Washington DC

Memorial Poster Project Remembers Lives Lost to Addiction, Overdose on National Mall

The project was designed to reduce the stigma and shame that often accompanies addiction disorders and mental health issues. 

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Six hundred posters, each representing a life lost to addiction or overdose, made an emotional display on the National Mall on Saturday, as family members described their lost loved ones as so much more than the drugs that killed them. 

For a second year, the nonprofit Today I Matter asked friends and family to provide two adjectives to describe their loved ones for the Memorial Poster Project. Beth Baldwin, a Northern Virginia mother, stood beside a poster of her son Phillip. 

“Kind” and “loving” were the words she chose. 

“He was 23 and he suffered about eight years in the struggles,” Baldwin said. “He finally was in recovery and coming home from Florida and rehab, and they put him in a hotel, and he died the next day.”

The project was designed to reduce the stigma and shame that often accompanies addiction disorders and mental health issues. 

Founder John Lally, who lost his son Timothy to an overdose in 2016, knows firsthand that the opioid crisis is claiming younger and younger victims.

“And a lot of it has to do with counterfeit pills. And kids think they’re buying an Adderall or Xanax on the street, but if it contains fentanyl, that first pill could kill a kid,” Lally said.

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