though, it's like, okay, that was a cool weekend thing. Where does the story keep rolling into like the literally being like on on college game day.
He also like he camped out and then he they asked him to be the honorary captain for the Hammerown Cancer game, which is a game they have every year. And then so that was kind of it in regards to football. And then like Tony said after that he started um writing for basketball and the exponent. And during that is when we found out that it had come back on his spine
and it was terminal at that point. So yeah, we found that out in April.
So okay, so this is April of sophomore year.
Yes. 20.
So April of sophomore year, you find out that the the cancer had returned. it's on his spine and that it's terminal. I'm gonna ask the similar question of how do you sit down and have that conversation with your college sophomore
that
whether it's two months or two years or whatever amount of time like
um that this is ultimately going to be the thing that uh that doesn't how do you how do you have that conversation?
It's a hard one.
Yeah. I never forget the fa this look on his face.
Well, and ironically, he had come home from basketball. He'd been out I don't think
he was in New York
and his car was parked at our house and he said, "Mom, I'm going to get in about 1, but I'm going straight back to school and we were hoping he was going to stay overnight so we could talk to him the next day." So, we
So, did you guys like had some had the doctor or someone talked to you all? Then you're like, "Hey, we need to sit down and have a little discussion."
Yeah. And he had no idea. He did not know. um his back had been bothering him, but we initially were told it wasn't that and then it came back that it was. We went up there the next night um that Tuesday night to take him out for dinner and that's when we had to tell him.
Oh man, I just can't even like imagine how how challenging of a conversation that is.
And and truthfully, the doctor told us two weeks to two months. We did not I was not going to tell my son that. Like there was no way I was putting a time limit. you know, I didn't want him to live with that.
Um, which I think has a lot to do also with just his fight, you know, to keep going while he could.
I don't know. I I totally agree. It's clear that he was very courageous and like, you know, such a just again, I go back to like the David Blow like he's going to fight with no matter what he has, right? He's a boiler maker. So you have that conversation like what are the dominoes that that end up like elevating him like I mean national status like fandom way bigger than just Lafayette.
I didn't know this about him but apparently he would sneak up and like late at night and and watch Sports Center and SBP and everything. And we we didn't know that. He knew he knew all those guys. And
somehow he friended Woge um Agent Wajinowski. He's an NBA analyst for ESPN. He's no longer like Tyler did.
Yeah. Woge came to our house and brought him dinner and he was in town for an NBA final or something with the Pacers and
and so Woge kind of spread the story with to ESPN personalities.
How did how did Wo find out about it?
Uh I don't know. He connected online with him somehow. the like explosion of just like all the media, all the pressing starts from
Tyler sneaking up late at night to watch Sports Center
and Woge somehow like whether it's online, they connected.
They connected online somehow and then Woge told everybody at ESPN about his story and hey look, there might be something here and so then we had ESPN Tom Raldi reached out to us and said hey we want to do a game day story about Tyler. We had to think about it. Honestly, there was a lot happening in his life and
because he doesn't end up going back to school junior year.
No, because he passed away during his sophomore year.
He never finished.
So, he he went back for like seven weeks his sophomore year. Like that summer
I I I had the pallet of nurse come help me tell him that
he he couldn't go back to school because he was talking about going back. And I'm sitting here thinking this is impossible. there's no way he can go back. She came to help me tell him and he quoted from a book when breath becomes air about a o doctor who was fighting cancer but still working. And he he said some I don't know the quote exactly but it said something like while I'm living with an impending visitor of death while I'm still alive I'm going to live. And Amy was her name our paladin. We looked at each other and I was like okay what do we need to do to get him back to school? like it just like changed the entire tone of the room and
so we went to great lengths to even get him back to school
and that's where the story really started
and so that's where it started and then to Tony's point by the time we did the ESPN story he was back home and he had announced that he had to go back he had to leave campus because of his health and people it just went gang busters like people reaching out to him and saying things and then everything just started to spiral from there. Oh yeah. And I mean if anyone I will we'll put links to the uh the game day. I think it's like six minutes long.
