My mom turned fifty one 21 days before she killed herself…. How sick, to murder oneself. Ugh. It’s so… abrasive.
Fifty one — we called it “Fifty Fun.” I coined the term, but Mom thought Scott made it up. Scott & I laughed about that at the time. She just adored Scott; he reminded him a lot of herself, with his optimism and lighthearted demeanor. Now these similarities scare me about Scott sometimes… Isn’t that sad?
“She was supposed to be ‘fifty fun’ not ‘ fifty done,’”I’ve often repeated to myself this year.
Grief rips apart one’s sense of time and space. It’s been almost a year since my mom died, but it feels like it’s been a decade. Others think the year went by fast. It’s seemed like an eternity. Pieces of me feel like I never had a Mom — I feel so far from her, it’s like she was part of someone else’s life. It couldn’t possibly been my life.
The sun and the moon and the tides testify to time’s reality, but it’s simultaneously a construct. A way to measure our days, with seasons to mark the harvests and the plentiful and the droughts.
Time moves quickly when we enjoy our lives, slowly when we’re bored, and halts when we’re suffering.
Suffering refines and illuminates what matters, while healing ensures one concludes with the right perspective.
It seems as though nothing matters when one’s suffering. For example — from my skewed and insecure perspective — nothing I’ve done matters.
It didn’t matter that I loved Patrick.
It didn’t matter that I loved my Momma.
It doesn’t matter that I love my grandparents.
It doesn’t matter that I loved my former pastors.
My kindness and my love, in the end, didn’t matter to any of them. They’re still gone. They’re still dead, in one way or another.
The letters I wrote them didn’t matter. My forgiveness doesn’t matter. My kindness doesn’t matter.
I can do all the “right” things and remain punished by others’ decisions. In a sense, nothing I do matters.
Nothing I did matters.
They chose this, they did this, and nothing I did deserved that.
So… nothing I do matters.
* * * *
And yet… it all matters. Maybe it didn’t matter to them, maybe it did in some ways, but ultimately it didn’t.
Healing reminds me that it all mattered — it all matters.
I’ve experienced how much kindness matters. Again and again and again, people extend kindness and grace and support, and others’ actions matters. If others’ kindness and cruelty matter, mine does too.
Many have said that my words matter. Sometimes it’s difficult to see how one’s actions matter when he or she experiences so much pain because of another’s actions.
Sorrow rips apart time and space, too. How hard it is, then, to see one’s importance and brilliance in a world clouded with such potent pains.
* * * *
She was beautiful, she was real, she was my Momma.
She loved me, but that didn’t matter either. It did and it didn’t.
It’s incommunicable how much life grief takes from you.
It’s the life itself.
It’s the relationship.
Then, it’s all relationships.
It’s the griever’s energy.
It’s the griever’s social capacity.
It’s the griever’s concentration.
It’s the griever’s loss of clarity.
It’s the griever’s loss of stability.
It’s the griever’s loss of comfort.
It’s — The list never stops.
Every single survivor is affected holistically, and it’s impossible to communicate. It’s impossible for outsiders to understand, it’s impossible for outsiders to see, and perhaps it’s impossible for outsiders to believe.
It’s impossible for survivors and observers to fathom.
So much life gone with the loss of one individual’s life. It takes everything. She took everything from me.
She took everything from me. There is not a corner of my life unaffected by her decision.
Some people try their hardest to beautifully ease the burden she left, some people intentionally add to that burden.
Nearly a year ago, volunteers from the Women’s Ministry at my mother’s church joined together to create a beautiful atmosphere after her funeral. They provided nourishment and filled a room with flowers, honoring my mother and my family. I often think of the beauty they created, and the tenderness they wanted to continue towards me and my family, with gratitude and kindness. They eased the burden.
Our small group raised a small fortune to help support me and Scott and Sawyer when we were out of work, and they even made a sweet basket for my dad.
Dozens made and brought food to our families. Some sent packages, some gave books, some brought flowers.
Some still do.
There’s so much loss in this life after death, it’s as if the acres of my life have burnt to the ground. The fire of her death consumed everything, and every bit pained me to death, too.
Life on every acre ceased that day, but the ground of my life remained. I lived.
