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Two Years Later … Still on the Journey

by Julia "Jay" O'Brien

I have learned that as a survivor, I can be whole again.

On December 2, 2010, the man I loved to distraction sent a text message to three people saying that life was too difficult.  He turned off his phone, went out on the front porch and shot himself.  In the two years that have followed, I have learned a great deal about surviving suicide.

In the early months following his death, I was in excruciating pain … all of the time.  I felt like a fish hooked deeply and painfully.  No amount of writhing or maneuvering could free me from that pain.  I wanted to sleep, but I couldn’t.  I tried drinking, but drinking just made me sadder.  Nothing brought relief.  When I tried to think of what my future was going to be, I was overwhelmed by sadness and fear and revulsion for a life I didn’t want.  Someone (actually, Ronnie Walker) told me not to think about the future – it was excellent advice.  She told me to just try to get by minute by minute, until I could handle hour by hour.  Two years later, I am able to think weeks or even months out, but trying to plan years out just depresses me.  I have learned that’s ok, I only have to do what I can.

Several months after his death, the terrible pain started to ease.  I thought I was returning to normal.  When you’ve been so far down, each little improvement feels like a huge movement up.  Other people also saw the improvement, and some felt like I was back to my old self.  But I was not normal.  I have learned that normal, if it returns, takes a long, long time.  And that however long it takes, you have to accept that and work within your new limitations to get through.

I have seen that tiny disappointments can now result in emotional meltdowns and days and days of depression.  My resiliency is not what it was.  I had always been cheerful and optimistic, but eventually after the loss, to protect myself against disappointment, I began to imagine the worst and plan for it.  I wasn’t obsessing about the worst; I was just preparing for it.  If the worst didn’t happen, it was a relief instead of a crushing disappointment.  Viewing the world that way works against my natural personality, but it allows me to function.  Some people find it disturbing, especially if they knew me before, but I’ve learned to do what works for me.

From Our Forum: Black Friday

by Audrey Crilley 

"My son’s nutcrackers decorate the mantle. Nothing else is really needed."

It’s the day after Thanksgiving. Known as Black Friday to retailers, the economy and bargain hunters. To Suicide Survivors it is just another Black Day we move through without someone very dear that we lost in an unimaginable way. 

This Thanksgiving I reminded myself that I am thankful for having my youngest son Adam in my life for 22 years. That I would rather have those 22 years with him than not to have had him at all. I am thankful for my surviving sons as they make me want to be strong. I give thanks for the friends and family who love and stick by me. After my tragic loss I am forever thankful for this forum as it gives me a place to speak, to be heard and to be understood. Alliance of Hope has been my lifeline and I am at a point in my life where I can listen and try to offer compassion and understanding as well. I seek now to listen more as I realize what a gift that can be to others.

This weekend I decorate for the holidays. It is another sign of my survival. My son’s nutcrackers decorate the mantle. Nothing else is really needed. No reason to add to it as each piece is a reminder of him and the love and joy he brought us. He is always with us and we celebrate him all year round.

This Black Friday I light a candle as I do every day. I give thanks for Adam and my surviving sons, for true friends and loving family, and for the AOH community of support. I am a suicide survivor and I am as loving as I am strong. I’ve come a long way and know others have too. So here’s to us...the compassionate and strong survivors who hope to help others make it through the Blackest of Days.

 

This essay was originally posted on the Alliance of Hope Forum for Suicide Loss Survivors and was reprinted with permission of the author.

From Our Forum: Thanksgiving

by DSM

This will be my first without my husband and also without my mom. I recently got back from my son-in-law's funeral and while I was there, I received a text message from my nephew. It really pulled at my heart strings and made me do some deep thinking. He said that he was very proud of me for making the trip alone – a first for me flying somewhere by myself.

He said that he was worried about me after my mom passed, but then he became really fearful for my mental well-being after my husband completed, shortly after mom's death. He said that my husband would be so very proud of me that I am making those very difficult first steps and trying to find my way in this new world.