U it's incredible. Like it is if you just need like a a daily dose of like gratitude and motivation and just like inspiration. Oh my gosh, it's I can I can't wait to dive into the book
cuz I'm excited to get into that. So
I guess I'm I'm kind of like there's so many things I want to tackle now. Um, so as the story goes timelinewise, um, he ends up passing away in January of 2019,
January 1st of 2019 at 20th time. Has just left, I mean, a huge impact on the world, the Boiler Maker community in general. I think there's an award named after him at Purdue.
Yeah, there's a there's three
there's three awards. with all of that and and his process like go and like listen to him speak about this journey. I can only imagine that's in the book as well to the first point where he said if I get a second chance to do this like I'm going to do it differently I suppose like the way that he talks and carries himself throughout all the media stuff that I have seen is is just incredible. Where did you guys see that start to arise and be like, how is our young man so inspiring?
The day that we told him that he had cancer, he was reading in his Bible 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18. And that verse says, uh, rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. And he took that verse to heart and he lived it. He lived it out till as fully as he could live it out.
Yeah.
And that was that was what motivated him
from there. Just like continued to
he just he rejoiced always and he gave thanks in all circumstances. And he wrote a couple of articles that went into the USA Today nationwide and one of them was on Thanksgiving. And I'll tell you if you're ever having a bad day, you should go read that article. He also wrote another article about dreams. It's in the book. It's in the back of the book.
And I literally end every one of my talks um talking to about dreams. Um because you had a 16-year-old that wrote about dreams and how his dreams of life were lost. They got morphed into something different. And today we live in America where we think that everything's going to turn out the way we want it to turn out. And if we just work hard, it'll it'll be okay. And I'm here to tell you that if you don't have your health, it's going to look different.
And how are you going to respond to that? That's the question. He responded in a way that is so abnormal
for adults. And he was a kid. And he challenged us to live in a different way.
Yeah.
He challenged us to be thankful and grateful in all circumstances. And he taught me so much
of how to live my life. We forget uh you know we I tell people that we have to be reminded every day when we turn the TV on that Coke is the real thing
because we continue to see the commercial over and over again. And I think it's good to get a story out there like this to remind people that there's more to life than what we want to accomplish. Maybe it's something that we're doing for someone else. This episode was brought to you by our friends at Greeks Pizza. Greeks has been a great partner of mine. If you remember, Zansville owner Mike Cole broke the world record for fastest marathon with a pizza.
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Order pizza today. I just have to imagine through all the time that you have like you know late nights just sitting there talking and getting to just convers about a 19 20 yearear-old that is going through a harder challenge than
a lot of us will ever face in our entire life and like his resolve and courage and oh my gosh I just like you talk about like
I don't know how many parents out there get to
truly learn that much from their child you know but if we all just just kind of stopped and sat there and like gave that time and you know
and I think I think some of the lesson is that as parents we think that we know best,
right? And our children sometimes know more than we do at at certain parts of their life. For example, I think about if I didn't let him try to be an adult, try to possibly fail. I think we want to fix everything about our kids. And there's so many lessons here to say, look, you know, my kid wanted to compile. Is there anything wrong with that? No, not necessarily. And if he wouldn't have camped out, what the story would have never gotten told.
Like you think $3 million has been raised in his in his name.
Oh, yeah. It's more than that. Yeah. Yeah.
Like millions of dollars.
He's raised three million with Purdue and there's the V Foundation for a while and there's the stuff at IU Riley.
Um and then the stuff that we are doing right now with the golf outing.
Yeah. So millions of dollars have been raised in entire that all started from being like a fanatical Purdue fan and camping out.
Yeah.
