Douglas Owen "Doug" Hopkinswas an American musician and songwriter. He co-founded the Gin Blossoms, a popular modern rock band of the early 1990s, with Richard Taylor. He was the band's lead guitarist and a principal songwriter.
Hopkins' writing credits included the hits "Hey Jealousy", "Found Out About You", "Hold Me Down," and "Lost Horizons". Throughout his adult life he struggled with mental illness and alcoholism. Shortly after receiving a gold disc for "Hey Jealousy", Doug Hopkins died by suicide. He was thirty years old when he died.
Last Sunday, I received a message on Facebook from someone I'd never met. I was deeply touched by what she said. Her words could mirror my own that first year after John died. She speaks for so many spouses and partners who are new to suicide loss.
Of her grief, the extraordinary pain of guilt intermingled with loss, and her acknowledgement of how important it is to not feel alone, I will say this:
She is why I write.
Sunday, 4/4/21
Hi Chelise,
I found your blog through a facebook suicide loss group. Thank you so much for it. I've been reading through your posts. I need them.
My husband of 23 years took his life on Christmas, 2020. The only things keeping me clinging to life are my family, friends, support groups, and blogs like yours.
My guilt is all-consuming. My husband had what I would call functional depression and alcoholism. But the alcoholism was severely affecting our relationship. In the last few years, things were very strained. We fought a lot. I said hurtful things. He wouldn't get help, and I became angry, desperate, even bitter. All of the worst things.
What I wanted underneath it all was just for him to get help, to be present for himself, for us. I wanted to have the man I saw when he wasn't drinking. Now he's gone. And I blame myself for everything I ever said, didn't say, did and didn't do. I feel I could have saved him. But I never had a clue suicide was a possibility. I knew nothing. I was a fool.
I saw what you posted from another blogger: "I fought so hard to
save her when she was sick.
& while it took awhile,
at some point after her passing
I realized it was now time ~that I fight, to save me."
I can't imagine ever wanting to save me.
I feel I deserve a life of punishing myself. How can I possibly live on knowing he took his life, and our relationship could have been part of that. I love him more than anything in this world.
Thank you for all you do. Your blog means so much.
- Sarah*
Here was my reply:
Oh Sarah.
My heart hurts for you. We have so much in common. The first years after John died were riddled with so much guilt. So often, it was hard to breathe under the weight of it.
Please know that functioning depression does not mean that it is not life threatening - and it was not your job to fix that. It would have been impossible. His alcoholism increased his risk, not you and what you did or didn't do.
Guilt is common with all grief, but it is nearly universal with suicide loss. Your guilt is proof of being a suicide loss survivor, not proof of actually having done something to feel guilty about. There is something I often share with those who've lost their partners and who'd been struggling/fighting/setting firm boundaries with, or even leaving, at the time that their partner died. It is true for you too:
Your husband did not die because of the things you did or didn't do. And he was not dealing with mental health issues because of your fights. Your struggles with your husband were likely due to the same things that killed him - the alcoholism and the depression.
Partners have arguments. Even terrible ones. We have people in our suicide loss survivor group who were in the process of pursuing a divorce from their partner. It is not their fault that their partner died. There are many people in the group who were mid-fight with a husband when he suddenly completed right in front of them. Their argument/s, however ugly or painful, were not responsible for their partner's death.
I don't know what your exact circumstances are, but just like I know for certain that those people are not responsible for their partner's death, I know this is true for you too.
If you can't yet take that in, please be very gentle with yourself.
And know that I, and so many other survivors, will hold the truth for you. You are not responsible. We will hold this truth for you until you are ready to take that deep breath and reach out for the self compassion that you so deserve.
💓 - Chelise
If you are a suicide loss survivor and can relate to Sarah's feelings, please try to take this in. You are not at fault. And you are not alone.
*Sarah is not the actual name of the woman who wrote me the letter. I changed her name in this blog post, for privacy reasons.
Those are the words I say to every new client at the treatment facility where I work. When they are in one of the groups I facilitate, I offer them the opportunity to introduce themselves. I ask them if they want to share some of their story. "Do you want to say what brought you here?" I ask gently. It's up to the client to answer. They can talk if they want, or not.
