Mrs. Tonia Patrice Jackson

Our beloved Tonia Patrice Jackson passed away peacefully in her sleep in her home on November 24, 2022, after a nine-month battle with acute myeloid leukemia. Tonia was born on September 2, 1967, to James and Patricia (Higgs) Duncan in Springfield, Missouri. She was the fourth of five children born to Patricia and grew up surrounded by a host of family and friends. Her childhood homes were situated near Silver Springs Park, a historic fixture in the Black community in Springfield. She was a member of Gibson Chapel Presbyterian Church. After graduating from Central High School in 1985 she attended Southwest Missouri State University and later earned her Associate's Degree in Early Childhood Education from Tulsa Community College. In the fall of 1991, she met her future husband Eric Jackson while he was on a relocation visit to Springfield. Little did either of them know that they would be united in marriage for the rest of their life. They wed on August 13, 1994, and would embark on the journey of a lifetime. Their journey would have stops in Dayton, Ohio where their first daughter Natalie was born on September 7, 1995, and Tulsa, Oklahoma where their second daughter Keely was born on December 3, 1997. Their last stop is Dacula, Georgia where she became a member of Christ the King Church. Next to her faith in God, the family was the most important thing in her life. She would forego her education and career pursuit to become a full-time wife, mother, nurse, counselor, chef, gardener, decorator, fashion consultant, and every other label that comes with the job of making a family functional and house a home. She embraced the responsibility and wore it with pride. Her influence on people extended far beyond her immediate household. She was all those things to many family members and friends. Tonia had an array of hobbies like watching movies and TV, traveling, tanning on the beach, cooking, gardening, decorating, socializing with family and friends, garage sales, and fashion. She loved all of those, but nothing gave her greater joy than being a loving, supportive wife to Eric and an all-everything Mom to Natalie and Keely. She was their quiet voice of encouragement, an attentive ear, shoulder to cry on, loudest cheerleader, and all-around best wife, mother, and friend they could ever have. She loved competing with Eric and Natalie as they watched game shows, marveling in complete awe at Keely’s latest artwork or her cooking and listening patiently to their rants and storytelling. She’d do it all with a smile or hysterical laughter while masking the pain caused by the Sickle Cell Disease that challenged her everyday life. She was a humble warrior, a Super Woman; truly One of One. Tonia leaves to cherish her memory: her husband Eric, her daughters Natalie and Keely (and her Rottweiler Moses), her mother Patricia, her sisters Cheryl (Lynn) Clay, Karen Tureaud, and Audrey Duncan, her Aunt Ferba Lofton and a host of nieces, nephews, great nieces, and nephews, cousins, in-laws and friends. She was preceded in death by her father James and brother Darrell McCullum. Services entrusted to Gregory B. Levett & Sons Funeral Homes and Crematory Lawrenceville 770-338-5558

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Mrs. Tonia Patrice Jackson

September 2, 1967 - November 24, 2022