I live, this empty, decimated, desolate life, but life returns after all wildfires. Maybe at first it’s just grass, and then wildflowers, and then one day maybe trees will grow and roots will return to this ground that’s covered in ash.
So much life destroyed with the death of one so beloved.
There are some types of sorrow that busyness passivates, while types of pain that cause tears to trickle regardless of how many tasks engage one’s mind.
For the most part, I can function relatively normally. Sure, my mind may be cloudy most of the time, but the average bystander seldom notices the storm in my mind.
In fact, somehow, I still have a reputation for being “happy” at work. No matter what I share, no matter what I do, somehow this cult of positivity shapes me into what it wants to see. Others want me to be happy, so they say that I am.
In some ways they are correct maybe — I still find happiness in many things — but I’ve never considered myself a very happy person.
Melancholy — that’s the word I’ve resonated most with for my whole life. If you know me well, or if you listen to my words and read my writings, you know this to be true. I’m comfortable in the sadness. It’s a part of me, it’s a part of me that has loved more deeply than most can fathom.
I used to think my melancholy demeanor was bad. My mother certainly thought it was. She used to pray that I wouldn’t be so melancholy. She rejected that piece of me, so I tried my best to hide it from her for years.
As I enter into conversation after conversation, it’s dawned on me how much insight melancholy provides. It’s become a favorite part of myself — a piece of myself I can finally freely accept.
I think the concept of melancholy scares people. Our society is so afraid of pain, but it’s this pain-avoidance that results in horrific atrocities. People fear their sorrow, so turn it into anger instead. Unchecked anger produces strife, dissonance, and murderous behavior. Avoided sorrow creates depression, mental illness, and unavoidable pain.
We’re all a little sad. We’re all a little melancholy. Denying that reality creates a disillusionment with our souls, and all disillusionments must break. Sometimes we break our own delusions, sometimes they break us instead.
Ryan O’Neal, creator of Sleeping at Last, composes astoundingly beautiful melodies with profoundly deep lyrics and is thus one of my favorite artists. His ballad Saturn hosts the aforementioned lyrics. O’Neal pens reflective songs portraying the ornate nature of life, drawing imagery from astronomy, personality, faith, and earth.
Lately, I’ve been pondering about life’s beauty and tragedy. Too often we hear the derogatory phrases about our existence; “Well, that’s life,” as if the universe demands we be disappointed, “Life sucks,” “Life is hard,” and a deluge of other cliches with similar messages. We create an undertone of disaster and negativity with these phrases, yet they simultaneously minimize the struggle. “That’s life [so stop complaining].” “Life sucks [so move on].” “Life is hard [so stop expecting anything different].”
One of my greatest passions is normalizing the depth of the human experience through delineating natural emotions, and I’m an immense proponent in admitting how painful life can be, but I’m drawn to the simple truth of O’Neal’s words. How rare and beautiful it truly is that we exist.
We teach one another that growing up is painful, but we say it as if that’s “just the way it is.” Life isn’t painful because God or the universe or some force is out to get us — life is painful because other human beings hurt us and because we often hurt ourselves, too.
Life is not bad, life is not hard. People’s choices are bad and they make it hard. Sometimes our choices are bad, and it makes life hard, too. But life at its core is not hard — life is a gift.
Life is precious. We see this in the beauty of new life, we see this in the dignity of a life well lived, we experience this in the relationships that give us life. Life is not to be condemned but to be loved, shared, explored, and freed.
I reject the concept that life is hard. Yes, so many things in our lives produce unfathomable amounts of pain that we will carry with us forever, but that truth does not negate that life is a gift.
In this life, we have ample opportunity to heal, to change, to love, to grow, and to enjoy this one beautiful gift that we have. It is our responsibility to ourselves and to one another to tend to our lives. In taking care of ourselves, in knowing what we want and need from life and acting on that, we transform our lives and undoubtedly positively impact the lives of those around us.
Life is hard because people make it hard. Life is hard because people hurt us, neglect us, betray us, and wound us. Life is hard because we ourselves, too, make choices that hurt ourselves, neglect ourselves, betray ourselves, and wound ourselves. May we remember that our lives, each, are gifts to ourselves and to one another.
