suicide prevention awareness

Week 25

May grace find you.

May peace meet you wherever you are, no matter what you’ve done.

May forgiveness absolve you.

May bitterness flee from you.

May friends support you when your feet no longer hold you.

May kindness wrap itself around you.

May goodness follow you.

May hope guide you.

May you heal from suffering others cannot imagine.

May you know earnest people that heal the pieces of you that betrayal broke.

May you thrive after living through what no one should endure.

May you shine truth where lies once prevailed.

May those who scorned you see reality.

May those who betrayed you open their eyes to your suffering.

May those who wronged you know the depths of your hurt.

May those who ruined you know forgiveness.

May compassion win.

May happiness enter your life once more.

May sorrow carry the beautiful pieces of your shattered life.

May heartache find solace in friends worthy of trust.

May you learn to tend to sorrow.

May you grow to carry what cannot be fixed.

May you speak to the language of pain and sorrow.

May you know to honor your frail heart.

May you live through the unspeakable with unquenchable light.

May you remember kindness when your life is cruel.

May you breathe deeply when life takes your breath away.

May you love while your heart breaks.

May you balance complex emotions: sorrow, anger, happiness, bitterness, forgiveness, all as they cycle through.

May you teach the language of sorrow to a world committed to avoiding pain.

May you face tragedy and tend to her reverberations all your days.

May you linger in moments of depth.

May beauty overcome the wasteland.

May compassion overflow the rivers of sorrow.

May loveliness harbor the oceans of pain.

May grace run wild in the landscape of your life.

May you endure what you never should have lived though.

May you endure what will always hurt.

May you endure what defines the character of your life.

May you love,

May you be loved.

Week 24

She’s not dead in my dreams. She’s never dead in my dreams. Sometimes she’s a ghost, but she’s never really dead. She’s always responsive… or ignoring me, but nonetheless she’s active.

But they’re always about death. In the first few weeks, I most often dreamed that she was a ghost or just too busy to talk to me — in these dreams, I knew she was dead. She wouldn’t talk to me in these dreams. I begged and pleaded for her to talk with me, but I could never quite reach her.

Now, nearly six months later, we catch her before she chooses fatality. Sometimes it’s just me and Mom. Sometimes my husband, Dad, and siblings are there too. She talks to me in these dreams. I/we are always trying to talk her out of it — to talk her out of dying. To beg her to stay. But they all end the same — I wake up. I remember she’s gone and she’s never coming back. Sometimes that brings tears to my dull eyes, sometimes it cultivates anger and protest, and sometimes it steals my breath and replaces it with anxiety.

I watched Where the Crawdads Sing the day before my Mom died, and I remember feeling so comforted when the main character’s mom walks out of her life forever. It’s a main plot of the movie — trying to figure out how a mother could leave her young. I remember thinking my Mom would never.

Ha. Isn’t life ironic like that? It’s so cruel.

* * * *

This has been of the hardest weeks to do anything. To get out of bed, to go to work, to want to do anything. I’d rather turn my phone off, ditch work, and cut myself off from the rest of the world for a couple of weeks and just sleep.

Scott woke up the other night to the sound of me screaming: he reported that I was staring at our fan, shrieking. One of the strangest part about night terrors is that one won’t recall the dream whatsoever, and people experiencing night terrors won’t typically wake up on their own. They’re not very common for adults, but almost always caused by immense stress. It’s unsettling to wake up to the sound of yourself howling in horror and shaking violently.

And then you have to go to work the next day, put on your best “I’m okay” face and complete whatever task is due by whenever deadline, half alive. A shell of what once. A candle burnt to its wick, melting whatever potential was once there.

The closer we get to the Christmas, the less I want to get out of bed. But I have end of year deadlines, places to be, things to do. So we trek on, one abysmal step at a time.

* * * *

I look forward to dreams now. They’re the one place I get to interact with my Mom, even though they’re just visages from my broken heart and my weary mind. Ever so briefly, it feels like she’s with me again, even if the dream is sad and dark and heavy. At least I “saw” her, at least I could spend just a few minutes with her ghost.

