I try not to think about it too much, but when the thought of losing my husband in an untimely manner creeps in, tears spring to my eyes. We’ve had our ups and downs, but overall, my husband is my touchstone through and through. I can’t imagine doing any chunk of life without him, especially as a mother to a young son. Every time I hear about a widowed mother, my heart sinks for her — she’s now got the hardest job in the world squarely on her shoulders. One grieving woman, however, turned her pain into purpose and has decided to honor the memory of her late fiancé by bringing a little piece of him back into the world, via his biological son.
Casey Lyons lost her journalist fiancé, Dylan Lyons, to gun violence when he was on the job.
The Florida reporter was on the scene of an earlier shooting when the gunman returned to the scene of the crime, taking Dylan Lyons’ life in 2023, along with that of a 9-year-old child, according to NBC News at the time. His coworker Jesse Walden was also on the scene and was seriously injured but survived, and described him as someone who would be immensely missed.
“You know Dylan was a reporter I work with every day,” Walden said, according to the outlet, from his hospital bed. “We were best friends.”
Of course, at the epicenter of grief stood Casey Lyons, who was left reeling from the sudden and untimely death of the self-described love of her life. Although the years since his death have been tumultuous at best for the widow, on March 19, 2026, three years after his death, Casey welcomed Dylan’s first and only child via surrogate.
“In the Jewish religion, when someone passes away, you name your children after them, whether it’s a first name or middle name,” Casey Lyons told People in an exclusive interview. “I felt like giving our son his name was the most beautiful way to honor his memory.”
Casey told the magazine she fell in love the moment they “locked eyes” at a Gainesville TV station in 2020, where she was a producer.
“I would find any excuse to spark a conversation with him at work,” she said. “Over time, we became close friends, but I knew I could never be just friends with Dylan Lyons. I was head over heels for him.”
They had their fairy tale love story, falling in love hard and quickly, and the two talked about kids early on.
Casey said the two were waiting to start a family until she was fully converted to the Jewish faith so they could raise them in Judaism. After Dylan’s death, Casey leaned on Dylan’s parents, with whom she moved in and still lives today. Though grief nearly swallowed her whole, working with a counselor helped her decide to live in honor of her husband. That dedication led her to start trying for the family they had always dreamed of.
Luckily, the family had the foresight to have Dylan’s DNA collected shortly after he died.
“To retrieve viable sperm after death, it has to be collected within 24-36 hours,” she explained. “We had to wait until Dylan’s body was released because of the investigation. That took about 24 hours, then we had to find a urologist who would perform the procedure.”
The road to baby Dylan’s birth was a bumpy one, with several health obstacles that surfaced.
After the “stressful” retrieval, Casey had to endure five painful egg retrievals and two failed implantations.
“There were days I would cry because I wasn’t sure if I would ever become a mom,” she told People. She finally learned on July 18, 2025, however, that a transfer was officially successful. Now, her baby boy is just over 1 month old and is growing beautifully. The new mom says she plans on telling him all about his father and will answer any questions he may eventually have.
“This is what we always wanted together,” she said. “However, Dylan is very much alive in my heart and now in our son’s heart as well. He will always be with us.”