Sometimes clients have never been to treatment before. Often you don't even have to ask what their treatment history is. They look at the floor as if they are afraid to catch someone's eye. That's usually the tell. What brought them into treatment? "I'd rather not talk about it," new clients will often say.
I don't care if they share their life story or if they feel too shy to speak a single word. When I first meet a client, there one thing I want them to know and one thing I make sure to say:
I am glad you are here.
Last week the facility where I work found out that one of our clients died. He was 24 years old, and he'd been murdered. He is not the first client I have worked with whose life has prematurely ended. I've even had other clients who've been murdered. Still, any time we find out we have lost someone, all of the staff I work with are shaken up.
For me, whether I want to or not, the first thing I do is search my memory. When was the last time I saw this client? What did I say to them? What did they say to me? Could I have said something more? Should I have listened more intently?
It's a short lived contemplation. Addiction is a disease that kills. I work in a field where clients will be lost. I could say a lot about the failing of mental health and addiction treatment in this country, but I'll save that for another post. What I know personally is that we can't save every client we work with. So much of the saving involves healing hearts and dismantling shame. This is the hard work required of those who are suffering from addiction, alcoholism, and mental illness. Most cannot do this alone, they need support. And those of us who are trying to help cannot succeed unless our clients are open, honest, and willing to do that hard work.
On my end, I believe the first step is to let a client know that I believe in them. I believe in their capacity for recovery. I believe in their ability to heal. I believe that they are entitled to lay down their shame and instead move forward with the compassionate act of self forgiving. Sometimes I tell clients who seem to feel partciularly unworthy of recovery: You have a life waiting for you. It's yours. You get to claim it any time.
And then, as a clinician I have to take a step back and wait for a client to find the courage to take their own first step. Sometimes they are able to do that, sometimes not.
In my own efforts at recovery, I meet with others who remind me to say prayers. Often we pray for 'the addict who is still suffering'. Just as often we will also pray for those who will lose their life to addiction today.
Sometimes people die from mental illness. Sometimes they die from addiction or alcoholism. And it's heartbreaking, but without better treatment modalities, some days the best we can do is to say a prayer for those who will die.
When I thought about the client we recently lost, I couldn't remember the specifics of the last time I'd worked with him. I am not sure what I did or didn't do. But there is no formula for what might have been missed. At present, we just don't know who is going to walk out the doors of our facility and into the life that is waiting for them, or who is going to lose their life to the very thing that brought them in.
Mental illness and addiction will steal away a person's sense of belonging and therefore their sense of hope too. I don't know the specifics of what happened to our client, and I don't know what his mindset was in the days or hours leading up to his death.
I can't remember the last words I said to him, but I am confident in what words were among my first. I can only hope that even if it were just for a brief moment, he took in what I tried to tell him. It is the thing I want every person strugging with addiction, alcoholism, and mental illness, to know. I say it because it is true. We are not alone. And so to every peer who stands beside me fighting this same good fight - know this:
Alejandra Pizarnik was an Argentinian poet. She was born in Avellaneda, a city within the Greater Buenos Airesmetropolitan area. Her imigrant Jewish parents were from Rowno (now Ukraine).
Pizamik was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1968,and in 1971 a Fulbright Scholarship.Her best-known books of poetry were: Los trabajos y las noches (1965), Extracción de la piedra de la locura (1968) and El infierno musical (1971).
Pizamik had a difficult childhood, struggling with self-esteem issues, as well as having a stutter. Due to weight gain that upset her, she began to take amphetamines. She became strongly addicted and struggled with long periods of sleep disorders that caused insomnia.
Despite her writing and academic successes, Pizamik lost her life to suicide just one year after receiving her Fulbright Scholarship. She was 36 years old when she died.
Charles Reginald Jackson was an American author widely known for his 1944 novel The Lost Weekend. As a young teen, Jackson experienced a significant trauma. When he was thirteen years old, his older sister Thelma and younger brother Richard were killed while riding in a car that was struck by an express train. As an adult Jackson struggled with alcoholism and addiction. He suffered from mental illness and in the years prior to his death, he was repeatedly suicidal and hospitalized more than once. Jackson did have years of sobriety, but at the end of his life he suffered a relapse. Charles Jackson died by suicide on September 21, 1968. He was sixty five years old.