The fact that I was able to travel by myself was a big step for me in gaining back a tiny sense of self. He made reference to the fact that he knows for sure that my husband would want me to thrive, as that man lived more in his lifetime than most people do in 10 lifetimes. He said that my husband would expect nonetheless from me. He said that I should honor my husband's wishes and thrive and live life to the fullest.

I always remember my husband telling our grandkids, friends etc. that we should always "REACH FOR THE STARS." Personally I feel like I am just going through the motions, still taking one day at a time because if I think too far past today, I start getting freaked out, and thinking about the future just makes me sad.

No one in my family really knows what to do for the holiday season.  I think they are all tiptoeing around me for now because they don't know what to say or what to do. We typically get together, so I thought a lot about it the last few days and decided that I was going to have Thanksgiving at my house. One of my sisters and her husband are going to come stay with me for a few days and help me do the setting up and cooking. Although I really don't need the help, it will be nice to have someone here. I figured that if I didn't do anything I would just sit here like a bump on a log and be miserable, sad and cry all day.

For me, working through my grief, staying busy really helps me mentally. I think my family is relieved that I volunteered to have it at my house. Maybe I will be too exhausted to think. That is my hope anyway. with cooking for at least 20 people. Good thing is I get to keep the leftovers ha ha ha – just what my big ole butt needs NOTTTT lol ...

 

This post was originally published on the Alliance of Hope Forum for Suicide Loss Survivors.

Remembering Loved Ones During the Holidays

by Fr. Charles Rubey

As long as there are rituals these loved ones will always be a part of our families and part of a family system. They are gone but not forgotten.

As we enter the month of November, we begin the holiday season.  For grieving people, this is a very painful time of year because a loved one has died.  When a loved one has died from suicide the family system has been permanently altered by a seemingly senseless act that with the proper intervention might have been prevented.

I am a firm believer that families that grieve together stand a better chance of coming to grips with the grief as compared to family members who go off and grieve on their own.  With the holidays approaching, I suggest that families gather together and have some type of ritual to remember that loved one who found life so painful that they could no longer endure the pain of mental anguish.  The ritual is a vehicle whereby a loved one can remain a part of a family, albeit in a different type of presence.  

Their presence is more mystical than physical, but they are present all the same.  They remain a part of a family system even though they have gone to the hereafter.  They still have a name and are loved by the survivors and have been a part of a family so why shouldn't they have a part in family festivities?  Will there be tears as they are remembered?  Probably yes.  Tears are OK.  Will these tears ruin the festivities for the rest of the participants?  I hope not. The alternative is to fake it through and not mention this loved one's name even though this name is on every person's mind and this person is very much missed.

How Suicide Loss Prepared Me for a Cancer Diagnosis

by Susan Auerbach

I was in a bookstore when I got the call on my cell. I knew it had to be bad news if the doctor was calling me herself after the breast biopsy. I stepped outside and sat down. I heard “definitely malignant” and “I’m sorry” before the call ended. I teared up but didn’t break down. What do I do now? Call my husband. Go back in the store and get a book on breast cancer.

The dreaded C-word. The word that older relatives, even some doctors, wouldn’t say 40 or 50 years ago when my mother, aunt, and grandparents had it. In my family, that was how you died. 

“It’s a sock in the gut, isn’t it?” a friend wrote, recalling the shock of her own diagnosis. 

Yes, but my shock absorbers have changed. The worst thing that can happen has already happened to me. My child’s suicide is a nightmare that will always be with me. Cancer, at least at this point, is an unwelcome guest—a condition to be managed. We each have our own private calculus. My instinct on hearing the diagnosis was to take charge, stay calm. I would not catastrophize, I told myself, unless or until there was reason to do so. I would try not to act out of fear.

