Resources on Changing Grief, Embracing Hope after Suicide

Life continues to evolve 2 years after the loss of my child. Here are a few ways I've changed and some resources for hope.

1.      Redefining. I don’t know who I am in the world. I feel lost, abandoned, and sometimes without purpose. I know it’s important for me to find that passion I once held for animals and people in need. I am far from apathetic about issues I encounter. In fact, after 2 years  into my loss and just a few months of losing my big sister, I can barely cope with events or circumstances I feel are tragic. I believe we who grieve experience a heightened state of fear and sensitivity until we are able to release it. Aside from becoming more emotional and sensitive, I feel as if I will return to being functional and even happy one day. So, I don’t push myself. Even if a child or family member moves away, or your heart suffers from an empty nest, we must redefine ourselves and many times over our lifetimes. Where do we start and how do we keep up the momentum or hope? Life takes work. Brain training takes on many forms and it has helped me move from my Emotional mind to my Logical mind.

2.     Purpose. As stated above, I find difficulty in choosing how to live a meaningful and purpose-driven life as I used to. For some reason, I now equate my previous passion and determination with my loss, as if I lived and functioned only for my daughter. This is simply not true. I have other family members and friends I care deeply for. But, when I’m alone and especially when I’m sad or nostalgic, the feeling of loss and lack of purpose arises quickly. An example of this change is times in which I look at old photos, even of me as a child. I wonder what it was all for if the end result would be a lifetime of pain lies ahead. I will never truly heal from my daughter’s suicide but I have learned to live with the pain. I can control my reactions better, now and hope to see the light.

3.     Stuff. In reflecting on purpose and passion, I see around my home the items, trinkets, memories, ashes…of people who I have lost. In a surge of strength and a desire to remove my surrounding memorabilia of the lost, I want to create space that is solely mine, or at least honors the living or helps me remind myself that it’s okay to create a “new me” instead of walking into every room of my house and seeing constant reminders of them. I have not created this space because, frankly, I’m afraid to. I feel guilty and overwhelmed with their Stuff. I don’t want to focus on it while redefining myself in the world. I believe that transition will come in time. I want to know it's okay. 

4.      Loneliness. I feel lonely a lot of the time. I miss the days when my home was filled with kids, friends, and family. I used to become abandoned in the first year of loss. I was lonely, the phone stopped ringing, my daughter’s friends moved on as they should. I realize now that I miss my daughter and sister. I don’t mind being alone most of the time. I know when a wave of grief is coming by my search to bond with others. The paradox is that life now is about a new me and strengthening my role as a mother of a son, a friend, and so on. I do miss my friends and my daughter and sister’s friends but I now recognize that the loneliness is the loss, not the lack of social interaction. Social interaction, I believe, is paramount in keeping busy and feeling useful in this time. Empathy has proven to heal us. I believe I must keep going.

5.     Cry. I help myself to cry when I am alone, feel grief and have the privacy to mourn. I learned not to dive so deeply into the depths of question after question about my family members’ passing. In doing so, I have learned how to avoid. If the pain is with me, I try to make myself cry, and feel that it helps me release pain. Choosing time to grieve and when not to fall in too deeply is a helpful tool.

6.      Friendship. My friendships and the dynamics of the many friends of my daughter have changed. Some  of my friends have been suffering for quite a while with their own issues after my daughter’s passing.  I no longer feel as if they need to pick up the phone first or take care of me. I simply need to reach out more and be more social. When friends confide in me, I am useful, I have meaning, I am needed. It’s hard for people to confide in me because they say they feel as if my pain is “bigger” than their issues so they feel as if they should not reach out. Reach out.

7.      Presence. The pain I carry today and the thread I’ve heard expressed by others who have lost close loved ones dissipates in moments in which I can be Present. When I feel alone or lost, when I feel depressed or in pain, I distract myself if the time or place is not conducive to a good cry. Loss like this will never heal completely. But, focusing on the Now is all there is. Do not confuse being Present to mean that we don’t remember. It’s okay to enjoy company and walk into the bathroom to cry or take a moment if needed. It’s okay to cry at a party. But, if you can look into another human’s eyes and just Be, the love you feel for them heals.

8.     Guilt. I believe almost all parents feel guilty about a child’s passing. I believe that once we own that guilt (although it’s almost never the fault of the parents or others who feel that they should have done more), we can move forward a step. The guilt will stay until I choose for it not to. Whatever doesn’t serve me must pass. Guilt is a barrier that I have not overcome yet. According to many books and testimonies, guilt is the most damaging and greatest barrier to overcome.

      If you or someone you know are thinking of suicide, 

text HELLO to 741741 or call the National Suicide Hotline 

1-800-273-8255. Please Stay.

9.    Thoughts. For 2 years, I could not pick up a book to concentrate. I can’t always remember people’s names. I think the most opposite and intrusive thoughts I have never had. I hear of stories of mothers who don’t talk to or want their daughters and I see moms and daughters in stores together and I feel jealous. I envy them. I have not experienced envy in the past. Now, the intrusive thoughts have shifted away from question after question about what I did wrong and they will shift again. I tell my Self to be happy for them as I used to be. This takes work. I can’t remember a lifetime of stories at the moment. I know this too will change slowly. I believe that in my case, medication for depression is helping me through and I feel okay about taking it until I feel I can cope better.

The goal in my life is to fulfill my own needs of belonging, presence, expressing my grief, and climbing out of despair that leads to guilt and shame. I hope the links in this writing will help others. I want to talk about my daughter’s and my sister’s wild, free, funny, endearing personalities and to tell stories about them. I also want to hear stories of people others have lost. One day, I hope to tell more stories to remind myself of the beautiful years I spent with them. The key word is hope.