According to the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, individuals with substance use disorders are particularly susceptible to suicide attempts and dying by suicide. Data shows that a diagnosis of alcohol or drug dependence is associated with a suicide risk that is 10 - 15 times greater than the suicide risk in the general population. Acute alcohol intoxication is present in about 30-40 percent of suicide attempts. In 2011, approximately 230,000 emergency department visits resulted from drug-related suicide attempts (and this number has risen since then). The relationship between addiction and suicide cannot be understated. In order to effectively lower the number of lives lost to suicide, we must improve treatment for both mental illness and addiction.
Speak up and end the stigma around addiction and mental illness. It is time to dismantle the shame experienced by those who suffer from these diseases. Ending stigma is the first step toward paving the way to funding more research on effective treatment. Begin now.
Hold me closer, tiny dancer Count the headlights on the highway Lay me down in sheets of linen You had a busy day today
There is a story here. It is the story of a journey. A seven year journey. And a six year journey. And a one year journey. And a seven month journey. This is the story of one journey and many journeys.
I'll start at the beginning, seven years ago.
In 2013, inspired by the counselors who (I believe) helped to save my son's life, I registered with CCAPP (California Consortium of Addiction Programs and Professionals) to become a drug and alcohol counselor. As with many social service vocations, certification (credentialing) was going to be necessary to work in the field. At the time, this required taking 12 academic classes and working just over 1,800 practicum (internship) hours. And all of this needed to be completed within five years. These requirements were non-negotiable. As soon as I registered, the clock started ticking. But I didn't take any classes in 2013 or in 2014 either. You see, in late 2013, I'd had a relapse and overdose. So the year of 2014 was dedicated to creating a foundation for not just my son's recovery, but my own recovery, as well. After my overdose, I moved into a sober living house (SLE) and I lived there for close to two years. In 2015 I spent many late nights sitting at the kitchen table of that house, studying for classes and exams. My roommates (also in new recovery) were very patient with me when, night after night, half that table was taken up by textbooks and note paper. In May of 2016, I was taking one of my last classes at Cal State University, East Bay. At that class, (the amazing) Jimmy Ischwas invited to speak. He was recruiting interns for the agency he worked for - Second Chance Recovery Center in Hayward, California. When he talked about Second Chance, he explained that they worked with underserved communities, including the homeless. Many clients were dual diagnosis, as well (dealing with illnesses such as PTSD in addition to their addictions). And there was one other thing he emphasized when he was recruiting interns. "You need to be able to write," he said. I knew then, this was the internship I wanted. I started right away, but only worked a few hours each week. My plan was to complete the bulk of the hours I needed by working full time, starting in April of the following year (2017). Everything went as scheduled and I was set to begin my full time hours on April 3rd. But then something happened. On April 2, 2017, John died. Everything in my life came to a halt as I tried to recover from his loss. My practicum hours had to wait. Second Chance was incredibly supportive. Everyone was very patient, taking my shifts when needed, and helping me with my work on the days that I did make it to the office. So I continued as I had before, a part time intern. It was all I could manage. Suicide loss stays with you always, but for me, the first year was particularly hard. By the time 2018 rolled around, I was in trouble. I simply wasn't going to complete the hours I needed in order to apply to take the statewide chemical dependency counselor exam (the IC&RC). My five years were up. So, I filed an application for a one year hardship extension. Armed with medical records from my 2013 overdose and a copy of John's 2017 obituary - my one year extension was approved. I made plans to work more hours. I believed that I could do it. That I could finally complete the bulk of my hours.
But 2019 was another brutal year. Loss after loss, yet again. Family members, dear friends, clients, and many other people I knew. Midway through the year, I was on the verge of a breakdown. Still, in August of 2019, I was finally ready to apply to take the official IC&RC exam. I filled out my application papers, and added documentation. The documentation included my transcripts from Cal State, and signed proof of those 1,800 internship hours.
