Jennifer Rae Anderson Van Wagoner

Jennifer Rae Anderson Van Wagoner died August 11, 2025 in Rita Ranch, Tucson, Arizona. She was born December 5, 1986, in Salt Lake City, Utah, to James Kendall and Susan Anderson.

She grew up in Taylorsville, Utah. As a diligent straight-A student, she excelled in her honors and gifted classes. In her youth, she enjoyed playing soccer, clarinet and piano. As a teenager, she worked as a lifeguard at the Taylorsville pool and competed on the high school swim team. She was a math whiz in high school and mastered AP calculus, but she really fell in love with biology. Continuing as a straight-A student and just three years after completing high school, she graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in biology and a minor in chemistry. She considered continuing her education and becoming a pharmacist. She briefly worked as a Lab Analyst for Nelson Laboratories, before transitioning to working as a Microbiologist and Chemist at Nature’s Way.

She married Jacob Van Wagoner on December 27, 2008 in the Salt Lake Temple. They moved around from Provo, to Chandler, Arizona, and then to Austin, Texas. Finally moving back to Orem, Utah and purchasing a home in Vineyard in 2014. And in 2018, they sold their house in Vineyard and embarked on another chapter of life in Tucson, Arizona. They had four wonderful children, Cora, Dallin, Emily and Alex. The couple recently divorced.

Jennifer loved watching movies, crocheting, bowling, and finding good deals. Being a very sweet person herself, she loved cheesecake and eating and sharing candy, of which she always had a good supply nearby.

Jennifer suffered for years from undiagnosed Graves’ disease, the symptoms of which greatly complicated her life. She nearly completed a master’s degree in medical diagnostics at Arizona State but dropped out with one last class to go because she couldn’t think. She had lost a lot of weight and was running high electric bills trying to get cooled off. These should have been the first hints of the condition. On one occasion, while severely dehydrated and suffering other symptoms of a possible thyroid storm she was admitted for evaluation and released with a diagnosis of psychosis. What she really had was hyperactive delirium. She subsequently went missing for a week and thankfully was found in Tulare, California, where she was treated for a thyroid storm and finally diagnosed with Graves’ disease. When her thyroid was radiated there was hope she would be well again, but that was not the case. Her medicine never seemed to get balanced right. Recently a scan showed a lesion on her adrenal gland and she was not well.

Jennifer was devoted to her children. She greatly regretted that her medical conditions and treatments caused her to miss out on spending more time with them. They were the center of her life.

Jennifer is survived by her children Cora, Dallin, Emily and Alex Van Wagoner, her parents Kendall and Susan Anderson, her grandparents, Jim and Charlotte Anderson [Alberta, Canada], sister Linda (Joel) Andrews, brothers James (Amber), Raymond (Shannon), Paul (Kelsey), Michael (Erika), and Derek (Rebecca) Anderson, and 16 nieces and nephews, many uncles, aunts and cousins. Preceded in death by grandparents Robert and Carol Warburton, Loran and Wilma Reynolds, also by uncle Bryce Holmes Anderson.

Funeral services will be held at 11:00 am Saturday August 30, at 5233 South 3200 West, Taylorsville, UT with a visitation from 9:30 to 10:45. Interment will be at Taylorsville City cemetery Zoom link for the funeral https://zoom.us/j/94303995126 Meeting ID: 943 0399 5126 there is no Passcode, so if anyone clicks the link or uses the Meeting ID to manually "Join Meeting," all is set