(NewsNation) — Everything changed in the blink of an eye for Crystal Woodman Miller when she was 16 years old.
A survivor of the Columbine High School shooting in Colorado, Woodman Miller remembers the day she was forced to grow up very quickly.
“Everything that I had known, the safety, the security, the innocence of childhood was gone,” Woodman Miller said on “Morning in America,” the day after a shooting at a private Christian school in Nashville, Tennessee.
Seven people, including the shooter, died on Tuesday.
Nashville police identified the victims as Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs and William Kinney, all 9 years old, as well as Cynthia Peak, 61, Katherine Koonce, 60 and Mike Hill, 61.
“We all want the same thing,” Woodman Miller said. “We all want our children to be safe..No parent should have to hug their kids at the school door and wonder if they’ll see them again.”
What needs to happen, she said, is for people from across political lines to come together and talk to find a solution.
“This problem is so multifaceted, and it’s going to take all hands on deck — no more division, no more yelling at each other from across party lines,” Woodman Miller said.
Now a parent herself, Woodman Miller knows there’s “no words” to say to a community that’s faced this kind of tragedy.
“You must grieve, you must feel this,” Woodman Miller said, adding “You are not alone.”
“To the young survivors, they are now part of a community they will be known and seen and heard and valued by,” Woodman Miller said.