As I was filling out the application, I re-read the requirements in order to ensure that I had everything needed. As I read, I noticed there was a discrepancy between what I was submitting and what was required. I was confused. I still remember that moment. I was at work sitting in the room where staff completed their notes after a counseling shift. No one else was in the room, and I was glad. Because suddenly, I couldn't breathe. I fought off tears. You see, in the six years that had passed since I first registered to become a counselor - the requirements had changed. For the first time, I realized that I was missing multiple required classes, and I wasover 300 hours short of those that were now required in a practicum.
I was already deeply overwhelmed by the grief of loss, and desperately fighting to control the beginnings of an eating disorder relapse. I was too ashamed to talk to anyone about the fact that I was likely to lose the six year long goal of becoming a fully credentialed counselor, too. I was angry and overwhelmed and extra sensitive to absolutely everything. I lashed out at people I loved. One particularly hard night, my son asked me if I would go into the hospital. So, I did. The truth is, I didn't want to live anymore. I just wanted to be done. I did live through the next several months though, but only because of the unwavering love of my son and my closest friends. More than once, the people who cared about me sat me down and said, 'Please make it through this.' In fact, on Christmas night, my son told me this same thing. "Mom, I need you to live." It was the greatest gift he could give me, I suppose, telling me that he needed me in his life. So I kept trying, even when I didn't want to. I complained to one friend that it was too much to ask of me. She told me something that we often hear in our circles of recovery. "Well, act as if," she said. "Act as if you want to live. That's enough for now."
I have two close friends whom I met in eating disorder treatment many years ago. Each one reached out to me. They buoyed my hopes when it came to the eating disorder part of my treatment this time around. "You can do it" really means something when the words are coming from people who've done it before, themselves.
Another friend came to my house one night with two matching pairs of pink onesie pajamas. She told me that we were going to put them on and sit on the couch and watch a stupid movie together. You don't have a choice, she said. It is amazing to me that there are times when I have no idea how to help myself, but sometimes there are others who know exactly what I need.
Equally important, John Macaluso's mother (and we'd lost John only two and a half years earlier) called me every single day for months. She wanted to make sure I knew that when a person deals with mental illness - even if, while suffering, they lash out at people they care about - it doesn't mean that they themselves are less lovable, less forgivable, or less of a valued person. My own mother is not living, but there were many nights that I spent at Jo Macaluso's house, just so I could be near a mother who loved me.
Always, all of these people reminded me that even if did cruel things while sick - those actions did not determine who I was as a whole. One friend reminded me that what you do while having a nervous breakdown does not take away the value you have as a friend. I was in day treatment when my counselors encouraged me to apply for a second hardship extension. They believed in me, they said. They believed I would be able to complete the additional classes and the additional hours I needed in order to take the IC&RC exam. I was desperately trying to find a will to live and they were telling me I should be applying for something that would happen in the future. I knew enough about suicide prevention to know what they were doing. Any step I took that spoke to the promise of a future, was a good step.
And so that is what I did. I applied for a second extension. It can be hard to get the second extension. If you are approved, it's your last chance. You will get no more extensions beyond the two years. That's it. Period.
Once again I gathered transcripts and medical records, and once again I submitted a copy of John's obituary. I included a letter from my supervisor at Second Chance that verified that I was a good intern with lots of promise and who was well liked by staff and clients alike. I submitted the application. Two weeks later, I received a letter telling me that the second extension was approved.
October 5th of 2019 marked six years since the day in 2013 that I'd overdosed. And the next day, October 6th, 2019, marked six years from the day that I began my journey of recovery. Meanwhile I was bouncing between inpatient and outpatient day treatment. Just like they had done six years earlier, my treatment team and the people who loved me made sure I lived through the last months of 2019 and the first months of 2020. I sure didn't know how to do it on my own, I leaned into all these people and learned to pick up the pieces of me that shatter when grief is too heavy for me to bear.
And I leaned into this too - the one thing that has remained constant from October 6th, 2013, until today: I stayed sober. Staying clean and sober when you are in eating disorder treatment can feel so very unfair. My primary addiction had been to anxiety medications, and for the past six years I have had to manage learning to eat again and all the accompanying anxiety inherent in that, without medication. This time around, it felt too hard. Just getting to day treatment felt impossible on most days. Seven years ago when I went through this process, even my doctors and my treatment team were at a loss as to how to help me. How to keep me in treatment at a time when my PTSD was so activated that I could barely breathe, much less eat. At that time, they suggested a service dog.
