Losing a child to Suicide

Every time I think I was a complete failure as a parent, I bat away that thought by recalling times when I think I was quite a special mum.

It’s a rainy day today in Cornwall and I’m binge watching TV with the dogs snoring on the sofa next to me and a memory came flooding in.

I was a single mum which at times had many benefits as I could indulge in lots of special times with Toby with no one to interfere or judge. It was TV shows that bonded us on rainy weekends and Friday evenings. I can’t remember exactly how old he was but it was before high school so he must have been 9 or 10.

On Fridays I used to finish work early so I could pick him up from school, something I mostly missed out on being a single working mum. We went swimming then on the way home we’d pick up snacks at the newsagents (bacon wheat crunchies were a favourite), then make a camp on the living room floor with cushions and bedding and watch American sitcoms. Our favourites were Cybill, starring Cybill Shepherd, Ellen (before she became a chat show host and had come out), and of course Friends.

Toby particularly loved the Nickelodeon channel and loved Sarbrina the teenage witch (don’t tell his mates). One weekend they had a marathon showing back to back episodes and we spent a whole day in PJs camping on the floor, watching episode after episode and probably eating junk food.

When Toy Story came out we went to see it about 5 weeks in a row, over and over again. Weekends were ‘our time’ as during the week I was working full time.

When Toby went off to University I sent him a Toy Story sticker book and a set of miniature Toy Story figures as a little joke to cheer him up. The little figures were returned to me with his belongings after I lost him.

Most weekends when he was little were spent visiting steam railways as he was obsessed with Thomas the tank engine. I have so many photos to treasure of these times. My mum and dad took him out on lots of trips, he went to the Thames Barrier, the zoo, Duxford aircraft museum.  

Even when he was older we did spontaneous things like deciding to drive down to Torquay the night before the total eclipse in 1999 or going up to London to see David Blaine hanging in a box over the Thames.

Sure I made lots of mistakes and I may not have been ‘mom of the year’ but memories of happy times help me on days like these. I was rubbish at discipline, saying no and getting him to do his homework but having all these memories to treasure reminds me he had a happy childhood, despite not having his dad around or any siblings.

I gave him the best life I knew how and that’s all we can do as parents. In my book a good parent is someone who loves their children beyond anything else and would go to the ends of the earth to make them feel happy, safe and loved, even if they broke every rule in the ‘good parenting handbook’.

I haven’t written this blog for ages but I sometimes I just feel I should share part of my journey as even though it has been 12 years this year, I experience something nearly every day that relates to Toby and that he died and how he died.

I don’t think many people realise this about grief – even after years it lives within you, every day of the rest of your life.

A few experiences I’ve had recently relate to telling people I have just met that my son has died and them ignoring me – this happens a lot. I don’t believe I should not talk about Toby just to avoid having an uncomfortable conversation.

In my job I am constantly meeting new people. I work for the National Trust as a welcome assistant and I don’t just talk to people about mining history, we share stories about our dogs, our lives and of course our children.

When a person dies they cease to exist in the physical world but their lives up to that point still matter and their memory shouldn’t have to be erased to prevent conversations about death and dying and in my case, suicide.

If I’m with my friends and they are all talking about their adult children and grandchildren – should I not join in and share memories of my child?

I really appreciated a friend who recently was willing to engage in a proper grown up conversation about Toby and his death. We were just chatting over coffee and she asked me something interesting which most people never ask, ‘It must be very hard not knowing why he did it’.

I’m quite comfortable responding to these kind of questions as I really encourage more people to have open and honest conversations about suicide rather than shying away from it as if it is a huge taboo or contagious. It shows empathy and a willingness to try and understand more about suicide.

So that has prompted me today to write this blog, hopefully to help others that struggle with accepting they will never fully know why a loved one chose to end their own life.

It is hard to get your head around the fact that a person would choose to take actions to end their life. I still find it hard to comprehend even after doing extensive research for my dissertation. There is no simple answer as to why someone not just thinks about it, but who makes a plan, then carries it out.

How often do we hear ‘They couldn’t possibly be suicidal, they seemed so happy and were making plans’. The recent case of the missing woman demonstrates this. We don’t know if she took her own life or if it was an accident but so many friends and relatives were insistent that she couldn’t possibly have been suicidal as she loved her children, had a lovely life, had sent a text making plans for the next day…etc etc. When I hear those statements I just think, if only you knew how many people die from suicide who you could say those same things about.

All Toby’s friends thought he was carefree and happy-go-lucky. He didn’t demonstrate any signs of being severely depressed or suicidal. I would have given him money, and gone to the ends of the earth to help him but for some reason he decided he no longer wanted to live in this world. Even though he didn’t leave a note he had written some notes in a notebook the day before saying ‘today is the most satisfying day of my life’. That hit me hard.