Well, and I think too to that point a little bit like because of his attitude and his age, I think it gave him favor with people and they were listening, right? because it's not normal that a 18, 19, 20-year-old would be responding to something like that and talking about it and living his life. And so I think it just gave him favor with people and so people started to reach out and um look into it with all the ESPN people. Well, was there a um a moment when inspiring others kind of like becomes the mission when you when you when he gets to like have this uh this other thing that he gets to do versus just like you know you're living with terminal cancer?
No, I mean I the his response we walk into the stadium for the game, right? And when we walk in, we we've had to escort with police to get there. And uh we walk in and there's these signs all over the stadium that say Tyler Strong. And I walk up to him t and I said, "Tyler, this is all for you." And he would just shake his head in disbelief and say, "I'm so undeserving."
Wow.
And I think part of what attracted people to Tyler was his humility.
He really believed that it was undeserving. And why me? and you will see him lots of pictures of him and one of the pictures that's captured quite often is when he's being pushed on the field uh to go out to flip the coin. That's what they were doing. And he's wearing a a t-shirt that says Ben Strong.
Yeah.
And it was another kid at Purdue that didn't have the same platform that Tyler had and he wanted to honor Ben by wearing his t-shirt and that was who he was.
Yeah,
that's who he was. Man, that is uh that's incredible. When he said, "Was it next weekend Purdue's going to beat Ohio State?"
Like
he had been saying that since the beginning of the season and no one would listen to him.
Everyone's like, "Yeah, sure, buddy." Like what?
And at what point in that game were did everyone start to kind of look at him and be like, "Man, you called this like cuz it ends up being a route. Like it's like 40 to nothing or something like that, right? 40 to 28, I think.
40 to 28.
The moment I walked into that stadium, I knew we were going to win.
You No way.
Yeah. You've
something different.
There was You felt the presence of something different. No way.
And everybody I've talked to about the game had had some of the same feelings. Like there was something magical in the air. It was unescribable. when those Purdue players like David Blau and some of the other ones and coaches and I mean all these personalities like when they kind of like talked about their experiences with your son, were there lessons or just fun memories? I mean I just hearing the way that David speaks about u about Tyler was just so moving for me. Are there other stories of like strong relationships that Tyler was able to build with other players or media personalities or anything like that? Oh yeah, he built lots of relationships with people and we still talk to some of those people today.
I mean, his interview with Scott Vanpelt is probably one of my favorite interviews that he did. We still talked to Tom Raldi um in Woge, too.
Hannah Storm, we just saw Hannah recently. And
that's amazing. And so it's it's really uh inspiring when you talk to those people and say they say to you that was the most I've done a lot of sporting events and that was the most inspirational uh uh game I've ever called in my life and they start to tear up.
We just saw Chris Fowler. Chris Feller told us that he he said that.
I can't even imagine, you know, like all the love and you talk about feeling something special and you talk about like obviously a huge staple in yours and Tyler's uh life was your faith.
It's like seeing that all come to fruition in this in this medium of a football game. Uh
it just goes and shows like I know uh we're this is like a pro sports podcast kind of sports guy, but it just shows like it's so much more than just like putting on pads and throwing a ball around.
Yeah. I mean, and I I would challenge every athlete that has the ability to have a platform.
I would challenge them that that to use that in a way that helps and encourages others because you you don't realize what you're doing for families. And in the book, we talk about just even a smile.
Like our lives were we were in so much pain and we were hurting that I would literally see somebody walking on the street and they would smile at me. And that smile made made me feel better.
Yeah.
And just a smile. You just don't know what how you're impacting others with with your positive actions.
Talk to me about the book. So the upset I I don't think a lot of people know that Tyler Trent had a book.
Yeah, they don't. Um you can go to our foundation website and get it. It's tylerfoundation.com.
Um the book actually uh has won four awards. One of them is like best sports book of all times. um the reader's choice award. It won that. Um and it won a best biography by a young adult. It would have been a New York Times bestseller if we would have or traditionally published the book, but we wanted Tyler to see the cover and to be a part of that before he passed away. And so I self-published it. We've donated $30,000 from book sales. And uh yeah, just encourage people to go buy it and and and see the real real story about
how did the process of writing it go.