We have got to stop talking about how life is terrible and how life is tragic and how Life/God/The Universe exists to make us miserable. That narrative is killing us. Life is not about suffering. The purpose of life is not in suffering. Loss and hurt and wounds are powerful and they drastically impact our lives, but life is so much more than our heartbreaks.
May we engage in life’s beauty, tragedy, and lightheartedness. May we enjoy what life has offered us and the goodness that life brings us. May you heal from the people who hurt you and may you heal from the ways you have hurt yourself.
Your life is precious, your days are your opportunities to change your world. Life is not out to get you. God is not punishing you. The universe is not hurting you. People hurt you, you hurt you, but that is not the final say in your story.
Your life is beautiful and your ability to change your world will change the world for the better, if you let it.
May we remember how rare and beautiful it truly is that we exist.
This week, I was sick again for the fourth time in five months. Believe me, I take every vitamin /supplement / herb you can think of for immunity but alas, they’re just no match for grief.
It’s a tremendous amount of work — surviving suicide — it depletes massive amounts of energy and requires unmitigated fortitude. I sat at my desk in denial about how sick I was until I couldn’t physically get up on my own. I had to call for help, and thankfully I had family nearby to aide. Tears escaped once they got there: “I don’t want to be sick,” I pleaded as my tears and tremors greeted them.
I spent the next day at home lying on my couch, alternatively sobbing and attempting to breathe. What a mess, what a mess all this is.
I had to go back the following day [24 hours on antibiotics] because, of course, I really don’t have anymore time off… because I keep getting sick. Thus the cycle repeats, and I’m trapped. Can’t stay healthy enough to earn time off, so I go back to work before being fully recovered, and then I get sick again.
And then I feel like I’m never at work.
And then I feel bad at my job.
Oh, and, let’s not forget, I don’t have energy to answer my phone.
And then I feel like a bad friend. A bad sister. A bad aunt. I didn’t call one of my nieces on her birthday…I’m not sure if I’ve ever missed a birthday, but there’s a good chance I’ve missed a few of them this year.
It’s exhausting, all this surviving. And there’s a million expectations, whether people admit it or not. One’s job expects the same performance, one’s friendships expect the same friend. One’s home requires the same maintenance.
And I just can’t keep up.
I’d like to isolate for a while: turn my phone off, leave my job for a bit, hide under a blanket, maybe even build a blanket fort with my husband to camp out under for a couple weeks, but it’s just not possible.
So I’ll carry on, more dead than alive, because I have to. “I don’t know how you’re doing it,” people often say, and I generally shrug and say the same thing: “It’s because I have to. There’s not another option.”
Yes, there are things that ease suffering and help to manage stress, but none of them diminish the physiological response of my exhausted mind and body.
There was a point in my first few months of grief when I felt like I’d never sleep again, but I sleep normally most days of the week; there will be a time when I’m not so frequently ill and exhausted, but now there’s no end in sight.
Oh, and I miss my Mom every second of every day. A lot. I mean I really, really, really miss her.
It’s hard to feel like you’re always failing, even if there’s a good reason for it.
I’ve always loved Valentine’s Day, and I attribute most of that to my parents. They celebrated one another and each of us kids: Mom gave gifts to the boys, and Dad gave a gift to me every Valentine’s Day until I got married. When I lived with them, Dad would leave a gift outside my bedroom door to greet me in the morning. It’s a great way to raise one’s kids because it made the holiday special from the beginning. I never minded being single on Valentine’s Day. I love getting to celebrate love, whether my own or someone else’s. I love the hearts and the pink and red and the genuine giddiness and galentines, too! Sure, hallmark and corporations push the holiday but hey, I love any excuse to celebrate Scott. I love opportunities to do something special for my love, and Valentine’s Day provides just that!
Buuuut… Losing my mother to suicide changes everything I knew about love. Abandoned by my mother, rejected by her family, shunned by the majority of her church leadership, and my parents’ marriage nullified by her death— four institutions that were once steady in my life, irrevocably destroyed. Three groups that made the contentious decision to harm me via violent action and lethal passivity, and one marriage that created a family obliterated.
