vulnerability

Week 26

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.

May love heal us as we pursue healing and peace 💙

Week 24.6

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.

Jesus wouldn’t do that.

But don’t worry, they “pray for” us everyday.

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 23

Complex creatures, terribly complex creatures… Humans are terribly complex creatures. Complex, perhaps, to our own detriment, and yet perhaps complex to our own salvation, too.

We can smile while we cry, our eyes can dazzle while they feel dead inside. We can hide our true emotions phenomenally, and we can feel multitudes of emotions simultaneously. Sometimes we aren’t hiding — we simply feel two things at once: happy, sad, scared, excited, depressed, grateful, grieving.

Grateful. Grieving.

Thanksgiving.

Ah, Thanksgiving can feel antagonistic to mourners. We don’t need to be reminded of all we have to be of grateful for. We know… we simply hurt, more.

Gratefulness doesn’t erase pain, thankfulness doesn’t even ease pain. It can offer a different perspective while we suffer, but it can’t fix it.

Some things will never be fixed. Some things will always be broken. Some things will always produce pain.

Yes, I am grateful that my family gathered once more for Thanksgiving, but I’m not grateful for the absence I will forever feel during every holiday, every family gathering… everyday.

Terribly complex creatures. We smile with our eyes, we remember terrible things in our minds. We press on, we press on, we press on. We feel both, we feel nothing.

With our complexity we hide from one another. With our complexity we hide from ourselves. How terrifying detrimental this complexity may become.

Week 13

I’m a little “late” to my write this post because I have been so enormously frustrated and exhausted.

Let he who is without sin throw the first stone.

John 8:7

Within the past month, there have been some who surmise that they have discovered the answer for “why” my mother ended her life, and with that “answer,” they cast stones at my family.

Lovely.

In the name of love for my Mother, they seek to harm those she loved most.

Those who believe they discovered the answer claim that they saw the signs, and, to that, I ask, “why did you not share them?” If you think you found the root cause, if you think you saw it while she still lived, why were you silent?

Let he who is without sin throw the first stone.

There is no room in this sacred space of mourning and bereavement for blame, self-righteousness, shame, and condemnation. It is shame that kills us most. Do not speak of things you do not know or understand. Do not assume to know the mind of the departed. Do not impart discord, hatred, and cruelty on her survivors.

Victims and perpetrators, that’s what everyone is in the wake of a suicide, including the one who physically died. Those left behind simply become more dead than alive, people walking without their hearts. Sullen, sunken, and tired eyes barely greeting those around them.

There is much we do not know, and there is much we do know. Do not be foolish enough to think that you have it figured out, and do not be cruel enough to speak abhorrent conjectures into existence.

This is the mess that fuels the stigma suicide survivors live through. This is the loss that begets loss, the suffering that begets suffering.

Yes, it’s harsh. Yes, it’s cruel. And yes, unfortunately, it’s the reality.

* * * * *

For those seeking to help and ease the suffering, the best thing you could do for your friends in mourning is simply to show up and listen with empathy and understanding. Advice doesn’t help. Platitudes don’t help. Conjecture doesn’t help. Empathy and compassion help.

Calm kindness helps. Showing up helps, checking in helps.

Reader, may your lives never experience this horror [again], and may love and compassion greet you. may kindness and humility envelop you. May reconciliation find you. May peace carry your broken heart.

Week 10

This has been one of the hardest weeks to get out of bed. Perhaps it’s a mix of jet lag, allergies, and grief. Perhaps it’s simply reality sinking in deeper and deeper as the days pass away, each new day taking me farther away from my mother.

I woke up at 3 am other day with the slightest fever and spent the next few hours weeping and feeling the weight of this catastrophic loss. I want my Mommy, I yelped again and again and again. She always made sure to stop by if I was sick, even if it was just for a quick hug or to play with my hair, but mainly just to make sure I was okay. She’d bring medicine, ginger ale or Gatorade, maybe some soup, and all the compassion in the world.

But no more Momma.

I’ve gotten out of bed every day since she passed. I’ve brushed my hair and my teeth each morning and each night without fail. Last week, I finally started putting some jewelry on… it’s funny the little things you do or don’t do in deep grief… but this week I have not wanted to get out of bed at all.

Several grief books discuss the experience of derealization and depersonalization — the out-of-body feeling where one can’t ground himself/herself to the present moment. The sense that the griever is observing oneself from outside his/her body, feeling robotic or numb. I find this occurring most often in large groups and, hence, I am a bit uncomfortable and almost alarmed amidst them. These group activities become a source of anxiety and tension, where I end up spending an inordinate amount of energy on pretending to be normal or pretending to have fun.

The good thing about pretending, though, is that it can often result in positive experiences, but at the cost of an exponential amount of energy.