We actually had somebody follow Tyler for two years with a video camera. So we have two years of coverage of him. Um we're actually working on possibly doing a documentary and working on a movie right now.
No way.
Yeah. So if we have anybody in the audience that would like to invest in a film, please reach out to us. But used all that coverage. It was scripted um and had somebody come to our house and interview Tyler. Spent two days with him. Um so it's it's Kelly and I the the book is from our perspective and Tyler's perspective. So the the chapters alternate back and forth.
Oh wow.
And um so we put the whole book together that
but a collaborator came in.
Yeah. Tyler's voice.
Yeah. And it's I'm telling you the book sounds exactly like Tyler.
That is incredible. Yeah.
And so he got to see it before he passed away.
He got to see the cover before it the book came out. So I was, you know, we were at the time the book was in full uh I mean we were doing stuff with Drew Brees. We were doing Drew Brees wrote the afterward and we were getting ready to do a big thing with him and uh we were traveling all over talking about his life and then CO hit and co was probably the best thing for Kelly and I because it allowed us to grieve um because we literally he passed away and we had so many people wanted to be a piece of the story, wanted to be a piece of which is awesome but it's extremely hard on a marriage
when you think about like raising money for cancer research. which like when you think about making an impact and a legacy and all these things, I'm sure that like you know putting together a book and a movie and all these like to really just
I don't know like yeah build the legacy of that piece like I'm sure that's has to be hard and time consuming and Oh my god.
Yeah. I mean I've never watched the two two years of video coverage. Um it's just too painful for me.
Yeah.
Um but we've given it to people to look at and to start processing. We we actually have we have a script right now um that we're working on possibly doing and then we've had other people um want to option the book and and and to uh write another script and to do the movie. So, we'll see what happens with that.
When you think about the impact that Tyler had on the world um and continues to still have Yeah.
and his legacy,
what does that mean to the Trent family?
It's humbling.
It's very humbling. And you know, you just sit here and think, I'm just a mom. I was just a mom like all the other moms, you know, living in Indiana doing our thing and like how did I how did I get here? You know, it's just it's such a bittersweet thing.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. We had a story that someone told us that they uh were in China wearing a Purdue shirt and some China walked up to him and said, "I know Purdue University, Purdue Engineering, and Tyler Trent." So it's it's quite humbling that his story reached the world. So that's what our drive is uh to continue that. He would be totally honored and
and and amazed that somebody 6 years later would want to do a podcast about his life. We don't want other families to go through this cuz even though Tyler had cancer, our whole family got cancer. You know, it is unimaginable. Um the pain and the heartache and watching your child go through what he went through. You just want to transfer the cancer to your to you as the parent and take it away from your child.
If you had to limit it to a few life lessons that Tyler taught you from
son to parents, how to live life, how to you don't know how long we're promised here, whether it's 80 years or 20 years. Uh what lessons did Tyler leave you guys that still impact you every single day? So, there's this movie called The Ultimate Gift, and if you haven't watched it, I encourage you to watch it. Um, and it talks about these seven, I think it's seven gifts that you there's grandfathers trying to teach a grandson. And I would say that Tyler taught me some of those ultimate gifts like every day is a gift. Uh, people complain about going to work, work is a gift.
Uh, family is sometimes the dynamics are hard. Um but family is a gift. So realizing um the gifts that we have that we tend to complain about and and are ungrateful for, it's a gift
and trust me, it's a gift. Uh when you don't have your child anymore and realizing that your health is a gift.
Yeah.
Uh and to make the most of those gifts that you have.
And I would agree with him wholeheartedly with all of that. I think the other piece for me is he taught me that I can do hard things. You know, like you look in at other families and you think I could never do that. Like how are they surviving? How are they getting through? And you know, just based on the circumstances surrounding Tyler, you know, just the perseverance and the care that it took to take care of him and um just even losing a child in general that I'm still standing like he that all he taught me all of that indirectly.