What is love, if not something that shatters you?
As I’ve written before, you can’t feel a mother’s love from the grave.
The last fabrics of security slowly tear from me. It’s fortunate I married before Mom died — I’m not sure I would believe in anything concrete enough to marry after she passed, and I’m quite thankful for my husband.
Like any couple, Scott I do our best to create and build our own love, and I try my hardest not to fear the possibility of every form of love slipping from my fingers.
There’s a pendulum in my mind that swings between the people I never thought I’d lose and the people I am amazed showed up.
Those who know deep pain speak a language entirely foreign to those who don’t lean in. Empathetic witnesses can learn this language with study and exposure, though they speak it with a distant accent.
Not everyone can show up, and that’s okay. Everyone can show love. Love marks people: it can heal them and brighten them, unrequited love can mar them, the absence of love can destroy them.
My father and my surviving two brothers remain a chain of unbroken and unwavering dedication towards each other, for now. I will always fear another suicide in our family — odds for repeated suicide increase dramatically after one suicide in the nuclear family. With two in mine, we survivors are 600% more likely to end our lives — but, we four survivors have been incredibly supportive towards one another.
Aside from these four, I remind myself that it’s the people who have chosen to show up time and time again that have aided in my support and healing. It’s the “aunt” and “uncle” I didn’t realize weren’t related to us that have become more family to me that my genetic relatives. It’s the friends that have shown up when siblings have checked out. It’s the Christian [and non-Christian] community disconnected from any one church that came together when my [past two] churches stigmatized us. It’s the people that weren’t necessarily“supposed to” be there who have shown up the most in my life, and this isn’t an uncommon phenomenon. We all know the saying “Friends are the family you choose.”
I don’t write any of this to bash my mother’s family or her church, and I don’t want people to weaponize my words against either party. There has been enough hurt, and it’s 2026: people have nearly unlimited resources, cell phones, and endless ways to reach out to one another. If they wanted to fix things, they would. It’s been eight months since my mom died — they don’t want to fix things, and additional [well-meaning] people getting involved will not change that. Sometimes the most loving thing one can do is let go. So, I let go of them. I release any hope of healing or restoration. Maybe it happens, maybe it doesn’t, but realistically I haven’t needed them to come this far.
Sometimes we are forced to create meaningful and beautiful lives without the people that were supposed to be there for all of it, and sometimes it’s because of death while other times it’s because pain separates the living.
To those who have shown up, thank you. I see you, I love you 💙. To those who can’t show up or chose not to show up, I love you, too. Take care, be well. Pursue healing and love.
The point is — this is what it’s like to survive suicide. A whole world erodes, and the roots left turn out to be beautiful and complex and mangled in grief.
The best people come to tend to and to water these roots, and one day new life and new dreams will bloom from what they have cared for. Above all, love each other deeply. Love heals a multitude of sorrows.
It’s been 231 days since my Mother ended her life. She was 51. I was 27.
It’s been 2,468 days since my brother’s suicide was discovered. He was 28. I was 21.
It’s been 2,836 days since my close friend drowned. He was 25. I was 20.
I could list a few more death dates, but these three have been the most sudden and traumatic. They are the most obvious and the most public form of trauma that I have endured.
* * * *
When I was a preteen and teenager, I couldn’t wait for my twenties. I couldn’t wait for the freedom that comes with growing up — being able to drive, choose a place to live, and figuring out what I wanted from life. I longed for the independence and relished the idea of being free and fun and maybe beautiful.
I started college at age 16 and was well on my track for freedom and independence — kind of. I had the most supportive parents in the world: they agreed to let me use Dad’s GI Bill and at 17 I “moved out” into a college dorm.
Dinner before Mom and Dad dropped me off at UniversityEach of my Sibling’s Favorite Bible Verses. Notes from my parents and brothers on the back of each letter. They made it as a gift for my first dorm.
In college… well, I was just about the most boring human you’d ever meet, ha. You can ask my good friends Brittany and Becca to verify — we called ourselves the “Grandma Group” because we woke up early and studied all the time. They’re actually the friends that pushed me to start this blog nearly 10 years ago (read my bio for more info on that).
