Tanya Green Carroll almost gave up on her own life when fate took her son’s life away.

“Take this truck, and ram it into the Mississippi River bridge,” was her first thought, Carroll said.

“God said no,” she said, no longer able to hold back the tears. “No, no, no. These grand babies, they keep me strong. Without them, I would have given up.”

She hasn’t given up, but nothing’s been easy since July 9, 2014, the day Antoine “Tweezy” Green, 22, died.

Lately, she’s found a new way to focus on her recovery, with support from those who are walking in her shoes. Carroll is one of several area ladies now attending a bereaved mothers support group, organized by Natchez resident Jacqueline Marsaw, who has also led “Stop the Violence” rallies in town.

The group gathers to talk about their pain. It’s not easy, Carroll said, but at the same time, it helps.

“People say, ‘Tanya’s a strong woman,’” she said. “Just because I look like I’m strong, it doesn’t mean I’m strong inside.

“I think about my child every day. But it does help to talk about it.”

Green had just graduated from Copiah-Lincoln Community College’s Natchez campus and was looking forward to continuing his education.

Carroll didn’t feel well the day of the vehicle accident, so Green, her eldest son, made her a pork chop sandwich to make her feel better.

“He was the cook,” she said. “I never thought it would be the last sandwich he made for me.”

Carroll left for work at 2:30 p.m. There, she received a phone call — whoever had left Carroll’s mother’s house in the car had been in a bad wreck not far from the North Palestine Road house, the caller said.

Carroll immediately headed to the accident site, with a friend driving. She prayed the whole way for it to just be something simple, like a broken bone.

Then she saw the wreck.

The vehicle had left the roadway and slammed into a tree on the passenger side, where Green was. The image left little doubt about the outcome, Carroll said.

“I got out of the car, and I said, ‘Lord, it is your will if my baby is gone,’” she remembered. “‘Please take care of him, I don’t want him to suffer.’”

Green died of blunt force impact on the scene, while the driver was airlifted to Jackson.

“He was loved by everybody,” Carroll said. “Nobody ever said a bad word about him.”

Carroll has not altered Green’s room in her house.

And, at Christmas, her granddaughter, Green’s niece, wouldn’t come out until her uncle’s Chicago Bulls hat was placed on top as the tree topper.

“I always make Antoine like he is still here with me,” Carroll said. “I picture him away in Canada. He has to still be here in spirit.”

At first Carroll wanted to shut herself away from everyone, but after she admitted that talking about it helped, she also realized she could help others in a similar situation.

“You make your life for them to have a nice life after you leave,” she said. “And here you are making arrangements and picking out a casket.

“I have gotten stronger talking to people like Jackie (Marsaw), and I want to do something. This is meant for me to reach out and help other people. The more I talk, the more I feel like I can help others.”

Karen Elmore Proby

Justin Williams Jr. was 17 when he was shot in the chest in the Morgantown area while playing a game of dominoes Dec. 13, 2015.

During the game, the shooting suspect decided to play with a revolver, spinning it around before picking it up and pointing it at Williams, reportedly firing a single bullet.

Karen Elmore Proby had brought Williams, and his older brother, Terrence Smith, over to a friend’s house at around 11 p.m., Dec. 12, because they were going to go to Alcorn State University the next morning for basketball.

She warned them to be careful on the highway and went home to relax. Before she had fallen asleep, she got a call from Smith.

“All I can remember him saying was, ‘Justin, hold on, please don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me,’” she said. “I’m nervous, I get to Palestine Road, get to Morgantown Road, and I reach where they are and see the ambulance there.”

Smith comes to Proby and tells her Williams has been shot in the chest, and they are trying to resuscitate him.

When emergency responders brought Williams to the ambulance, Proby saw his eyes. He had dry tears, and his pupils were dilated.

“I said, ‘Justin, if you can hear me, if you can hear mama, I love you,’” she said. “‘Don’t you ever forget I love you.’”

She followed the ambulance, but by the time they got to Melrose-Montebello Parkway, she noticed something odd. The sirens were not on.