The first few weeks after the diagnosis, I felt some of the same vulnerability and reached for some of the same solace as I did after Noah’s suicide. I was tired and slept a lot, while also having trouble sleeping. I took one day at a time. I craved comfort food, like big bowls of Japanese ramen. I prayed for healing. I felt the concern of friends and family who fretted: "You shouldn’t have to deal with this right now." I told my son, Ben, that I wanted him home for Thanksgiving and for my lumpectomy the following day. He came, as he came so often to visit us in the year after Noah’s death. Much of this felt familiar.

Unlike after Noah’s suicide, after the diagnosis I welcomed distraction and positive thinking rather than crying fits. I didn’t feel the need to find a support group or talk a lot with other breast cancer survivors. I knew that everyone handles the diagnosis differently, just as everyone handles grief differently. In 2013, I wanted it known that Noah died by suicide and that we welcomed support. In 2016, I wanted to keep the cancer news more private because I didn’t feel like a cancer patient and didn’t want to have to deal with a lot of well-wishers eager to help. With the suicide, many people said there were no words, but with a breast cancer diagnosis, people seem to know the drill. After all, one in nine American women get breast cancer while only 13.4 of every 100,000 Americans die by suicide. The C-word is a familiar visitor, no longer so fearful, but the S-word remains laden with stigma, ignorance, and horror.

I’d never had surgery or general anesthesia before. In preparation, I listened to a guided meditation on visualizing successful surgery that suggested imagining everyone who loves you, living or dead, as a “band of angels” watching over you in the operating room. Thinking of my dead son and parents wishing me well made me cry so I decided that the living were enough to protect me. 

I’ve been lucky with this cancer, considering. It’s small, early, treatable. I have good insurance and encouraging, competent doctors. I don’t need chemo—the other dreaded C-word, reminding me of my mother’s shrunken face at 47, cheekbones protruding, gray tufts sprouting on her head like a baby bird. If I’d had to have chemo or my prognosis was worse, I’d more likely feel like a cancer patient, more afraid and sorry for myself--at which point, maybe I would seek a support group.

In the desert two days before surgery, I saw the biggest rainbow I’ve ever seen. Its perfect arc spanned the sky with thick bands of primary colors, like a child’s drawing. While meditating by the beach on the day before my chemo consultation, I sensed an unfamiliar deep, teal-colored light behind my eyes. I’ll take both of these signs as Noah’s blessing:  You can do this, Mom.

 

Susan Auerbach is twice a suicide loss survivor and the author of I’ll Write Your Name on Every Beach: A Mother’s Quest for Comfort, Courage, and Clarity After Suicide Loss(Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2017) which can be purchased here. This article is reprinted from her blog, Walking the Mourner’s Path After a Child’s Suicide. © Susan Auerbach 2017

We Never Mentioned His Name

by Ronnie Walker MS, LCPC

November has arrived and with it, the holiday season. On November 23, we will celebrate Thanksgiving here in the United States. Thanksgiving signals the beginning of a holiday season that can provide additional challenges for those who are grieving, especially when loss is new. Celebrations bring to the foreground that a beloved member of the family is missing. Many survivors tell us they fear or dread the holidays. Others say they wish they could hibernate until the whole season is over. 

This morning, I recalled memories of the first Thanksgiving after my stepson’s death. Still raw with grief, my husband and I flew south to join in a gathering at his brother’s house. Family members reunited there, Wednesday through Sunday, with the highlight being of course, the Thanksgiving meal. Three months earlier, these same people had gathered together in grief at our home in Illinois and at a memorial service where attendees overflowed the church.

I recall bits and pieces of that Thanksgiving week, back in 1995. I know who was there. I recall helping to straighten the house and set the table for Thursday’s meal. I recall the children -- nieces and nephews -- all younger than ten. I recall making a treasure hunt for the children and bringing their Christmas gifts along on the plane. And I recall the house where we stayed. 

But most of all, I remember that over those five days, no one mentioned this boy who was so dearly loved. We did not talk about the fact that he had died. For me, it became the elephant in the room. In every room, every day that week.