Jayme Lynn Dolan

Victoria native Jayme Dolan, founder of the nonprofit Golden Groove, died in hospice care Thursday at age 43.

Jayme Dolan struggled most of her adult life with complications from Type 2 diabetes, but despite that, she always made a point to help and bring light to others.

“She was one of those people people want to talk to,” Jayme Dolan’s husband, James Dolan said. “People would go to her when they had a problem and she would listen and try to help them.”

In the last couple of years of her life, she became an active member of the Victoria community through the Innovation Collective and her nonprofit Golden Groove, which aimed at helping provide activities to seniors and connecting them to other groups.

From the moment Karissa Winters, Innovation Collective’s Victoria community lead, met Jayme Dolan at one of the organization’s Coffee and Concepts events, she inspired her and others.

“I’m deeply saddened by her passing,” Winters said. “She literally touched everyone she encountered.”

Despite the struggles with her diabetes that made her blind and forced her on dialysis, she could be positive and see people’s character better than those with sight, Winters said.

“She would always tell me how much I inspired her, but to me, I was always inspired by her ability to stay positive and willingness to help others despite the challenges she had herself,” she said.

Winters was particularly impressed with how she tried to utilize her nonprofit to help those alone and isolated. She said Dolan felt when a person stops moving and enjoying life, they start to die.

“She leaves an incredible legacy,” Winters said. “True greatness lies in inspiring others and she impacted so many people just through the energy she had. I will carry her with me the rest of my life.”

For Juan Flores, a friend and Golden Grove board member, Dolan was the epitome of how far human strength could go because of how much she endured health-wise.

“She wasn’t the kind of person to be a Debbie Downer,” Flores said.

She kept that energy up until the last week of her life, Flores and Dolan’s husband said.

The death of her mother, Charlene Pennington, was hard on her as it happened during the period she was undergoing rehab from a leg amputation that resulted from complications from her diabetes.

She would receive further negative news as both her hands and her other leg would have to be amputated and rather than go through with it, she decided to go on hospice.

For Dolan, the one thing he will miss with his wife’s passing is the friend who always made him laugh and could talk to her about anything.

“Even when she entered hospice, she kept the same positive energy,” he said. “When you are with someone that long, they just stay with you. Her voice is going to stay with me the rest of my life.”

For Flores, he is happy that his friend is no longer in pain and hopes she is happy where she is now.

“There was a pink sunset last night, like the color of her hair, and we all thought that it was her saying goodbye and that she’s going to be alright,” Winters said.

There will be no service or funeral for Dolan out of respect for her wishes, her husband said.

Golden Groove will close as Dolan’s husband does not have the energy his wife did to run it in addition to his full-time job.

Dolan is preceded in death by her mother. She is survived by her husband, father Don Pennington and her brother Wesley Pennington.

Services Entrusted to Victoria Mortuary & Cremation Services. 

Article written by Kyle Cotton in Victoria Advocate. 

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