I wasn’t fun. I don’t think I’ve ever really been fun, but I did love the freedom. Turns out, all I really wanted freedom to do was read books and drink coffee peacefully. There’s not a whole lot of peace in a houseful of teenage brothers 🙂 but there is a whole lot of love.
My sweet friend drowned mere weeks from my graduation… suddenly my exciting twenties sank into the vast ocean of grief. As JK Rowling imaginatively defines it, there really are two types of people in the world: those who see thestrals and those who don’t. Brittany and Becca lovingly cleaned my apartment when I went home for my friend’s funeral, and they left flowers to welcome me when I returned. Professors extended capstone deadlines, and Lauren even helped me write some of my final papers.
Brittany and Becca left this when they cleaned my apartment 💙
My parents moved the day I graduated college, and I wasn’t sure where I’d live anymore. I was searing from a world stripped of all confidence and hope. My friend Rachel took me under her wing and let me stay with her while I tried to figure out my next move.
Sweet Rachel 🩷
366 days later, my brother Patrick went AWOL. I spent the night with him the evening before our friend’s one year death-anniversary. The morning of the one year, Patrick gave me a book, he told me he loved me, and I never heard from him again. I haven’t brought myself to read that book. Those same sweet friends showed up then too, and a few more. 💙
💙There’s so much shock in initial grief — you’re just so happy to see the people who are alive 💙
11 months after that, I left Virginia to join my parents for a month before I moved to Florida. I only told two people what day I would leave Virginia… I didn’t even tell my now husband, despite his pleadings to let him know when I would be gone. I think hurt a lot of people doing that, but shame kept me from allowing people to say goodbye — I didn’t think I deserved it. I thought people wishing me well would be lying… I wasn’t much of a good friend back then. My theme song was The Prince of Spain’s “Rising Sun,” and so I went just like the lyrics.
At 22, my dog Nala and I travelled across the country to start our new lives in Sunny Florida. I’d accepted a great job in a town I’d never heard of, my friend Tori gifted me Nala, and we were off to create a new and exciting life. And it was new and exciting! I had a beautiful apartment and I had hopes and dreams once more. I had a safe place where I could read in peace once again. It was such a turning point for me, a clear mark of sunshine and healing.
Mine and Nala’s first stop on our move.
My parents and brother Sawyer joined me not long after. Life was beautiful for me. Simple. Healing. Years of healing and new life. I pursued EMDR — a specialized trauma therapy — my second year in Florida and it changed my life.
My parents buying me things for my first solo apartment 💙So much growth and healing in this sweet space.
I learned about my own attachment style and how to navigate various attachment styles, and I learned how to better love and accept love. Much to my surprise, I reconnected with Scott and our friendship bloomed into a loving marriage when I turned 25. I remember thinking at the beginning of our relationship that Scott had seen me at my worst and he still loved me — he still showed up, especially in times where I couldn’t show up for myself, much less anyone else.
The night that changed everything 🤍
You can do so much healing on your own, but there are some forms of healing that can’t be done outside of relationships; relationships, especially marriage, expose insecurities and triggers people typically can’t realize they have on their own. Trust issues rooted in past relationships surface even in the most trustworthy of partners. So many triggers and arguments have so little to do with the person in front of you. We had fun in our first year of marriage, but a lot of trauma resurfaced. Moving was a huge adjustment for Scott and I tended to take that personally — as if him missing home meant he didn’t love me or our life together.
Our second year, though, brought a new golden age. I dared to hope. I dared to dream. It was beautiful and it was sweet and it was fun. We explored everywhere together… and then we’d bring my parents back the next week :). We did almost everything with them. It was idyllic. Our lives were measured with so much love, support, and hope.
Then bullets pierced the contentment we shared as murder and suicide ricocheted through our lives.
Some of those same friends, Brittany and Ean and Lauren came back for the third time. They did everything for me… when I have done so little for them. They cared for my home, they cared for my family, they cared for me. So many more friends joined along the way — other friends in multitudes of states sent their support or show up, friends in Florida came to our aid as well.