So, from 2013 - 2015, I'd had a wonderful service dog - Butter - who came with me everywhere. He came with me to the hospital when I was in treatment. He came with me to the meetings that supported my sobriety. He came with me to work and he came with me to school. Butter ushered me into the life that I have today. But Butter was an older dog. In 2015 he passed away. Although I was heartbroken, I knew I was ready to move on without a dog at my side.
She needs a service dog again, is what my doctor said this time around. And so, that is what we did. We trained my tiny dog Peanut to be of service. Most often, the service she provides is to sit quietly for hours at a time. Peanut is a spitfire ball of energy, but she learned her service skill right away. That dog can sit beside my chair or in my lap for up to six hours, without complaint. So again, a dog accompanied me to treatment. Slowly, we noticed that I could eat again. Soon after, I could sit through a day of treatment without crying the entire time.
One week though, people were particularly scared for my life. Once again, the people who loved me pleaded with me to go into the hospital. So in I went, yet again. My doctor knew that my efforts at eating would be lost if I was hospitalized without help for my anxiety. So my sweet little service dog came with me. She slept beside me in my hospital bed. Sometimes in the middle of the night she would bark at the nurses as they passed by my bedroom door. One of the nurses put a sign on my door, so that others wouldn't be startled. "Beware of Service Dog," it said. "She may bark if you enter the room." Beware of service dog. I thought that was the funniest thing. I just laughed and laughed.
I left the hospital two days before Thanksgiving, but I was in day treatment for a total of seven months. I've never been in treatment for so long. I just couldn't find purchase for a way to forgive myself for struggling so much. Perhaps the beginning of my true journey toward healing began one February day, while I was at day treatment. I was sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall, with my face in my hands. I didn't know what to do with the self hatred that had been so unrelenting. Sarah, a fellow patient, sat down beside me. She knew that I couldn't forgive myself when my mental illness has impacted the people I love.
"Maybe you can't do anything to change the way you behaved when your struggles were at their worst - but today you can do the thing that you wish your boyfriend who died could have done for you, and the thing that the people who are in your life are asking of you, now." She looked at me, and then she finished. "Find a way to stay alive."
During those seven months that I was in treatment, I continued to work towards my counseling credential. I had to complete multiple classes. My friends and family cheered me on as I completed one class, and then another, and then another too.
I was still in treatment, but I had to work as many hours as I could. Second Chance accommodated me every step of the way. At one point I apologized to one of my supervisors. I couldn't return to taking day shifts, because my treatment was going to last for yet another month. And his response was to tell me that he didn't care how long it took, Second Chance just wanted me back healthy and ok. So I worked as many part time hours as I could. My little Peanut came with me to work, and soon she became more popular than I was. More clients at Second Chance know Peanut's name, than they do mine. By March, I'd completed the last of the hours I needed in order to apply for the IC&RC exam,.
Staff at Second Chance Hayward Recovery Center.
Left to Right, Andrea Caracol, Wendy Love, Chelise Stroud, Jimmy Isch
Dan Castro in the right forefront.
With all of this love and support surrounding me, and because of the extraordinary team at Alta Bates Herrick Hospital, in April of 2020 I was ready to leave day treatment. My feet were shaky but they were there, underneath me, once again.
That same month, I submitted my shiny new application to take the statewide IC&RC exam, so that I could finally be fully certified as a drug and alcohol counselor. I held my breath and waited. Within a week, I received notification that all of my requirements had been met, and I received my hard-fought Candidate Admission Letter. Now I could schedule my exam. Except for one thing. There was a worldwide pandemic and all exams had been suspended.
So I waited. I worked at Second Chance. I played with my dog. I mended some relationships, and I surrounded myself with lots of love. Maybe not physically, but through the phone, and zoom, and even through the mail. Week after week passed, I waited, still.
