SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Lexie Warejcka of the Platte, S.D. area runs to connect.
“It’s the closest time that I am to God, honestly,” she said. “I love going to church. My faith is really, really important to me. But that’s the time that it’s me time. I really get to pray.”
The miles offer an opportunity.
“That’s also the time that I get to ask questions, talk to him about my frustrations and then also ask him am I going the right direction that you want me to be at,” Warejcka said.
Warejcka will soon be part of The 437 Project’s team of runners crossing the state, and her legs of the route will memorialize Terry Severson of Platte and Will Godber of Tea, S.D. who each lost their lives to suicide.
“He was very thoughtful and kind and considerate of others,” Will’s mother Melissa Godber of Tea said about her son. “He gave a lot of thought to the things that he did. He was well-liked by everybody. He kind of fit in with all groups at school.”
Severson had that appeal, too.
“He was loved by many people,” Terry’s widow Kela Severson of Dimock, S.D. said about him. “He was a wrestling coach along with being a soldier.”
They were South Dakotans at entirely different points in their lives: one a boy, the other a veteran, father and grandfather. But they, like many others, struggled with mental illness. Terry Severson died in 2014. He was 36 years old.
“I do know he struggled with undiagnosed PTSD,” Kela Severson said. “Like, there would be many a night where in the middle of the night he would be struggling.”
Her late husband served with the South Dakota National Guard in Iraq.
“I do believe Iraq and him always trying to be the tough, funny guy, kind of just wore on him a little bit and didn’t like to show that there was a part of him that was struggling,” Kela Severson said.
Will Godber battled depression; he died in 2017 on the day before Thanksgiving. He was 13 years old, in the seventh grade.
“I could hear the helicopter come in to the neighborhood, and the next thing I know the police chief is saying, ‘I’m sorry, he has died,'” Melissa Godber said. “And then I could hear the helicopter take off.”
Amidst this tragedy, there was support.
“I was sitting on the sofa, of course, with my husband and my family, and the next thing I know there was someone there from the Helpline Center,” Melissa Godber said. “And I have no idea when she arrived, but she was sitting next to me, and I said to her, I said, ‘It’s too late.’ And she wasn’t there for that. She was there for us, to support us, and she told us that we were suicide survivors.”
The unfamiliar term now describes her.
“I had no idea what that meant,” Melissa Godber said. “I thought a suicide survivor was somebody who survived a suicide attempt, and truly that is what we are. We are suicide survivors, and it takes so much to process that and go forward from that.”
One way Kela Severson has gone forward is by taking care of foster kids, which she does at her home in Dimock.
“Life’s just not what I had planned without Terry, so this is my way of still giving and having a life without him that I can feel good about,” she said.
Warejcka’s commitment to Will and Terry has their loved ones marveling at her gesture.
“Incredible. She messaged me in February and said, ‘I am doing this run later on this year, would you be okay or comfortable with me honoring Will on my run,’ and I was blown away,” Melissa Godber said. “I was so touched by this. It meant the world to me.”
“It’s amazing,” Kela Severson said. “It’s absolutely an honor for Lexie to be running in Terry’s memory and in Will’s memory. She never even met Terry.”
Before his death, Terry Severson was manager of the Platte Locker, which Warejcka’s husband Wade now manages and owns.
“Terry took Wade in, honestly as an apprentice,” Warejcka said. “Everything that Wade knows as a butcher is because of Terry and probably some of his pranks also.”
Warejcka’s husband and Melissa Godber are first cousins. Will attended Warejcka’s wedding; a photo from that wedding day is the last family photo taken before he died.
“Melissa shared with me his love for farming,” Warejcka said. “And he loved to farm with his grandpa and his cousins and his uncles, and as you can see, I run in a lot of corn with a lot of combines and a lot of tractors.”
Terry and Kela Severson were high school sweethearts, and he was the love of her life.
“Still is,” she said.
“His family and friends have shared a variety of different stories, his leadership to not only this town but to this country, and that’s why I want to run for Terry,” Warejcka said.
Will was a runner, too.
“Actually, the fall right before he died, he had just completed his first cross country season,” Melissa Godber said. “So he ran cross country in Tea, and he was a Tea Titan.”
“If I can save one person’s life by talking about Will’s story, talking about the resources that the Helpline Center has, that’s really what drives me and why I picked Will as somebody to honor,” Warejcka said.
“One of the things that I worried about after Will died was the fact that he might be forgotten,” Melissa Godber said. “That was really important to me that he be remembered, and fast forward now to 2024 and to be, to have him remembered in this way means everything to me. I am just touched beyond measure by her willingness and want to do this.”
Completing The 437 Project’s route across South Dakota from the Wyoming border to the Iowa border will not be easy. But it’s happening because of the lives and impact of people like Terry Severson and Will Godber.
“He was kind of a friend to everybody, and he cared about people,” Melissa Godber said.
“He was a great guy, and he was loved by many, many people,” Kela Severson said. “And he is missed by many people.”
KELOLAND’s Dan Santella is also one of The 437 Project’s 12 runners who will cross South Dakota on foot by taking turns running from west to east in September; he will bring viewers and readers stories from along the route as he and the other runners complete their trek. The 437 Project raises money for the Helpline Center, a Sioux Falls-based nonprofit that connects people to mental health resources. If you’d like to give to The 437 Project, you can do so here.
