Tracy O’Carroll has told the story a thousand times. Talking to her, one wouldn’t automatically think she was a public speaker, able to communicate with thousands of people at a time. But she does, because her story is in demand — a story of love and tragedy and trying to prevent what happened to her child from ever happening to anyone’s child again.

Three years ago today, O’Carroll said goodbye to her daughter, Sarah Edwards. She told her she loved her and to drive carefully as the 18-year-old walked out. Ten minutes later, O’Carroll would get the call that would change her life forever — her daughter, distracted by a text conversation with her boyfriend, had veered across the center line on Chandler Road near Chocowinity and run beneath the rear wheels of an oncoming logging truck. She was killed instantly.

For the first time since Sarah’s death, O’Carroll and her two other daughters decorated for the holidays — the first item out of the box was Sarah’s stocking, which sent them into a new tailspin of grief.

“This year was the hardest on us. The holidays are not the same,” O’Carroll said. “I have an ache and it won’t go away. There’s a piece of me that’s gone.”

But it’s the missing piece that caused O’Carroll to go on a one-woman mission to speak out about the dangers of distracted driving. She wasn’t alone in her mission for very long, however. O’Carroll teamed up with the North Carolina State Highway Patrol the first year, with the Subway’s “W8 2 Txt” campaign last year, and now AAA North Carolina this year, to share her family’s tragedy.

In 2013, O’Carroll spoke at over 20 events, from Washington to Asheville; at the end of the month, she’s slated to speak at the Girls World Expo at the state fairgrounds. At many of these events, O’Carroll’s real-life example of the dangers of texting and driving are paired with a highway patrol obstacle course, in which teens drive a golf cart and attempt to text and drive, trying to avoid mowing down the orange warning cones lining the course. They always fail. It’s an effective message, one that O’Carroll is determined to continue imparting to North Carolina drivers.

One of the reasons it’s so effective is because O’Carroll does not mince words. Her speaking engagements are often preceded by a note home to parents about the graphic content of her message. She tells her audiences exactly what it was like to see her daughter in the morgue, wearing her favorite hoodie sweatshirt, so saturated with blood she could have wrung it out.

Even now, O’Carroll is still hearing new information about Sarah’s accident: that young volunteer EMTs who responded to the accident scene had stood, helpless with shock, because they had gone to school with Sarah — they knew her; others wrapped Sarah’s body in not just a standard sheet, but a blanket, as well.

What keeps O’Carroll going is the chance her words may prevent another needless death like Sarah’s, she said. With AAA now sending out packets of information including Sarah’s picture and story to every school system in the state, her memory remains fresh in many people’s minds.

“I don’t think I’ll ever stop,” O’Carroll said. “Unless teenagers and adults wise up. I’m not going to let them forget Sarah. Her memory is going to live on and her story is going to live on.”