With the expiration of my second hardship year looming, I began to get worried. I called the credentialing agency. What if I can't take the exam in time? Will I be allowed another extension, even just for a few months, because the exams had been suspended? The answer was no. The state had not, as of yet, made any allowances for that.
So, I kept waiting.
Finally, in mid May, they opened up exam registration. The first appointment I could get was two months away, on July 10th, 2020.
The next two months were a flurry of studying. I'd taken so many of my academic classes five years earlier. I was worried that I wouldn't remember what I needed to know in order to pass the exam. Did I remember anything about pharmacology? The difference between agonists and antagonists and the partials of both? What about the differences between statewide and federal regulations and assembly bills? 42 CFR Part 2? AB109? It was disconcerting when I realized how little I'd retained of these types of details.
I read and I researched and I pre-tested, nonstop for eight weeks in a row. People worked with me as I memorized hundreds of flashcards. My job gave me time off so I could study. On the week before the exam, one person stayed up, twice, until the wee hours of the night, so that he could quiz me on 450 potential exam questions. Likely, he could pass the exam himself, now.
Finally, the exam day came. I prepared the people close to me for the inevitability that I was going to fail. I just could not remember enough. Too many flashcards and too many practice exam questions. My brain couldn't take it all in. The exam was three hours long, and it was harder than I expected. It did cover a great deal that I hadn't studied. There were many questions where I wasn't sure about the answer - I just had to pick the best one I could. When I finished the last question, I still had time left. But I used every minute of the three hours in order to check and re-check my answers.
I was still checking answers when 'Time is Up' flashed on the screen and locked me out of the test.
I blinked, and then the exam result appeared. Congratulations! Your scores indicate you have passed the IC&RC exam.
I realized I was holding my breath. I don't know. Maybe it was the only real breath I'd taken in over a year. If you had sat down with me one year ago, I was so enmeshed in all the loss in my life, in many ways I myself had become the walking dead. But that is not who I am today.
How beautiful it is, what can happen if you just don't give up.
So yeah. I did a thing. A great big little 'ol thing that was seven years in the making.
That same night, one of the women in my online suicide loss survivors group posted a request. In that group, we do whatever we can to share hope. This was her request:
Share something positive that happened today.
So I wrote it down there, first.
I passed my IC&RC exam to become a fully credentialed drug and alcohol counselor here in the state of California. ❤ That was where I wanted to write it. On that thread, in that group.
I know there are a lot of people who are proud of me. That amazing man who is in my life, and John's mom, and the people I work with, and even more friends. And I know that wherever John is, he is proud of me, too. I also know this:
Whether you are a suicide attempt survivor, a suicide loss survivor, or someone who is dealing with thoughts of suicide right now - I have been where you are. Please hold on. You may have a lot of heartbreak ahead of you. But, you will also have many busy days ahead, and there will even be moments of joy, and miracles too.
I promise.
Richard George Manuel was a Canadian musician, best known as a pianist, lead singer, and occasional drummer of the Band. His songs were widely covered, including by Cass Elliot and Joan Baez.
Manuel was well known to struggle with depression and addiction. On March 4, 1986, Richard George Manuel died by suicide. He was 42 years old.
Charles Reginald Jackson was an American author widely known for his 1944 novel The Lost Weekend. As a young teen, Jackson experienced a significant trauma. When he was thirteen years old, his older sister, Thelma, and younger brother, Richard, were killed while riding in a car that was struck by an express train. As an adult Jackson struggled with an addiction to alcohol and pills. He suffered from mental illness and in the years prior to his death, he was repeatedly suicidal and hospitalized more than once. Jackson did have years of sobriety, but at the end of his life he suffered a relapse. Charles Jackson died by suicide on September 21, 1968. He was sixty five years old.
I am a survivor of suicide loss. I have written about that. I am addict and alcoholic in recovery. I have written about that. I have an eating disorder. I have written about that, too.
But, until last year, I didn't write much about my own suicide attempts. Actually, I did do some writing in 2013, following my second and last attempt. I made some of that writing public, but within a month or two I removed the writing from public view.
