Dr. Irene Weaver Duckett-McGruder

Irene always held positions (eventually creating a flourishing career) in areas which promoted good mental health, counseling, mentoring and therapeutic technique and services which were cutting edge, creative and modern. From counseling with a focus on Early Childhood Development with Dede Wallace Centers to Drug and Alcohol therapy and counseling with (MADAP) Meharry Alcohol and Drug Program at Meharry Medical Center. Irene conducted many presentations and workshops working with one of the Centers of Excellence at Tennessee State University.  She also worked with the Dual Diagnosis Program with the State of Tennessee.  Illustrious, industrious, inspirational Irene was also awarded a contract with the State of Tennessee for Employee Relation Issues and Resolution Services provided by the State for all employees. Irene also taught Psychology at her alma mater, Tennessee State University, where the students were greeted with positive adjectives to their name. For instance, "jocular" Joseph on the initial class to lighten the moment of first day impressions. Her entrepreneurial pursuits were realized by starting I. Weaver Associates Consulting, that included The Wellness Center, contracts with mandatory counseling sessions for first time DUI offenders. Always working with the public in one way or another, she touched and blessed numerous individuals in her many years of providing counseling, teaching, treatment and therapy in an effort to restore each individual to wholeness.

Irene loved her family enormously, immediate and extended. She is the mother of four children with the union of first marriage, Marshall Weaver, I, Marsha W. Weaver, Kim M. Weaver, Marshall Weaver, II and the late James David Weaver.  Grandchildren Mardae Allen Weaver, Jayla Nycole Weaver, great grandchildren, Memshalyah, Emunah, Orzora and Mardae Yi Weaver. 

Irene was very spiritual and committed to her church relationships. She enjoyed travel, shopping, and was a foodie before it was a thing. A fun fact in addition to a beautiful soprano singing voice, in her youth she played drums and was a pianist through middle age, not known why she stopped playing. 

Those are just some of the pinpoints of her 89 years which were interspersed with some months of illness here and there, but she always bounced back.