I think I am pretty spent from the few social activities I have mustered the courage to participate in. I’m not quite sure how one finds balance in this. Maybe I need to plan more one-on-one activities with patient listeners, eager to indulge me with their empathy and kindness. Buuut scheduling that is exhausting, too.

Thus, in the end, everything is simply hard. So excruciatingly difficult and sad and painful.

I’m still getting out of bed, I’m still brushing my hair and my teeth each morning and each evening, but this week it’s seemed to require so much more from me than past weeks.

Friends have done their best to help ease the suffering and mental load, showing up with kindness by bringing me soup, dropping in just to give me a hug, and so much more, and I’m so grateful for that. More grateful than I can probably communicate, but…

It’s a living nightmare, and that’s the reality of living with pain that cannot be fixed. Time and new memories will heal, but not today, not this week, not anytime soon.

Week 9

Traveling while grieving can become a sick game of “how many places can I be sad in?” Each new experience serves as a reminder of how I can never share any of this with my mom.

Grief mutes the senses and dulls the atmosphere. It prohibits its host from experiencing anything to the full. The infamous brain fog clouds everything one’s eyes behold and rains on the memory of one’s memory newest experiences.

Traveling is helpful, I suppose, in that it requires a massive amount of focus from one’s mind — one must keep moving, walking towards the goal of his or her next destination. One’s loss can’t be at the forefront of the mind when navigating unknown places, but the ache is there. It’s always there.

Death is such an unwelcome visitor, knocking on the doors of our lives and bursting them open despite our protests. Illnesses can creep in to poison’s one’s life, accidents can wreak havoc and destroy life, wicked people can barge in and steal life, but what is this?

What is this?

How terrifying that one’s own mind can betray itself and create death in a most unnatural way. How terrifying that we can’t even see it coming.

And then there’s the stigma: Stigma about grief, stigma about suicide, stigma about mental health, and the deep shame these stigmas create for people who struggle and for survivors left behind by those who lost the battle. Stigmas that prevent people from getting help. How can one reach out for help when everyone around them expects to have the answers?

Our church did not/has not publicly acknowledged my Mom’s death — my mom, a highly influential staff member of the church. What type of message does that send to the stigmatized? What message does that send to the thousand who attended her service and who are in deep mourning?

Maybe they don’t address it because they’re terrified of it, too. Silence always helps, doesn’t it?

Ignoring problems never makes them go away: Silence simply suffocates the suffering, and stigma shames them into solitude.

There should not be shame in “having demons.” Life is abundantly difficult and misery isn’t something to be ashamed of. There should not be shame for having a good life and still struggling with terrible intrusive thoughts. You should be safe to voice that. You should not be shamed or silenced for voicing how horrible life can be and how tormenting your own mind can be. Even God acknowledged that it was not good for man to be alone. Even Jesus acknowledged that life is troublesome. Even Jesus asked for a different way out.

I return home from a trip I aimed to keep very private — there’s a comfort in enjoying quiet and hidden moments after the world discovers something so deeply personal out about one’s life — but all I can think of is the fact that my Mom won’t be there when I get home.

She used to say that she couldn’t wait to get home after traveling because “there’s no place like Florida.” She loved its warmth and its beauty and its vibrancy. She loved that it was home, and she built her home in the loveliest ways.

I can’t reconcile how someone who loved life so much, and who loved me so much, could execute the cruelest action against all that she loved.

I wish she thought that she could get help. I’m sickened that she couldn’t verbalize her struggle. I hate the stigma, I hate the silence, I hate the finality.

If you have ever — ever — ideated, please speak out. Seek a professional counselor and share your ideations. Don’t let shame kill you. Don’t let shame destroy everything that you do love in life.

Be there when someone gets home. Be there when your friend gets home. Be there when your family gets home. Be there to welcome your loved one back. Don’t let stigma take that from all of us.

Week 8

Happy birthday to me… 🎶

I’ve been dreading this day for the past six years, since my four year old nephew looked up at me and said “28. Hopey, are you going to die when you turn 28?” Because his uncle, my brother, died when he was 28 and that didn’t make sense.

I’ve called it my “Patrick Birthday,” and I knew it would be difficult, but I never imagined it would be this terrible. A few months ago I imagined the birthday as a source of solemn strength to mark how much I have grown, and to mourn that I would now be “older” than my oldest brother. That alone would have made today painful.

I’ve been dreading this day, and I’ve been mourning it all month.

Birthday.

I used to thank my mom each day on all of our birthdays, praising her for the fact that it was her birth day — the day she did all the work and a day that changed her life immensely. I just showed up.

But now there’s no Mom, and that sucks.

So many people want to celebrate with me, which is sweet and I feel loved, but I don’t want to celebrate. It’s difficult to celebrate with sorrow seeping from your eyes.

Mom made each birthday so special. Most years, she made us us a delicious cake and made the day a big deal! She was a thoughtful gift giver and she was always so excited.