“‘Oh my God, Justin’s gone,’” she recalled thinking. “I just froze at the light. I just froze, but I got myself together and finished driving to the hospital.”

Nobody would tell her anything for another 30 minutes there, but she said she already knew. Williams was pronounced dead at 1:10 a.m., having been shot in the heart.

“I went in to see my baby with the tools in his mouth,” Proby said. “A parent ain’t never supposed to go through something like this. Children are supposed to bury us.”

Proby, who now sleeps with a pillow made out of the Natchez High School class of 2018’s shirt, which her son’s classmates signed and gave to her, said she does still have sleepless nights thinking about it. But talking about it does help.

It is also Proby’s hope that her story can help others. She urges parents who have lost children to not give in to the anger.

“If we are always angry — if you let the anger build up — it means the person who killed him has taken our life, too,” she said. “I just feel like, God chose my son, it was not something I could prevent. Anger kills your soul, makes you not in control of your life.”

Cynthia Grace Washington

Walter Washington Jr. was 25 when he was shot once in the chest near the entrance to the Natchez Mall on Aug. 27, 2011. Washington was heading for the car after purchasing a new hat when he was shot.

He started running, leaving a trail of blood across the parking lot before collapsing in a pool of blood near the exterior shops at the turn-in from John R. Junkin Drive.

Cynthia Grace Washington was in line getting food at a wedding reception when her daughter, Angel Washington, called.

Washington didn’t answer at first, but her daughter persisted in calling and she eventually bent down low, and answered in a hushed tone.

“She was hooping and hollering.” Washington said. “She was hysterical.”

Washington said she eventually understood from Angel that Walter had been shot. She did not touch her food and left.

“It seemed like everyone was driving so slow — they weren’t — but it seemed that way,” she said. “I was saying, ‘Please, I’ve got to get somewhere, I’ve got to get somewhere.’

“I was thinking he was shot in the arm, or the leg, and he’d be OK. Please let him be OK.”

As she was headed to the hospital she noticed the sirens and ambulance still on the hill at the mall, so she pulled in.

The police officer stopped her. He told her she couldn’t go up there because there had been a shooting.

“I said, ‘I know; it’s my son. I’ve got to get to him,’” she said. “He said, ‘Ma’am, you can’t get to him.’

“‘Whether you let me go or not, I am going,’” she recalls replying.

Then the ambulance started down the hill, and she followed.

As Washington got to the hospital, her family and friends started arriving. When they first saw the doctor, the family was told Walter had suffered a gunshot wound, it was serious, and they were doing all they could.

Washington said she stepped outside, and after what only felt like two minutes, she went back in to see the doctor, and it was a different story.

“He starts, ‘Ma’am, I’m sorry,’” she said. “Before he could finish saying sorry, I stopped him, got up, hugged him and thanked him for everything they had done for my son.”

Washington said she couldn’t bear to see his body covered in blood with the tubes in his mouth.

“Part of me died there,” she said. “I can’t put it into words. It’s like a ghost — something just went away.”

Walter left behind two sons, and Washington said it has been particularly tough on the older one.

Washington said a mother has to talk about it.

“You have to stay sane,” she said. “It can make you insane to lose your child.

“That is why you have to talk about it. If you don’t have support, you don’t have nothing. When I get to feeling it, I know I can always call so and so, and they will help.

“You will never get over it, but you can learn to cope with it better,” Washington said. “Every week, it’s like you make it over one more hurdle. You are never going to win the race — it will go on forever. But through God and support, you can keep going, and one day, the hurdles won’t be so tall.”

Support group

The bereaved mothers support group meets at 6 p.m. every third Sunday at the supervisors’ meeting room on State Street.

Marsaw, who can be contacted at 601-443-3630, said the first night of the support group went well, with several women sharing and attempting to heal. She hoped to have more people at the next meeting.

“I’ve talked to so many mothers, and you can see how they are suffering when they talk about what they have been through,” Marsaw said. “It is a hard road, but I hope this can be of some help.”