* * * *
I had been looking forward to my thirties, begging to leave behind my twenties. If I’m honest, most days I really don’t want to be alive. I don’t want to do the basics of going to work, making dinner, keeping up with a home, and socializing. It’s not that I want to die, I just don’t want to live through this and through whatever else is next.
I thought in my early twenties that I’d made it through the worst of life, but it just keeps getting worse and the losses keep getting more painful. I’m the youngest in my family — I always assumed I’d be the last to die, but I didn’t think I’d lose so many so early and to such violent ends.
This week I’ve given up hope that my thirties will be any better than my twenties.
I don’t believe that life is good, but I’m starting to believe that it isn’t necessarily bad. There are many, many, many things and events in life that are bad, but that doesn’t mean life as a whole is bad. It’s not even neutral: life is beautiful, and it is a gift.
Despite everything, as I type these tragedies, I see the beauty of the friends who have shown up again and again and again. I haven’t been able to be that person to them, but they’ve been that to me. They have lived and loved and given and given — they have made the worst of my life live-able and bearable and beautiful. These and so many other friends… They have made life kind. They have brought healing.
When I see the beauty around me — in friendships, in nature, in kindness — it reminds me how much of a gift this life truly is. Awe prompts me to think of all Patrick and Mom gave up and all they’re missing out on.
While I may not have the energy or motivation to engage in basic life tasks, these things ground me. Maybe tragedy will continue to define each decade of my one wild and beautiful life, but as long as I’m living I know that more people will come alongside and join me in these tragedies, and that is a very beautiful thing.
“Merry Christmas!” “Happy Holidays!” “Joy to the World!” We proclaim in the darkest season, with the brightest lights illuminating our obsidian neighborhoods. The most light-centric and joyous holidays amidst the coldest and darkest moments of the year — it’s a beautiful tradition. Warm hot chocolates in our hands and cozy candles on our shelves, and sorrow in many of our hearts.
Yes, firsts are hard. First Christmas without Mommy. Mommy, Mommy, Mommy. Holidays are particularly difficult because they are family-centric: extended families gather and honor traditions. Most of our siblings have kids… all my nieces and nephews have a Mommy. My husband has a Mommy, and his Momma has a Mommy too. Everyone has a Mommy… except me and my siblings. “Why don’t I get to have a Mommy?” I ask Scott, through reddened eyes. Most of us have a spouse, too, except my Daddy. She’s gone now. Holidays and family gatherings like these amplify the isolation we already feel. The void my mother left companions us always, but holidays can make it feel as though a spotlight highlights the void.
Togetherness, though, feels like medicine for this severing pain. When something like this happens to one’s family, uniting with surviving family members is like taking aleve or ibuprofen: we’re all fully aware of the gaping wound, we all still feel it, but there’s a measure of relief in each other’s company. Days leading up to the reunion pass slowly and agonizingly. We hold our breath until we can hold each other in our loving arms, united by our terribly sealed past and fighting to press on towards a healthier future.
There’s ease with this reunion. There’s a peace in shared pain, an unspoken understanding, and a space to speak about a pain only we few understand. It provides a chance to process together and to share our pain… togetherness brings healing.
This Christmas, this thought assails me: two-thousand years ago, a baby lived and died and changed the world. Six months ago, my mother died because she wanted to meet that baby. She didn’t want to wait any longer to meet her precious Jesus. These days, I often wonder if my family would have been far better off without the Church (global, not any specific church). The idolization of heaven has killed two of my family members. That’s not what Jesus wanted, I know, but our pain-saturated culture seems obsessed with this unobtainable paradise.
The point of life is not to get to heaven, and heaven is not our home… at least, not yet. Heaven may be God’s dwelling place, and it may be the land of the dead, and it may be a place of renewal and eternity, but heaven isn’t everything and it’s not the point of our existence.
Jesus came to restore the earth. Jesus came to heal the earth. Jesus didn’t come so that we would scorn and leave the earth, and Jesus didn’t come for Christians to wish their lives away hoping in heaven. On my Mom’s best days, she knew that. She taught that, she lived that.
I’m not sure if my family would have been better off without the Church, but I think dreams of heaven are dangerous to those who suffer from mental illness.
Bring heaven to earth. Bring healing to earth. Bring joy to earth. Bring peace to earth. Isn’t that why Jesus came?
