Risen Magazine

The Thorp family sounds like any Southern California family you’d encounter… a Sales Executive father, a mom in the fashion industry, and two boys who love school and baseball. But when their oldest son came down with a mysterious illness, little did they know, their lives would change forever. Recounting the difficult years leading up to her son’s death, Beth Thorp shares her family’s story. With full vulnerability she talks about how she, and her husband Brad, navigated grief, started a foundation ( Mitchell Thorp Foundation ) and have a book ( ANEW Creation ), all in hopes to come alongside families as solution to their desperation.

Beth Thorp:  Mitchell was our beautiful sunshine boy, because he was just so joyful, so funny. He had a sense of humor. He had a love for other people, always looked out for the underdog. That was his character, and he had a great love of baseball due to my husband, who played for the Los Angeles Dodgers, and he took his coaching experience and coached our boys. So, a lot of life lessons and growing up and playing baseball, which he loved, and was even sought after at the age of 12 from different high schools.He was an amazing young man. He was a 4.0 student, excellent in his schoolwork. I would call him a perfectionist. He hated to lose. Mama always had to tell him,  “It’s okay to lose. It’s okay to make a mistake. That’s being human.”  He wanted to always please people and was just a beautiful soul inside and out. Even his teachers, after his passing, would say,  “When Mitchell walked into the room, he lit it up.”  I think from his smile to just his character and who he was, just people gravitated toward him.
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This was five years of managing pain, trying to figure out what is causing and driving this pain in his head.At this point a research hospital or the Mayo Clinic was recommended.So we had to make the decision to go to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota or up to a research hospital in Los Angeles… we chose the latter. He was there 30 days. He was in myoclonic seizures due to pain and still asking,  “What’s causing me this?”  Every test, again, things kept coming back negative normal, but I said,  “But he’s not normal. He’s in bed here. He can’t function. He can’t talk. He can’t speak. What’s going on?”  You’re at your wits’ end, because you’re like, wait a minute, you’re the doctors… and you’re hoping that they had answers.

​Then they started to say,  “Well, it’s all in his head,”  and that really threw me for a loop and Brad, we were like,  “My son is laying here, and he’s in myoclonic seizures due to pain.
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Everyone is touched differently, because your attention is so much on the affected child, that the other children get forgotten, and then… family stepped in. If you have family, it’s great to help support, which oftentimes I did come and stay with Matthew, my other boy. When we had to go to the hospitals, but it was very challenging. That was a point in the time when you’re praying. You had people praying for him, and you’re like,  “God, where are you? Why aren’t you answering our prayers? Where are you? Are you listening?”
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But all along, He kept bringing people to us. When you’re walking through the thick of it, it’s so hard to see it, but He did bring people to us each time. ​ From the nutritionist to the hospice.
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It’s like he was entrapped in a body. He understood, but still in pain. Then, it finally just came down to,  “Tap yes.”  Means yes. Don’t tap at all, that means no. Then, we know it’s not working, so we kind of had to pose questions to him when it got to that point.
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You keep remembering how he was, so it really was hard at that point, to that darkest night at the hospital when he passed in Texas at that time, so then we wanted to take him to another doctor in Texas, and he couldn’t fly there because he had to be able to walk on the plane, and he wasn’t able to walk. So we ended up renting an RV, loaded him in there, and drove to Texas, where he ended up passing away, which was really our hardest night ever.
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So that’s why we titled the book “ANEW Creation” after him speaking to us this way. So not only that week, the double rainbows, but then this profound situation.
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RM:  When did the idea come to you that you wanted to share his story in a bigger way and make a lasting impact? The development of your foundation and then eventually a book.. obviously the name was divine.
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​​I felt like God was just carrying me one step at a time… I just felt that presence around me. And I just kind of did one thing at a time. And then he went and filed the paperwork. And then we started, we got on our hands and knees. We prayed that the Lord is the CEO of the foundation. God, You planted this in our heart. So we need You to show us the way. We needed Him to show us the way because we really didn’t know.
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So we started with those first two families and now we’ve given back over $2.6 million back into the community, 13 years later. Giving back to children who are fighting for their tomorrows and families who are struggling to make ends meet. I’ve heard this saying, if your faith is not tested, you can’t be trusted. ​ Think about that. If you’ve walked, the walk people understand that we understand what they’re going through.
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​ I didn’t know what God wanted me to do with that. I just knew I wanted to do something in eternal significance for Him through Mitchell. And I said, the enemy messed with the wrong Mama and Papa Bear. And he pissed me off and I am going to bring people closer to God through our son and through our story. And we’ve been doing it now and we’ll be doing it forever until I’m off the planet.

​ RM:  And now you’ll continue with that in an even broader way with you book,  ANEW Creation: Finding Meaning in the Midst of Tragedy.  Share about how you brought the book to fruition.
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I didn’t have to carry it. He was telling me I don’t have to carry it. I got him. Wow. I took a deep breath. I said, thank you. I loved him through it. I helped my husband through it, was there with him. He lost terrific amount of weight and went through his own battle and journey.

​He lost a lot of weight, like 60 pounds. So he was like a skeleton, but I loved him through it, anyway. Lord, I’m going to love him. Got him through it.
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BT:  True. I think that is one of the hardest things. People sometimes reach out to me and say  Beth, what do I say? This is what’s going through in my family. And I don’t know what to say.  And I usually just tell them to listen, just to be. You just have to go with that compassionate heart and just say, what can I do to be of some help? You just ask what I can do. Can I take the kids off your hands? Can I bring a meal? Can I cut the grass? Simple things. What can I do that would ease some of the burden? That’s one way of helping. And then for my Christian friends, they’re always like, what can I do to pray for you for? What is it that you need help with or breakthrough or healing?
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And then how people can get involved… every book that you buy, proceeds will go to the Mitchell Thorp Foundation to help another child fighting for their tomorrow.
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