This birthday is special, I suppose, in a different way. It’s sacred: I’m surrounded by people keenly interested in trying to make my birthday magical and sweet, perhaps more so than I have ever experienced before. It’s a day filled with love and gentle care and sweet reminders of my friendships and of those who love me. I won’t forget this birthday, and I will remember all the beautiful acts of kindness so many people have bestowed upon me.

It’s my Patrick birthday. I am 28. I feel old, though so many people still tell me I’m such a baby, ha.

One day, I’ll probably have a Harmony birthday. I’ll turn 51 — “fifty-fun” as we briefly called it — and I’ll be older than my mom. The solemn knowledge of that pains me. I’m not yet ready to be excited about the future, but today I do have hope.

I am loved, I am seen, and there is life and goodness all around me.

One day, I’ll be able to participate and experience the fullness of life once more. Today reminds me that life is a gift, that I am loved, and that the sun still shines.

Thank you to everyone who’s making today special 💙

2019 – Patrick’s 28th and Final Birthday

2024 – Hope’s 27th Birthday, My Last Birthday with My Mom

2025 – Mom’s 51st and Final Birthday

“Fifty Fun”
2025 – Hope’s 28th Birthday

Week 6

I know pain, I know it well. I am friends with sorrow and companions with anguish. I’ve made a home with sleepless nights and solitary mornings. My eyes sore and strained, my lungs feel heavy and weak.

I have known sorrow for years, it has always been with me. It resonates throughout my mind, into my chest, and it overflows from my eyes.

I was just getting used to happiness. Laughter and joy, for what felt like the first time, finally took residence in my soul. I was healing, I wasn’t afraid of the worst case scenario anymore. I felt freedom and the good gifts I had, I felt plenty in my abundance, I felt safe with my family.

We were building a home here, we were building a life here. Our days were filled with sunshine and laughter. My only concern was what joyous outing we would participate in over the upcoming weekend.

I thought we were in this together.

I thought we loved this life, and maybe we did. I thought we were all healing and moving forward after catastrophe. But while I flourished, part of her soul was dying.

She couldn’t tell me, she couldn’t tell anyone. That will never make sense to me. That will always haunt me. That will always terrify me.

Some days it feels impossible to truly smile. How many days did she feel like that, too?

Every day of this nightmare, it’s like I discover something new. Something new about my Mom, something new about my reality. I’m forced to process a complexing piece of information day after day, thought after thought, moment after moment. It’s exhausting. It’s haunting.

Maybe ghost stories were never really about apparitions but about the horrors left behind by the deceased. The painful thoughts they force you to think, the painful loss you have to shoulder. The painful dreams that wake one up in the middle of the night. I feel haunted by my mother and haunted by her actions.

I can’t feel a mother’s love from the grave. Not like this. Not when she leaves me with all this. All I feel is the pain and abandonment from being left behind.

The saddest part is that she never would have wanted that, but she doesn’t get to influence or comfort me anymore.

Week 5

One sentence has flurried in my mind since I read it Wednesday:

Perhaps I did not deserve their deaths, but I did not deserve their presence in my life either.

Jerry Sittser, A Grace Disguised.

It stings. I don’t like it. But, but, but. But perhaps it’s true.

From my point of view — a 27 year old woman, a sister and a daughter survivor of suicide who has always love my family deeply — it’s incredibly tempting to submit to cynicism. Thoughts like Nothing I did mattered flutter through my brain. It didn’t matter if I was the best daughter or the best sister in the work, they still left. The sad part about that thought is that it’s entirely true.

I’m sure many are thinking similar thoughts… if I’d only… if I was a better _______ … I wish I would have… the list goes on.

Suicide tends to reverberate guilt throughout its affected community. The truth is, you could be the best mother/father, husband/wife, brother/sister, son/daughter, or the best friend and this nightmare could be your reality, too. Chances are, if you’re reading this, you are and you were — you were a good _____. In fact, you were probably great. Odds are, you loved my Mom well and you laughed together often. And yet…

The thought Did any of it matter? haunts me once more.

I loved my Mom… did that matter? I was a good daughter… did that matter? We loved my mom. My entire family loved my Mom deeply. Her community locally and globally loved her deeply.

Oh, this shattering outcome makes it too easy to believe that none of it mattered.

“Why don’t I get to have a Mom? I loved my Momma,” I sob endlessly to Scott (thanks, honey).

Then I despair that it feels like none of it mattered. That’s an incredibly easy lie to believe until someone knocks on my door to bring us dinner. Until we check the mail and have letters and packages from friends we haven’t connected with in years. Until we read the text messages. Until we feel the warmth from your embrace. Until we hear the care in your voices.

It did matter. It does matter. All of it mattered. Your kindness matters, your help matters, your love matters. It’s easy for me to believe that nothing I do matters, until I receive boundless kindness from those around me and I experience comfort and healing from each little act of kindness and care. That matters to me, and it reminds me that what I do does matter, and that what you do matters, too.