Week 22

My mother was like the sun, everyone felt how bright she shine. Her presence instantly lit up the room: she dazzled with light, warmth, and life everywhere she shined. Those closest to her orbited her and grew from her tender care, but they were severely scorched when our bright star transposed into a supernova. Our sun blazed and left us in ashes. What once brought warmth became an epicenter of frigidity. What once held life holds only withering dreams of what could have been. Our universe, once safe and secure, forever centers around a black hole.

* * * *

There are a few places where I feel my mother’s presence, or rather absence, most keenly. Places where memories implanted forever in my scarred mind. The spa by my home is one of these places — somewhere I can remember so well it’s almost as if she’s there. I see her in the lounge chair next to mine… only, I don’t. I see the empty chair, but her memory is so palpable I can vividly imagine her. It’s not just a spa anymore, it’s a sacred space where I once met my Mom, and where I wish so badly she was with me again.

In my mind, I imagine she’s with me. I pretend I see her smiling and welcoming me into the room, inviting me to sit with her. The sofas are so large that we sometimes shared one so we could whisper to each other. So, I imagine she’s here. I look at her empty seat and speak silently to myself “I love you, Mom. I wish you really were here with me.” I think, maybe she is. Who knows? So, I pretend she is. I carry on my empty conversation: “I love you, Mom. That’s all I want you to know.”

It’s a question my therapist often asks — “If your Mom was here, what would you want to say to her?” I cannot utter much get past “I love you, Mommy. I wish you were here.”

But today, I continue my imaginary chat. “We really were best friends. I should have told you that more often.” Maybe I did, I just can’t remember.

And I cry, and I cry, and I cry quietly to myself. Softly in the silent room of the spa, staring at an empty chair where I can’t actually see my mother. I imagine she gets out of her chair to come sit by me, I imagine she holds my hand, and I imagine she pulls me into her arms as I cry. She strokes my hair.

I imagine all of it as if it really happened. I imagine all of it alone. So quiet, so cold, so empty.

I rest my head in the gray lounge chair, as if the chair offers a hug. My imagination fades and only the simple chair remains, reminding me of my loneliness here without her.

And yet, despite the tears and heartache of that still room, it may be my favorite part of the spa because I can see her so well there.

* * * *

My little supernova, so grand, so brilliant.

Your light carries on for a millennia

My universe is so cold without you,

But there’s beauty in the frost, too.

My beautiful supernova,

You’ll always be my black hole,

Forever drawing me to you,

Forever icing me with your absence.

My magnificent supernova

Week 19

I leave old sticky notes from my mother around the house because… what else should I do with them when I find them? I don’t want to throw them away and I don’t want to put them away, either. So they sit out, collecting dust, beguiling to be read, hauntingly there.

In the first few weeks following Mom’s death, so many loving people gave and gave and gave. Aside from meals that nourished my whole family, people gave me face masks, candles, stickers, socks, etc.

Peoples’ hearts can be so beautiful in heartbreak.

At the time, I had so little capacity to process the gifts, so I set them aside as if part of a collection. Now, I can’t even remember who all gave things. Someone gave me a necklace — I don’t remember who now. She gave a card, but it was separated from the necklace. I can’t remember who to say “thank you,” to… but…

Thank you.

Thank you each person who gave food or a card or some piece of comfort. Thank you for reaching out, thank you for reading these, thank you for commenting, thank you for showing up and bearing witness to a pain that seems as unbearable as it is. It’s not easy or comfortable to watch this incomprehensible level of pain. I know many of you who knew and loved my Momma hurt too, and many of you who simply know me hurt for me. Thank you for giving out of your pain and for showing up.

I tried to go through that collection of gifts — those tokens of love and comfort — yesterday, 133 days later, but I still can’t get through it. It’s still too raw, it’s still too fresh of a reminder that my world was ripped apart… that my Mommy is gone. Yet, the things that I got through reminded me of all the love you have given me and all of the love you had for my Momma. It felt raw to touch and see these gifts of love from people I could not even remember. So I will try again another day, and be reminded once more of all this love.