One Year After Losing my Daughter to Suicide

Unedited from original 2016

Let’s get the questions out of the way first. No, I don’t feel any better. No, I’m not unusual in this. No, this is not a quick process and it doesn’t ease up after 11 months. No, I did not enjoy the holidays, even with family as there was a clear and significant part of our family missing. Yes, I’m getting help but grief has no timeline and no rules. The only healthy thing I would advise that everyone should do is to stay alive. It’s not a matter of what you want to do for yourself, especially as a parent. I stay alive for my family. Yes, suicidal thoughts are normal. No, they don’t last forever. No, having another child doesn’t help and people who have lost their only child, although I try to connect and even replace all of her needs by transferring them to my son, I believe I have done more harm than good to him. People who comment that at least I have another child is like erasing her from 22 years of our lives. My son is different with different needs and I focus on him as I feel I’ve always done. Just as I focus on my relationships with my family and partner.

I remember things now but almost never know the date. I don’t remember people’s birthdays that I clearly remembered in the past. I don’t remember the first 6 months or about after her passing from the physical. I don’t feel the immense and excruciating physical pain that rocked my body in the second and third months and I don’t wake up every day with panic but the anxiety presents.

 I feel as if I’m not rushing myself but failing at healing so that I can honor Taylor. I want to educate and raise funds for Borderline Personality Disorder and teach about mental health. I want to get a good job first for a year and have no interest in doing it because I feel like a massive weight is sitting on my chest still. I feel useless and hopeless. I tried to learn astrology, I tried to learn about crystals, I tried the I Ching and tarot cards, Christianity and I read about other religions to find out how others see death in the physical and how to reach her in her spirit form. None of it helps. Counseling has helped with other relationships and group meetings are horrible for me. People are “stuck” for years and years and I cannot live like this forever. I’ll give myself the time now but in this time I suffer with my Self. I do not feel useful and do not want to hear that people need me. My immediate and caustic response is that she needed me and I failed. I know that’s not the “right” perspective but good luck changing a parent’s process.

I’m not even close to the same optimistic, funny, hard-lined animal advocate. I don’t blame myself for focusing on Africa but I’m completely different now. I don’t feel hope except for my son and partner. I don’t feel happy inside. I am not optimistic. I am depressed and I believe still in shock. I do take medication and don’t care what people think about it.

I hang my head every single time I see my parents or her friends, feeling I took her away from them even though I know it’s not true. Stop giving me logic. I can be logical on some days and even for a week. But, there is nothing I can say to my crying parents who are now losing my big sister and their daughter to cancer. I am trying so hard not to have regrets about her and love her and help her transition peacefully. That’s all I can do.

I ask questions every day and try to go back and examine what happened in those last months and days and I want to know why no one told me, why I felt anxious and didn’t know why, why no doctor or counselor ever asked the right questions or even mentioned BPD. I am angry sometimes and I’m scared I’ll always feel this way. I want to go back and talk to her about the diagnosis and to the doctor who she said made her feel like there wasn’t much hope for her for at least a year. She wasn’t talking to me about that at the time. I want to expose her abuser because he hasn’t changed a bit, even after cutting her down. He was the last person she spoke to after she tried to call me. He abused her until the end and she stepped off the chair. How can you possibly think a year of this trauma would be better?

 

I know all of the rational answers and I don’t want to hear anyone mitigate the process I’m going through. The best answer I’ve received to date when I have had to tell people she passed is “I’m sorry.” That’s it. People don’t understand it and I’m ok with that. I understand. I’m not holding anyone accountable but myself. But, for me this is what an almost year looks like and this is where I am. I am angry, fearful, in despair, selfish, without an ounce of self-love (I don’t even understand what that means), and in physical pain. The only advice I can give now to anyone is to please phone a friend or 10 friends if it means you’d take your life. I understand completely why you want to if you’re suicidal. It makes sense to me. But, things will change and suicide is permanent and ruins the lives of those who will stick by you and will suffer. I won’t let anyone suffer for me the way I suffer for Taylor.

Inside my head I rage, I scream, I cry, I flail. My mind still cannot comprehend what has taken me a year to understand. I am in shock, I torture myself with questions, and no I am not better. No one who has lost a child has EVER told me that they are “better” after the first year. I heard it’s the worst but you don’t get “better.” The most I can do is wait…feel useless waiting…for the day that I can pick myself up and create a new “me,” which is the last thing I want to do.

I want to see my son happy and successful. I want a better relationship with my parents and partner. I want to WANT to do something good again. I want to WANT to live fully again. She cried as I held her and kissed her head. She said, “I don’t want you to leave but I’m proud of you.” I said, “I’ll cancel right now. I will not get on that plane if you just say the word.” She wanted me to go and walked away a little teary. She could not reach me as she was taking her life. I can’t reach her physically and a year is not even close to feeling a bit better.

 

I’m not writing this for sympathy, empathy or through the Ego. I’m writing to tell you that if someone is suffering, support them like I have been supported and don’t do it for that first week or month. So many friends have returned to their lives because Taylor was not their daughter. I understand that. But, if you do make the commitment to support someone, remember you’re walking with them and possibly holding them up or allowing them to hold on for one more day, for life…for hope. This writing is an example of one way I try to “fix” people. I want to help people and when people call me with problems because it gives me a sense of purpose. I just couldn’t fix her from Africa or for 22 years of her life. I will sit with my pain until it no longer serves me. I’m told that suffering is our greatest teacher. I’ll let you know when I figure out that lesson. But, it’s not after a year.