A mother in Connecticut is launching a desperate search for a necklace containing her son’s ashes which she lost while on a beach walk Wednesday.
Leslie Soyland realized that her most prized possession was no longer around her neck after returning home from a stroll at her local Calf Pasture Beach, in Norwalk.
Soyland had worn the necklace for ten years — receiving it at the wake of her son, Johnny, who died at age 27 in a car crash on Oct. 3, 2014, according to Connecticut News 12.
“It’s monetarily not worth much, but sentimentally, it’s everything,” Soyland told News 12.
The jewelry features a small teardrop charm with a heart inside on a 30-inch chain and contains some of her departed son’s cremated remains.
“I just feel like I lost part of – sounds funny but — part of me, you know? And I’m sure there are a lot of people out there that don’t understand it, and probably think it’s strange, but it’s what I had all the time, and it just made me feel close to him, because we were very close,” Soyland told Eyewitness News.
She believes it slipped off her neck when she took a sweatshirt off during her walk on the beach.
The bereft mother says that she traced the steps of her usual 3-mile walk along the coast multiple times in search of the missing piece of personal memorabilia to no avail.
With no luck, she took to Facebook to ask for assistance from locals and was warmed by an overwhelming amount of support.
“There’s been just such an outpouring. I am overwhelmed. I feel so blessed,” Soyland told News 12 while tearing up.
Some neighbors have already made trips to Calf Pasture Beach seeking the lost amulet, according to the outlet — which ran into one such stranger with a metal detector by chance.
“Out of everything bad, something good happens. And the something good is so many people have reached out and so many people have shared things on Facebook and said, ‘Keep your eye out for this. It needs to get back to her.’ That’s touching. That’s an amazing thing,” Soyland told the news station.
Johnny left behind a son when he passed away.
“He was the best father bar none. He was amazing,” his mom said.
The necklace with his ashes has yet to be found.