I removed the writing for the same reason that I rarely write about my attempts now. I was ashamed. At that time, people contacted me and told me that they disagreed with my point of view, others contacted me and told me that I was being disrespectful toward my son by violating his privacy. Not that I was writing about him (I wasn't) but because he would undoubtedly be ashamed that his mother had attempted suicide. Out of respect for him (he was 16 at the time) I needed to hide the fact that I'd had an attempt. That is what I was told.
Every reluctance to write about my suicide attempts had been grounded in shame. The stigma in our culture is so strong. We are routinely told that those who attempt suicide are selfish, attention seeking, weak, sinners, inconsiderate, cruel, etc.. Those who die by suicide are taking their pain and without giving it a second thought, they are handing all that pain to someone else. That's what our society tells us.
Those who attempt suicide are everything that I don't want to be.
I can write about a lot of stigmatized issues that are close to home, but writing about my suicide attempts is one of the most difficult things I have ever done. I am not alone in this. In Jamie Brickhouse's article Overcoming The Shame of a Suicide Attempt(New York Times, May 2016), he says:
"As a recovering alcoholic I know that admitting to my behavior and owning my story is the only way it can no longer own me. I’m not ashamed of being an alcoholic, but I’m still ashamed of trying to kill myself."
For me, despite having feelings that were similar to Jamie Brickhouse's, there was a point about a year and a half ago, when I knew it was time to share my personal story. I was knee deep in suicide prevention advocacy, and I regularly bemoaned the stigma that deterred people from reaching out for help. But that wasn't my primary reason for talking about my own attempts. I was frequently exposed to people who were angry at those who'd taken their life. But, that wasn't my reason for talking about my own attempts, either.
I decided to write about my experiences with being suicidal, because in my suicide loss survivors groups, I kept hearing people say: "How could they leave me like this? Why wasn't I enough? Why weren't our children enough? How could they not have told me what they were planning to do?" These questions were agonizing for the people who were posing them.
I wrote about my attempts because people who didn't understand the complexity of suicidality were in excruciating pain. And by and large, this pain reflected a general misunderstanding of what it is like to be suicidal. I wrote about my attempts because my fellow survivors of suicide loss, who were already in so much pain, exacerbated their grief by tormenting themselves over the possible answers to their questions. And I knew, most of the questions didn't actually apply to the circumstances under which a person loses their life to suicide. I knew I wasn't going to speak for all who have attempted suicide, but I also knew I was speaking for an awful lot of us.
I wrote about my attempts with the great hope that my story might help someone else who was suffering.
So today I will share my story again. It's long. (I'm 'wordy' as someone once told me.) But, it is thorough. Others have told me that my story was very helpful as they processed their loss. I am so glad. If you would like to read what I wrote, simply click on the picture below:
Margaux Louise Hemingwaywas an American fashion model and actress. A supermodel in the mid-1970s appearing on the covers of Cosmopolitan, Elle, Harper's Bazaar, Vogue, and TIME. She was the granddaughter of writer Ernest Hemingway who died by suicide when she was six years old. As an adult, Margaux Hemingway suffered from both addiction and depression. Thirty five years following her grandfather's death, Margaux Hemingway also died by suicide. She was forty two years old.
My mother died seventeen years ago, today. It was a cold Wednesday afternoon. Cold at least for the month of April, in Oakland, California. That day, the temperature outside never rose above 56 °F. My mother took her life sometime during those cold daytime hours, while she was home alone. My step father would find her when he came home from work, later that evening. I, however, did not find out that she'd died, until early the next morning.
I remember bits and pieces of that morning. It was just after 7 a.m. when my phone rang. My brother was on the other end of the line, and he said that he had bad news. Then he told me that my mother had taken her life. Needless to say, 'bad news' was far from an accurate description.
Over the next several days, I would vacillate between disbelief, anger, and grief of course. It was the grief that seeped in between every other feeling. It would rise until it took over where my other emotions couldn't manage to hold on. The disbelief eventually settled into acceptance. The anger eventually turned towards forgiving. Forgiving my mother, and forgiving myself as well. But the grief, it never went away. Not completely. Seventeen years later, and I still grieve, today.
Still, as time went on, it was not the grief that wrecked the most havoc in my life. It was something different. It was fear.
