About the founder
Meet Deitrice “Dee” Willard-Ruffin.
Dee is a Christian woman, mother, grandmother, widow, and the first Black female Postmaster of Bethesda, Maryland. After a full career in service, she stepped into a new chapter of life — and twelve years later, found herself walking a road no mother wants to walk.
Dee created Present in the Pieces after the loss of her son, Tyric. She walked beside him through a serious illness and held him as he took his final breath. The love did not end there. The grief did not end there. And, quietly, neither did the calling.
She is not a therapist. She is not a doctor. She is not a grief expert. She is a mother who knows what it feels like to wake up in a world that keeps moving when yours has stopped. What she offers here is not a program to fix you — because you are not broken. You are grieving. There is a difference.
Dee is building this space while she is still healing. Her prayer is that no mother has to walk this road alone, and that faith, honesty, and companionship can carry us through the parts we cannot carry ourselves.
"I am not writing or speaking from the finish line. I am speaking from the road."
Mother
To Tyric, forever.
Grandmother
A joy she keeps.
Widow
Familiar with loss.
Woman of Faith
Held by grace, still asking questions.
Retired Postal Executive
First Black female Postmaster of Bethesda, MD.
Companion
For mothers who need one.
This photograph was taken in a season when laughter came easily and the future felt wide open. Tyric's smile could light a room; Dee's pride in him was written on her face long before this shutter ever clicked. Today, this image holds more than a memory. It is a reminder that love outlasts absence, and that a mother and child can remain beautifully connected even when one has gone ahead.
A love that remains
Tyric.
This space exists because of a love that did not end. Tyric was Dee's son — her joy, her prayer, her heart walking around outside her body. Though he is no longer here in the way she once held him, he is woven into every word, every resource, and every gentle invitation extended to another grieving mother.
Present in the Pieces is, in many ways, a love letter to him — and to every mother who knows what it means to keep loving a child the world can no longer see.
"A mother's love does not end. It changes shape, but it never ends."
Walk with Dee.
If any part of Dee's story met you where you are, come a little closer.