Yeah. It's humbling and it's I'm also so honored and I'm so proud to have been his mom and to be able to do those things for him that no parent should ever have to do for their child. But
in grief and loss that it is like the ultimate teacher and the gratitude like people that have experienced loss of whether it be like child or parent at a young age or any of that just have this perspective of like gratitude. Uh, and I don't when I say this, I don't mean this in a negative way, but I can walk up to people and have a conversation. Uh, in the conversation, if it turns to hard, I can tell if that person has gone through hard or not.
Yeah.
Right. I mean, because they there's a level of depth of understanding that people don't have.
Yeah.
And it's okay. I mean, it is okay because I we've gone through hard. we can also sympathize with other people that have gone through hard at a different level that some people can't go through.
Yeah. And and I think that like you know whether it's reading the book or watching all the videos and just like learning about Tyler's life
and then hearing this podcast and it's like
I would encourage listeners just like take a minute like five minutes.
Yeah.
And just like
put yourself in these other situations
and just like soak that in. And and like you talk about like needing like a gratitude practice for the day or like inspiration or whatever the like the motivation that you need to like
whether it's get up and go to work or like go run your marathon or whatever it is like there's just so much of that that can be had in situations.
Well, and I don't know how much time we have left.
Oh gosh, I could go all day.
But I have a story of a young man that uh reached out to us a couple years ago and and said, "I want to come volunteer at your golf outing." And I said, "Okay, come volunteer." And while he was volunteering, I I heard he had a story and he he wanted to meet with me to have coffee and talk to me. And so he had reached out to me several times. And so we actually met. He said, "Hey, I I want to tell you what's my story."
And I said, "Okay, talk to me." And he basically said, "I want you to know that Tyler helps basically motivate me and change my life." And I said, "Well, what happened?" He said, 'Well, I was working uh in Illinois uh at an at a factory and I lost my job. I have two kids and a wife and I'm like, "How am I going to do this?" And he was in bed depressed and he flips on game day and the interview of Tyler comes on.
He like was crying and he gets out of bed and he said, "I'm going to the Purdue Ohio State game or my grandfather used to take me to Purdue when I was a little boy." So he goes to the game and obviously Purdue wins. He follows us everywhere we go. I we don't even know any of this. So every game that we went to, he followed us and basically it ended up um encouraging him to apply to Purdue. Actually, the first time he applied, he didn't get in.
And so he applies again. He gets in um and he's a senior at Purdue right now.
Stop. going to graduate in in um communication doing he's going to probably be on ESPN someday and we have become friends with him and we talked to him often.
What's his name?
Um his name is um Craig Combmes.
Craig Combmes. Yes.
And so that's just one story that we know. We know there's more stories of how people's lives watched the the the you know the ESPN video and uh and it changed their life and their direction and now is he's a student at Purdue.
That is that's incredible. Yeah. I want to wrap up the episode talking about the foundation and the golf outing and the work that y'all are doing. The golf outing out outing happens every June. Correct.
It does. Usually about the second Monday of June.
The second Monday of June. Where where did this get started? Just give me the the info about it.
So, right shortly after Tyler passed away, somebody reached out to me and said, "Hey, I want to do a golf outing to raise money in his his name." That ended up not working, but it sparked the idea of doing it. So, um, we've been doing it ever since. Um,
what year is this?
This will be the fifth year. We had to skip the COVID year, but we otherwise it would be year six.
Okay. This year, I'm excited to announce that it's our biggest year ever, and we have literally sold every possible sponsorship.
No way.
Yeah. Our biggest online auction. We always usually sell out the golf the golfing uh with 144 golfers, but um it's it's quite incredible that uh this many people would give up their time, their energy, their money to be a part of what we would consider our day.
You also have a a concert coming up. Yeah,
with my yellow rickshaw.