Love is all we have left, and love is both enough and not impossibly enough at all. But love does, as the old saying teaches, “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends,” and what is grief but love that persists?

Week 18

“How much is enough?”

“Just a little more.”

There were so many things we were supposed to do together. There were things I wanted to show her, experiences I wanted to share with her, places I’ve gone since that I wish I could still bring.

And yet, we got to do so much together. We drove across countries and states, we got to live by one another as adults. We shared so much, but it’s all over and that hurts.

I’ll be wanting a little more of her for the rest of my life.

It’s October, which brings torrents of sorrows to my family but also holds birthdays of some of my most beloved people: my Daddy, my niece Klaire, my husband Scott, my Auntie Beth, my sister Carrie… which just makes October an emotionally complex month. Much to celebrate, much to grieve — an unending dichotomy in our lives.

Mom was enrolled in a week-long intensive at Liberty University (my alma mater) taking place this October, and we talked about making it a girls’ trip. I haven’t been back to the university in years and Mom never attended a university in person. We were excited for the potential adventure… We never went on a girls’ trip with just the two of us.

A life cut short is so cruel. I’ve lost a lifetimes of memories that will never be made.

There’s the primary loss of my mother and the secondary loss of all the little things that died with her. Every book on grief will tell you that you will lose friends and people you thought would be in your life forever, but knowing that does not make it any less painful or shocking when it actually happens.

Grief can be incredibly isolating: in one sense, grief is as individual as the relationship, yet grief is public. My friends know, my coworkers know, strangers know. They know and they squirm.

Most close friends don’t know what to say… so they say nothing. Many fear saying something will make it “worse,” (which is nearly impossible)… so they say nothing. Many fear bringing it up will make me upset (don’t worry, grievers are thinking about it 100% of the time)… so they say nothing.

The hard work of grief support lies in entering into that awkward and sacred space and reaching through the silence. So much of grief support is simply companionship, simply bearing witness to a world torn apart. Entering this space requires bravery and delicacy, but it is fairly simple.

A fog follows me everywhere I go. It clouds my mind and wells in my eyes. You may not see it, but this invisible grief shouts in my mind at every moment of wakefulness and regularly infiltrates my dreams.

A little more, a little more.

I’ll want a little more forevermore.

Week 12

Happy Suicide Prevention Awareness Month 🩵💜

I write, with a pit in my stomach, dryness in my mouth, and fear behind my eyes.

For years, I’ve dreaded this month. It’s a month where I felt so invisible and so abundantly reminded of my own pain. No one really cares about awareness months, except the people whose lives they reflect. For suicide survivors, it’s a tiny little broken community, screaming out in the darkness. It’s not like heritage months or LGBTQ+ months or even cancer months, which all seem to have so much support.

Of course, I have been well aware of Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, but it felt as if no one else really was. September meant annual Suicide Prevention trainings at work, where I’d cry to myself at my computer-based trainings, or fight not to weep during the in-person HR trainings where no one else was affected… except me.

Quite honestly, Suicide Prevention Awareness Month feels like a giant shame-fest for survivors. “These are the signs,” the trainings warn. Only, the thing is, we can see all of the signs, take all the right actions, and people can still end their lives.

So I sat isolated in trainings, and reflected on all the help we did get my brother Patrick. All the signs we did see. All that we did do.

I reflect on my last conversation with Patrick, when he told me “Hopey, you’re my hope. You make me believe that we’ll really beat this.”

This is the first year that it seems other people are aware of Suicide Awareness Prevention Month: it fills my Facebook and Instagram content with posts of warning signs, of fundraisers, of hope, and of so much sadness. It’s strange, and it still feels so icky.

For my Mom, there weren’t signs. It’s a terrifying reminder that, if someone really wants to die, he or she will ensure that we can’t stop them.

Where is the hope in that?

I’m not sure. I’m not so sure there is any hope to prevent suicide. For now, you can hope for me, and maybe I’ll find hope again someday.

What I do know is that this world was a much brighter place with her in it, and the world is a much brighter place with you in it, too.

Check out this link if you are interested in supporting Brevard County’s American Foundation of Suicide Prevention (AFSP) Walk.