Our Heartbeat family suffered a major loss this past Thanksgiving weekend. In the wake of the holiday we awoke to the news that Dawn Truesdale, an Option Line Consultant of 17 years, passed away unexpectedly in her sleep. A devoted wife and mother to three boys, she left us all way too soon. We will all miss her greatly.
When I note that Dawn was with Option Line for 17 years, it’s important to realize that Option Line itself is 17 years old.
Dawn was part of that very first handful of consultants who saw the vision for the work and said yes to the adventure. From the beginning she would faithfully anchor the critical overnight and weekend shifts that allowed Option Line to be a 24/7 outreach.
Today, that’s made a little easier by the technologies that allow consultants to operate from home, but for the first 10 years of Option Line’s existence this meant leaving her home to go to the call center here in Columbus, Ohio.
Dawn was always a joyful and spunky presence during her Option Line shifts and at our Heartbeat gatherings. Each year, at our Heartbeat Christmas party, she would sure wear fun, festive – read that “usually goofy” – hats and sweaters. Standing short of five feet tall, I most remember her elf ears hat and necklace of large bulb Christmas lights.
With an almost permanent smile and quick laugh, Dawn positivity marked her ministry through Option Line but also helped me, personally.
Dawn Truesdale - July 17, 1966 - November 28, 2020
During the difficult dissolution of the joint partnership under which Option Line was first established before Heartbeat took on exclusive oversight in 2012, the Option Line team was the hardest hit.
Yet, Dawn pulled me aside, flashed her “can do” smile and said, “We’ll get through this. It will work out.” Her faith and hard work was rewarded. Not only did the Option Line team survive that season (under Bri Laycock's capable leadership) but has gone on to reach new records of impacting lives (with Nafisa Kennedy now at the helm).
Dawn is a phenomenal example of the behind the scenes heroes who serve in the pregnancy help movement.
Like all the consultants at Option Line, she felt the weight of the mission and the opportunity to champion life. While we went home for holidays and weekends, she stepped into the gap to be a warm, welcoming voice to a person reaching out for help in their unintended pregnancy.
An Option Line consultant averages more than 50 contacts in a four-hour shift. Dawn answered more than 100K calls during her time.
Most of the callers never know their consultant’s name or the part they play in connecting them to the life-saving work of Option Line’s pregnancy help network.
Still, Option Line is only a microcosm of the whole pregnancy help movement - One that is filled with champions from all walks of life, those engaged now and those who came before us. From the counseling room to the conference table, material aid to medical services, rescue outreach and recovery offerings – we are a diverse crowd coming from across the spectrum of Christianity, varying professions and personal experiences. But we all sense the same call and mission and the sense of the Holy Spirit’s involvement in us and through us.
This side of heaven we simply cannot know the impact that our part plays in the rescue of lives and lifetimes, legacy and lineage.
Only now, without the constraints this temporal world places on us, is Dawn able to realize how many lives she has touched. Lives whose trajectory was hurtling them toward a decision involving certain death and the prospect of permanent spiritual hurt. Dawn help changed those, just like you help change them as well.
Please keep Dawn’s family and our whole Option Line team in your prayers as they walk through this sudden loss. Fortunately, as a family of Christ-followers, we grieve our loss yet have confidence in the Lord’s promise beyond these earthly bonds.
Dawn’s obituary can be viewed HERE.
Editor's note: Heartbeat International manages Option Line and Pregnancy Help News.