My yellow rickshaw. We're going to for the first time ever, we're going to do a benefit concert in July. It'll be at Daniel's Vineyard on July 24th. Uh if you're interested in being a part of that, we would love to have you come. It's going to be more of a family event. You know, most of the time kids can't golf, right? So, or they can. They're probably better golfer than myself, but usually more of of the adults come. So, we'll be doing that at Daniel's Vineyard on July 24th. You can come to the tylthertrenfoundation.com to learn more about that.
Yeah. And then the the final thing is the captain's club.
Yeah. So that's getting started.
Yeah. We just launched the captain's club. Uh Tyler basically uh said that not everybody has the intellect or the ability to do cancer research, but everybody has the ability to give. And so we wanted to create a platform for people to be able to give maybe $15 a month or $10 a month, whatever it is, uh to be able to give just to to uh benefit the kids. Um a really sad story or a statistic is um about 11 therapies will be invented this year for adults and 11 therapies have been invented period since the 1950s for kids. So Tyler received the treatment that was created for adults that was developed and invented and we put the man on the moon over 50 years ago and there's no what?
Yeah, there's nothing for kids right now. They're working on it and the things are starting to happen and get better.
But that's the therapy he got. I would ask anybody, hey, look, would you go to a hospital that's 50 years old? And everybody would say no. Would you buy a car that's 50 years old? Not unless you're a car collector, right? Yeah. He He didn't have another There's no other options.
So, that's why we're involved and that's why we want to we've been involved at the state house trying to get money
for pediatric cancer research.
Yeah. We're trying we're trying to get a bill passed. Uh other states have uh funding for pediatric cancer research and Indiana doesn't. So, we're working uh with the state trying to get that to happen along with other families. So, I mean, it's going to take families to come up with a cure rather than to fund it. Just another quick statistic, five cents of every dollar that's funded by the federal government goes to kids. So, literally every dollar that they give for uh that, you know, US health organizations or uh cancer research, uh five cents go to kids and kids are our future.
I these are stats that yeah, I had no idea about like are shocking to me. ways that people can get involved to help with pediatric cancer research.
Get involved, period. If it isn't with the Tyler Trent Foundation, just get involved. That's all we ask.
We We care about the kids.
Absolutely. Whether it's golfing or concerts or you want I mean, you're a book an avid book reader. Feel like every There are definitely some Purdue alumni out there that need some great customer gifts for their uh Christmas gift.
Christmas gifts. Come on. And that's like you're going to get them like whatever entrepreneurship book or whatever. Come on. You're a Purdue grad. This is the book for you. I love it.
Or you don't have to be a Purdue grad. It's a book for and actually we've had families say I was so impacted by the book I made my kids read it
because my kids don't understand living in America that there's a different perspective in life. They think that we live in a fantasy world on Facebook and that everybody's their friend and so they've made their kids read it. It's it's a a book that child can read.
I'm really excited. Uh it is uh it is next up in my book rotation. So spectacular. We've come to the end of the episode. First off, I just really appreciate you guys coming on and being vulnerable and sharing the inspiring, impactful, amazing story of Tyler. I our listeners are going to love it. I know that it's impacted my life, you being here and and giving me an hour of your time. So So thank you for that. Thank you for the work that y'all are doing to help raise money for pediatric cancer research. It's just so amazing to see
um the outpouring of love that even Yes. 6 years later, Tyler still gets from around the world.
It's crazy.
It's a gift.
It's a gift.
It's It's so amazing.
It keeps us going.
I Yeah, I can't even imagine. Oh my gosh. I do have uh a couple fun segments questions here at the end that we wrap up with all of our guests. So, I'm really excited to get this perspective from you all, too. So, this is brought to you by our friends at OR Fellowship. It's a great organization here in Indiana helping develop young and business leaders across the state. So, Tony Kelly, what advice would you give to your 22year-old self? Life isn't about you. 22 years old, you're you're thinking about yourself. At least I was a lot. So, I would I would tell myself, life isn't about you. And thank God I don't know what the future is because if I did know what the future would be, I I'm not sure I would tread on.