It’s been six months since my mom died by suicide. Twenty-six weeks, six months.
* * * *
Six weeks after she died, the police allowed us to collect her belongings. In them, we found a deleted email that she wrote to me and my siblings. Another layer of grief, another thing to process. Some may think it should be comforting for us to know she thought about us before she died, but [to us] our mother thought about us and still chose to leave us. That stings.
We kept the letter to ourselves: it contained highly sensitive and personal information that we didn’t want shared with the world.
* * * *
Four weeks after she died, my mother’s family decided that Mom’s death was my father’s fault. My Daddy… my wonderful, wonderful daddy.
They called our church, telling them that my dad was a wicked man, sharing fraudulent stories, and slandering him. I’m not sure if the church believed them — no one reached out to me or my siblings or my father about it. I hadn’t heard from the executive church staff since a week after the funeral.
* * * *
Six weeks after she died, the police included that private deleted email in their report. I called asking for it to be redacted — it was a message my mother typed for me and my brothers, and even she decided not to send it to us… what right did the world have to the email? — but it couldn’t be redacted. Detectives said it was a clear admission of her guilt: it proved no one else was at fault, no one else was to blame.
Ironically, my mother’s family received this information, made copies of the letter and the report, and sent it out to the masses with notes blaming my father.
When people called us crying, saying they’re not sure why they received such information from Mom’s family and sharing their support for my Daddy, I reached out to those family members via text:
I meant it. This was entirely distressing. Another layer of grief, another hurt. It cut me to the core that they would do something like that, violating my mother’s privacy, violating my privacy, and, above all, doing something so wicked to my Daddy.
They didn’t answer the message. I haven’t heard from them since.
* * * *
Six weeks after that, I got a letter from someone on staff at the church. A kind letter, a letter filled with love, care, and memories of my mother. This was the first legitimate form of communication anyone from my family had received from an executive staff member from the church since a week after the funeral.
* * * *
One week later, we found out Mom’s family sent the police report and letters to the church. They’d been talking with the church all this time, telling staff members that my Dad and my brothers and I blamed the church for Mom’s death. The church, believing my mother’s family, chose to “take a step back” from my family because of narratives my mother’s family shared.
I spent months writing how we shouldn’t blame each other, and yet, ironically, our church thought we blamed them. How sad is that?
That same week, we had the Out of The Darkness Community Walk. Several church members came to honor my mom and my family and show their support, but I was too scared to appreciate their support at that time — it’s terrifying to go into large crowds when hate mail has been sent out about one’s family.
We hadn’t heard from the executive church staff, the people we thought we’d received the most support from… so I assumed they blamed us, I assumed they hated us, too.
* * * *
A week after that, Scott and I met the staff member who wrote that kind letter. We had dinner, we stayed for a couple hours. We cleared some of the air, I think. I think we learned from one another. It was the first time I’d seen them since a week after my Mom died — it was awkward at first, but it was kind and loving. We talked about the chaos, we talked about the fall out, we talked about missing my Mom. We talked about how the church took a step back, we talked about how they thought we blamed them.
I’m still puzzled by that: troubled that they thought we blamed them, but did not seek us out to know if we actually did.
* * * *
Last week, I met with another executive staff member. We, too, enjoyed dinner and talked about the past six months. We talked about the fear people have of reaching out to my family. Some fear the intensity, some fear the heaviness, some fear the awkwardness, some fear bombarding us.
The dinner was peaceful, healing, sweet, honest.
* * * *
Yesterday, my brother Sawyer posted alluding to these details, and, in some ways, he freed us. He freed us to tell the truth of what has happened to us. He posted it in such a tasteful way — not grotesquely, not angrily, not wickedly. He simply told the truth.
Yesterday, Scott and I went back to the church. He had been wanting to go back for a while… I couldn’t bring myself to want to go to a church where most of the executive staff hadn’t reached out to me or my family. In fact, still only those two people on the executive staff have.
It’s painful to feel abandoned by people my Mom gave so much to… her time, her life, her energy. She gave so much to the church she loved, and yes, it feels like they did abandon us.
