BATON ROUGE, La. (BR Proud) — In honor of Women’s History Month, BR Proud and Healthy Blue will spotlight four women, over the next four weeks, who have been nominated by the community as “Remarkable Women.”
Dr. Terri L. Byrd is the first finalist of 2021. Her story is one of selflessness and inspiration. We caught up with Dr. Byrd on her 55th birthday, as she gathered with friends and family to devote her time to one of the area’s more vulnerable populations.
“Generally, we expect something for our birthday, but for my birthday, I want to give something back,” Dr. Byrd told BR Proud. Friends and family came together on a misty Saturday morning to help Dr. Byrd celebrate her birthday.
“We’re going to pass out masks,” said Dr. Byrd. “We’re going to pass out hand sanitizer and a treat in a goodie bag and we’re going to give that to the homeless.”
Fifty-five bags for her 55th birthday. Selfless and remarkable. Traits Dr. Byrd said she gets from her mother. “She would help anybody with anything. We didn’t have a lot. We were very poor, but the one thing we had was a heart, a love for people and selflessness,” said Dr. Byrd.
Outside of being passionate about assisting the homeless during a dire time of need, Dr. Byrd routinely gives back through her non-profit, Daughters of Zion United.
“We work very closely with the nursing home, Baton Rouge Heritage nursing homes,” said Dr. Byrd. “We couldn’t go into the nursing home (due to the pandemic), but we wanted them to know that we had not forgotten about them, and so we took gifts – for the workers, frontline workers, for the residents. It was just an honor to do that.”
Daughters of Zion United also hosts an annual Mother’s Day breakfast. “We have a prayer breakfast and we serve over 200 women. We do a continental breakfast. We give them gifts, we give them flowers,” said Dr. Byrd. “We started that because there are quite a few women in the community that are without their mother and it’s a very difficult time for them around Mother’s Day, and so I thought, it was a great idea to bring women together to love on each other, to encourage each other, to motivate each other.”
Dr. Byrd also recently undertook a new project and said she is ready to share it with the online community. “I’m excited about my new podcast called ‘My Single Life.’ Living my life, but living it God’s way. It’s created a community for singles to talk about real life issues. So it’s real people, real issues, real conversation,” said Byrd.
The podcast, My Single Life, launched on Dr. Byrd’s 55th birthday and is now available on YouTube as well.
Dr. Byrd also works for the Louisiana Department of Education. She manages funding for after-school programs across the state.
