A Place of Yes: A Grief Podcast
Host: Heather Straughter (Jake’s Help From Heaven)
Episode: A Marine’s Mission to Honor His Daughter (with Kim “Rooster” Rossiter, Ainsley’s Angels)
Date: December 10, 2025

Episode Overview

This profoundly moving episode features Kim “Rooster” Rossiter, a Marine veteran and founder of Ainsley’s Angels, in conversation with host Heather Straughter. Both parents who have lost children, Heather and Rooster open up about their journeys with grief, vulnerability, healing, and the legacies they’ve built in honor of their kids. Together, they candidly explore what it means to actively grieve, to allow both joy and sorrow, and to create purpose from profound loss. The conversation, timed with Ainsley’s birthday and near the anniversary of Heather’s son Jake’s death, is honest, uplifting, and connective—a true safe haven for anyone navigating grief or supporting others through it.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Saying "Yes" to Vulnerability and Active Grieving

Timestamps: 02:22–05:35

• Heather and Rooster reflect on the podcast’s title, sharing recent brave moments of “yes.”
• Heather discusses giving up Thanksgiving control to embrace presence with family “even when it’s hard” (03:26).
• Rooster moves the conversation to the importance of “saying yes to being vulnerable or to actively grieving my daughter’s loss” (04:04).
• Notably, this episode coincides with what would have been Ainsley’s 22nd birthday, heightening the emotional resonance.
• Quote:

  “By my willingness to say yes and finding a way to actively grieve, it’s led to a pretty beautiful legacy.”
  — Rooster (05:16)

2. Feeling the Highs and the Lows

Timestamps: 05:35–13:40

• Heather and Rooster discuss a recurring theme: letting oneself experience both the highs and the lows of grief, and not numbing the pain even when it’s tempting.
• Rooster traces his understanding of this to a lyric by The Counting Crows: “Sometimes it’s hard to feel... sometimes I can’t get high…” (09:00). He riffs on the connection between numbing pain and the loss of authentic joy.
• Both speakers reflect on how, especially in early grief, they tried to “stay steady” for the sake of their surviving children—but realized this dulled both joy and sorrow.
• Heather:

  “Once you embrace that…I do believe strongly, right? It’s like grief and joy, they coexist. And my joy is downright giddy sometimes, right? Like I almost feel childlike in my joy…But because I know that I have to sometimes sit in the space that is dark and uncomfortable.” (12:45)

• Rooster describes a pivotal moment—crying openly during a sunrise in the Colorado mountains, and instead of feeling shame or judgment, being quietly supported by others—“It was a top five life moment…if I can cry every day, this is good” (14:16).
• Quote:

  “The ability to feel the lows in the lowest way led to an ability to feel the highs in the highest way.”
  — Rooster (15:36)

3. Gratitude for Life’s Simple Things

Timestamps: 16:07–20:39

• Heather shares how, even on difficult days, she seeks out small joys, like holiday decorating with her family.
• Rooster links this ability to positive psychology’s concept of appreciating “beauty and excellence”—“the little things is the sun rising…the beautiful meadow…the way the water drips off the roof…”
• He calls these moments “a medicine…so powerful.” (18:25)

4. Ainsley’s Story and the Origins of Ainsley’s Angels

Timestamps: 20:47–30:12

• Rooster shares his family’s journey—Ainsley, the middle of three children, was diagnosed at age 2 with infantile neuroaxonal dystrophy (INAD), a terminal, genetic disorder.
• He describes the immense guilt and isolation that can follow genetic diagnoses, especially as a military family far from home:

  “You rest in this place of, oh, I did this to her…that’s a whole podcast we could jump into.” (24:45)

• The move to Virginia Beach for continuity of care led them to focus not on research or cures, but on living fully—taking Ainsley out in public, sharing her joy, and eventually being introduced to inclusion running via Team Hoyt.
• The first pure, joyful race experience:

  “I saw the sensory integration, coupled with the wind, coupled with this nonverbal communication that says, ‘I love this, and I want to do more of it…’ I got to see my daughter smiling…most beautiful emotion right now just remembering that.” (28:55)

5. Loss, Diagnosis, and Grieving What Might Have Been

Timestamps: 30:32–41:24

• Heather draws parallels between Jake’s and Ainsley’s stories—both healthy at birth, then changes, new realities, and learning how to live publicly with differently-abled children.
• Both reflect on grief that isn’t about death: diagnosis, loss of the life or child you expected, divorce, moving.
• Quote:

  “Grief isn’t just death. Grief is diagnosis. You have to grieve diagnosis, you have to grieve the lows, period.”
  — Rooster (33:21)

• Rooster introduces the acronym MAGIC: “My Active Grieving Instills Courage”—the philosophy by which he approaches both loss and life (35:46).
• He describes how actively grieving, whether through running, storytelling, or showing up for others, grants the courage and connection people need to move forward.
• Quote:

  “Celebrate the high and grieve the low. And by grieve is magic—my active grieving instills courage, because if you’re going to actively grieve, you’re going to get courage to keep going.”
  — Rooster (33:33)

6. The Ongoing Impact—Public Grieving, Relationships, and Identity

Timestamps: 41:24–59:57

• Heather discusses the double-edged sword of running a legacy nonprofit—gratitude and pride, but also the heaviness and fatigue that can come with always carrying the mantle of a grieving parent (45:00).
• Rooster relates, describing his wife’s more complicated feelings about continuing Ainsley’s legacy, and the strain (and also strengthening) that grief places on marriages and families. Open communication is crucial.
• They talk openly about gender and grieving—how society more readily accepts public grief from mothers than fathers, and why it’s important for men to be open about loss (49:39).
• The conversation returns to running’s therapeutic role after loss, the importance—but also the limitations—of “healthy distractions.”
• Rooster shares how the pandemic and injury forced him to confront parts of grief that distraction had deferred:

  “If we don’t truly take the time to discover the feeling part of it…then what? Then you’re left losing identity again, losing your medicine again.” (53:17)

• Quote:

  “There’s so much power in the reflection phase and the removal of the distraction, but it feels so dangerous at the same time because you have to get so raw and so vulnerable…there’s a whole other side of life that’s waiting for you.” (57:05)

7. Legacy, Love, and What Our Children Would Think

Timestamps: 59:57–63:24

• Heather asks, “What do you think Ainsley is thinking of all this now?” Rooster’s reply is humble and poignant:
• Quote:

  “I don’t know what Ainsley’s thinking…but I know in my heart that her life mattered…sometimes it takes others a whole life of decades…to achieve something so positive. I’m so proud of her.” (60:17)

• The episode ends on a note of connection for all bereaved parents:
• Heather:

  “My dad actually says it all the time, like, imagine like, look what we’ve done because of Jake. He was only four, and look at this…We’re so proud. Proud of them both.” (62:10)

• Rooster, lightheartedly:

  “Shoot, they might even be in the corner kissing each other. Maybe they fell in love, they’re raising hell.” (62:42)

• Both express gratitude for this conversation as “therapy,” and toast their loved ones’ memories together (63:05).

Memorable Moments & Quotes

• On vulnerability:

  “If I can cry every day, this is good…and now, the reason I’m even higher on life now is because I figured out how to navigate being low in life.”
  — Rooster (15:36)

• On legacy:

  “As a parent, all we ever want is for our children to be safe and for our children to thrive in life and for our children to still want to talk to us, call us, love us. It’s all we want…I’m so proud of her.”
  — Rooster (60:17)

• On public grief:

  “The more of us that do it, the more of us that talk about it, I just think it’s gotta help others.”
  — Heather (13:37)

• On magic:

  “Magic: My Active Grieving Instills Courage.”
  — Rooster (33:33, 41:28)

Important Timestamps

• [04:04] – Rooster on saying yes to vulnerability and grieving actively
• [09:00] – Counting Crows lyric; importance of feeling highs and lows
• [15:36] – Rooster describes crying publicly and newfound freedom
• [28:55] – Rooster’s first race with Ainsley; pure joy
• [33:21] – Grief tied to diagnosis and living with loss
• [41:28] – Introduction of MAGIC and its meaning
• [45:37] – The heaviness of carrying a legacy and public grief
• [53:17] – The necessity (and pain) of pausing and deep self-reflection
• [60:17] – Rooster’s pride in Ainsley and perspective as a parent
• [62:42] – Rooster’s humor about Ainsley and Jake “raising hell” together

Tone & Takeaway

Heather and Rooster model honesty, self-compassion, and a refusal to shy away from either pain or joy. Their conversation balances deep vulnerability with moments of laughter and hope. They demonstrate that legacy work does not erase loss, but can offer connection, healing, and the courage to actively grieve in ways that honor both those gone and those still here.

This episode is a master class in living with loss, touching anyone walking the grief journey or supporting someone who is—reminding listeners: you don’t have to do it alone, and there is still beauty to be found.