For years after she'd died, there were times when fear dictated every aspect of my life. And the fear was very specific. I was afraid of all the ways that I was like her. And I am like her, after all. We share some physical attributes. Many would say that you can tell by looking that I am my mother's daughter. And we both had a sharp sense of humor, though hers was more dark than my own. And this too. She was a writer. She wrote sophisticated fiction and less complex but equally powerful poetry. We were similar there too, of course. My writing style is different, but we always shared a love for pen and paper - or, later, for a keyboard and the accompanying screen that would fill so quickly with our words. This adoration of the possibility inherent in the written word - we shared that, my mother and I.
Me, with my mother, El Collie Kress.
Saint Clair Shores, Michigan, 1978.
It was my mother's disease that scared me the most, though. Her mental illness that had steadfastly stolen her from me and from so many other people who'd loved her. I agonized over the deterioration of our relationship during the years before she died. And I agonized, even before she died, over the thought that we shared the illness that was taking her from me. The illness that would eventually take her life.
I once confided to a counselor my fear that because my mother had taken her life - it was inevitable that I would also take mine. Perhaps not right away, but one day, I said. I was truly afraid that I would leave my own son with the same loss that my mother had left with me.
"Your fear is not an omen," my counselor had tried to explain. "It is not a predictor of the future. It's normal, it's common, when a parent takes their life. Their children then must contend with the fear that they might lose their life to suicide as well." Predictor or not, the truth is, I did eventually attempt to take my life. Afterward, I was absolutely wracked with guilt over the attempt. "I've done to my son what my mother did to me!" I'd often weep when talking to counselors, and doctors, and anyone else who would listen.
No, no, no, they'd correct me. "How am I any different than her? How is what I've done not the same as what she did?" I'd ask. "Chelise, it is very different." people would tell me.
"But how?" I'd cry.
"It is different, because you are alive," they would explain, pointing out the obvious. Of course. There it is. I am alive.
There is evidence that my mother planned her death over a period of time. She'd acquired the means weeks earlier. She wrote a lengthy note. She'd likely been composing her last words, for days ahead of time. And she was fastidious in the execution of her plans. A fastidiousness that suggested pre-planning.
I don't know why she chose this particular day in April. Likely, I never will understand. But I do suspect she'd chosen the date well in advance. I would imagine that once she decided upon the day, then her measurement of time stopped flowing smoothly and became instead a chipping away of sorts. Suddenly, every day that passed represented one less day until the date she had chosen to die. So there are times now when I look at life through that same lens - counting time backward instead of forward. It is just that our start and end points are different - as different as the very natures of life and death.
It would be easy to sit back and blame my mother for my mental and emotional woes. It seems likely that I have a genetic predisposition toward both mental illness and addiction, and those genes both appear to originate on the maternal side of my family. And I could blame much of the childhood trauma I experienced on her as well. Living with a parent who was so severely mentally ill meant that I lived in a constant state of chaos with little structure or support. My mother's untreated illness tore my childhood away from me. This is true.
But my anger at my mother has softened. By and large, I am much more forgiving now. My mother lived with an illness that was (and still is) misunderstood and stigmatized. She was provided with very few resources and no hope for a cure. The universal lack of understanding when it came to mental illness meant that she was blamed for her symptoms. Blamed by society, blamed by myself, and blamed by other loved ones as well. Looking backward is where I find my compassion for her. As my mother got older, her symptoms increased. Her anxiety and pain were joined by delusional thoughts that often bordered on psychosis. Her despair was relentless. In fact, without any hope for relief, in many ways it is amazing that she lived as long as she did.
So it is guided by this compassion that I allow my own countdown to begin. Unlike my mother though, I am not counting down to a final day. Instead, each day that I wake anew, I recognize that it is one less day until I live past the day that she died. And tomorrow will once again afford me the opportunity to say that I haven't just survived so far, but that I will continue to survive. I am my mother's daughter, I am a part of her legacy. So, despite her death, I will do everything in my power to carry her legacy forward as one that speaks of survival instead of one that speaks only of loss.
My mother died seventeen years ago, today. It's a sad day for me. This is true. But if someone asks me how I did today, a day when the absence of my mother is so prevalent - I am glad that it is one less day until I can say that I made it through.