* * * *
One of the two executive staff members that had reached out to me shared that he or she feared their “presence wouldn’t be enough” for us. The truth is, their presence was all we ever wanted.
We saw both those staff members yesterday, and I was deeply happy to see them. We smiled and we hugged and we shared how much we love each other. I love them — I love them so much. I saw another sweet friend, someone who reaches out almost on a weekly basis. They saw us and immediately came to give the warmest hug, just the hug I needed. I love them so much, too.
Presence brings healing. Togetherness brings healing. Conversations bring healing. Compassion brings healing. Eye contact brings healing. Seeing each other brings healing. Love, love brings so much healing.
I love you, Mom.
I love you, Daddy. I’m so sorry for the hurt and the injustices that have happened to you over the past six months. I’m so sorry you lost your best friend in the worst way. I’m so sorry you lost everything. You’re my hero.
I love you, Brothers. I’m so sorry you’ve had to go through these new hurts week after week. I’m so sorry we don’t have a mom.
I love you, Church staff. You’re not perfect and I don’t expect you to be, but I did expect you to be here and you weren’t. I’m sorry you lost my mom, too. I know you loved her.
I love you, Mom’s family. I hope you experience healing.
* * * *
I’m not sure what the next six weeks will look like, but I hope they’re filled with less drama than the past six months.
I hope they’re filled with healing and with renewed community. I hope relationships mend and forgiveness and trust and love grows. I hope that new life comes and new joy buds amongst the thorns of this life.
I know that I will experience a lot of pain during the next few months and years as I continue to process these numerous hurts. I know it won’t be okay, and that’s okay.
Once upon a time, there lived a relatively happy family. They were a solemn family, where sorrow was ever before their doorstep, but happiness loomed at their threshold as well.
Their smiles were bright and welcoming, their tidings were of joy and compassion. They danced among a community of happy faces, committed to the cause of goodness and grace. Though they lived many states apart, they upheld that solemn unity that family and trauma require.
The mother, yes, she was the shining star. She was the jewel of the community, welcoming the shiny happy people — celebrated for her friendliness and hospitality, honored for her good nature. A shepherd to her community, a shepherd to her family. She boasted of her beloved family — children, the apples of her eyes, and her one beloved, her friend.
But, like all beautiful things, she died.
And what of her community? This shepherd did not pastor alone. No, she had several who could have looked after her flock. Only, they didn’t.
Her family was left to grovel, abandoned by the community that celebrated their wife and mother. Shunned by those whom called her a “co-laborer in Christ” and a friend. Exiled by the very community that spoke of her love and beauty at her funeral. Her family was judged and rejected, abandoned but not forgotten.
They thought of — and prayed for, of course — her family, they said, when five or six months passed and they finally decided to check in.
Five or six months of silence, of gossip, of abandonment from the very place their wife and mother once shined. She was the woman who really “saw” people, and they couldn’t see her survivors.
I’m sick of the veiled statements and the cryptic messages: I’m disappointed and hurt by how much my mother’s pastoral staff didn’t show up for us — after all she gave to them. She gave them her life, and they repaid her by shunning her family after her death.
But, as they read this, they’ll say “See! She’s angry at us,” and not “oh, we’ve hurt her.” It’s always the sufferer who must snuff her feelings, protecting the egos of those who did the hurting. Those who inflicted pain seldom care to take ownership of their wrongs, choosing rather to call the wounded impaired.
I’m sick of the injustice of it all, I’m sick of the gossip. I’m sick of the people who got my mother’s police report, made copies of it, and mailed and/or texted it out to people who had no right to her private information. I’m sickened by the people who continue to share it, choosing not to protect my mother nor my family from harm. I’m sick of being afraid to leave my house and wonder if somebody’s going to ask me about — someone I don’t know, saying things she would never tell them, looking to exploit answers from me. I’m sick of feeling so powerless, so voiceless, against those who have hurt and who keep hurting me and my family.
There were people who blamed my mom for my brother’s death, and those same people blame my family for her death. They were vile to her, sending nasty letters and saying wicked things.
They whisper and they lie, they spread misinformation in hopes of isolating us from our community. And guess what? It worked. Shunned. Isolated. Abandoned. All in the name of Jesus.