I mean, the thing that comes to my mind is, you know, life is hard and
like Tony said, I mean, not that you want to know what the what the future holds because it would be too overwhelming and too much. But everything has a way of working itself out. It just does. It's a simple statement, but it's it's very true that everything always works out somehow. and to just have that perspective and to know that going into hard things.
Um, and just embracing what what there is to learn from it, you know, you just get through it easier.
I think that's that's spectacular advice. If we took out I like the Ohio State game. Yeah. So, we're going to tell you that game is, you know, can't be. Is there a favorite Purdue
memory? doesn't have to be sports, could be any memory uh that that just like resonates with you all and your family.
You know, the dedication of the gate um in Tyler's name um is quite an honor. I think about all of the
famous Purdue uh alumni and there are very few people that have recognition on campus. You know, Tyler has that gate and he's also has this center for pediatric cancer research named after him as well. So, you know, most people have to spend millions and millions of dollars to get their name on a building and and so Tyler has that as well. And then lastly, I'd sum it up by probably one of the funnest memories and a memory that just was such a gift to our family and more than you could ever know or dream dream about is uh my youngest son Ethan receiving a football scholarship. Mh.
It was just a full circle moment for me and my family of knowing all of the hard things that we went through. And yet God's good gifts to our family are amazing. And to see that video um of him getting a scholarship was just it made me cry.
Yeah.
And he's currently a junior.
Yeah. He's a junior in school and has uh uh three years of eligibility left in football. Mhm.
What do we think of the new coach? See the guy?
Like him a lot.
I think you're going to see a big change.
Hey, there we go. New fans. Come on.
It's a very different culture now.
I I love that. And that is such a full circle moment to go from I mean, being legitimately like a little kid and watching your older brother go through this
incredibly difficult, challenging time.
Well, you know, Game Day did a segment on Ethan
last year. last, no, his freshman year when Ohio State was coming back to Purdue for the first time since 2018. And so they did a followup
on Ethan and he was a walk-on at that point, you know, and just and so now to see
Yeah.
he's earned every bit of that scholarship. It was
how important to Ethan was it to because I'm sure if you're walking at Purdue, it's like, well, you probably could have like gone somewhere smaller, maybe in the MAC or somewhere maybe Ball
State. He had full rides offers and he gave him up to go to Purdue
and to prove that he could find a spot on the team.
So important. And it says a lot again like we talk about perseverance and staying the course. He did it and he did it all on his own effort.
That's impressive. Yeah.
Which I think really worked out even better. You know, it wasn't handed to him. It's not No one can say, "Oh, because your brother you got a scholar." I mean, he earned
like I said because people told him that of it. Oh, you're only on the team because
your brother.
I love a good prove the haters wrong story and I love it.
Um, thank you so much for coming on and sharing. I I am like
I have I'm now more of a Purdue fan. Like I obviously like basketball season's always like I'm like a Purdue but I'm like football now I'm I'm all in. Well, and I I just have to do a shout out to Mitch Daniels because, you know, he was one of Tyler's biggest fans, and he paved a way to help the story progress in a way that um not only helped, I believe, Purdue University, but the state of Indiana,
right? I mean, we put we put the eyes on on the state of Indiana. And it's really fun to see, you know, the Pacers, you know, doing what they're doing to get them in this race on Indiana. We love Indiana and um and hopefully our movie will portray Indiana as well.
I have a I have a producer. I know I know the guys that that are from Indiana that build uh put out movies. So if uh the Pegasus guys, they are have a production house that have done like they did the movie with Dylan Sprouts that was shot all in Indiana like 90% Indiana. That's the connection we got to make. Um anyway, appreciate you guys. Thanks for coming on and uh one have a great golf outing.
Thank you. Two, have a great uh concert benefit concert there. And three, I mean, let's go boiler makers.
Up.
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