Everyone wants reasons as that would make it easier to accept. ‘His wife left him, he was made redundant, in debt, in poor health etc etc but millions of people go through hard times but don’t take their own lives. There is no one reason. I do believe that any one of those events can be a catalyst – the straw that broke the camel’s back, but that it is much more complicated than just having a shit thing happen then deciding to end it all.

Suicide is complex and every case is different. I believe it is an intense desire to end the pain of a current situation and dying seems the only way out. I’m sure many of us can relate to the feeling of not wanting to go on, I feel that frequently – but then something else must happen to go from that feeling to actually deciding on a method, obtaining anything needed then going ahead. I can’t imagine being that brave – I would chicken out. So I believe the suicidal mindset is just focusing on bringing the current intolerable situation to an end – it doesn’t mean they don’t love you or their children.

Quite early on in my journey I recognised that they were 2 critical things I had to address and make peace with if I was going to survive and not drive myself crazy and go down a destructive path.

The first thing was to realise that I was not responsible for my child deciding to kill himself. It wasn’t anything I did or didn’t do or should have done. It wasn’t my fault. When I truly acknowledged this it was life-changing.

The second thing was making peace with knowing I would never truly know why Toby killed himself or what was going through his mind that weekend. I can speculate based on what I knew about him and his life at the time – but I had to accept I would never know why.

I went to a spiritual retreat 3 months after Toby passed away – searching for some comfort and healing. It was run by a guy known as The Barefoot Doctor (he has since passed away). In one session I wailed that I just wanted to know why he did it. I was taken aback when he said ‘why don’t you try asking him’. At first it seemed like a strange question – but then it made perfect sense. I closed my eyes and reached out and really tried to connect with Toby, and a very clear answer came back – ‘I don’t know mum’.

This made perfect sense to me and in that moment I was healed from the pain of not knowing why. Toby wouldn’t have been able to articulate in words why he did it…it was exactly what Toby would say. It wouldn’t have been authentic for him to write me a neat little ‘I’m sorry mum I love you’ note.

Toby was an esoteric being, a free spirit, mega-sensitive and intelligent – maybe on the spectrum – If I ever asked him how he felt about anything he could never tell me. I have a few notes and musings he wrote a few months before his death and it seems he was lost and confused, and couldn’t find a place in this world.Death is complicated, suicide is even more complicated and for those of us left behind, a survivor of bereavement by suicide, our grief is very complicated, and even more so if it is our child.

So if you are in this situation, recently bereaved and struggling with trying to understand why – perhaps see if you can sit with this and get to a place of peace and acceptance – it will aid in your healing.

34 years ago today I was in the Good Samaritan hospital in Phoenix where you had just been born. We never talked much about your dad, but I want you to know you were born with love and very much wanted. I was convinced I was having a girl and when they told me you were a boy I said ‘it can’t be’ but then I was probably delirious. I was just delighted I had a healthy baby as I was really sick when I was carrying you. You had a nearly perfect agpar score – all the tests they run – and were 7.5 lb and 20“ long. I still have the little card they gave me at the hospital, sometimes it’s hard to look at it but I will treasure it forever, I also have the tiny woollen hat they put on your head, a few precious memories of your birth.

I’m not sure where the name ‘Toby’ came from – we wound up my mum by telling her we were going to call you Spike which would have made you Spike Thorn. The name Toby fitted your perfectly.

We were on our own for 2 weeks until my mum arrived from England but we muddled through, your dad was only 26 but he was a natural – he was so calm whereas I was overwhelmed with the responsibility. At the beginning the urge to protect this tiny helpless baby is overwhelming and goes on forever no matter how old your child is.

I still struggle with the fact that I could not protect you in the end. Everyone says to me ‘I can’t imagine how you cope’, but I don’t want them to. No one, other than another bereaved parent’ can imagine what it is like to lose your child. People think I’m so strong and that I am coping well just because I show up every day with my make up on and don’t look like I’m broken, but of course I am.

The daily reality of living with the loss of a child is that at any given moment there will be a memory, a stab of pain; destructive thoughts. One morning last week I was walking round the field with the dogs like I do every morning and out of the blue I started talking to you and I was telling you how sorry I was that I failed you and that it was all my fault. This was just an ordinary day, nothing that I was aware of prompted this thought – but this is my reality. This is the reality of the life of a parent who has lost a child to suicide.

Saying that I wouldn’t change my life to not have had you in it. I always go back to the Wordsworth quote, something he said in a letter after losing his young son.

I loved the Boy with the utmost love of which my soul is capable, and he is taken from me – yet in the agony of my spirit in surrendering such a treasure I feel a thousand times richer than if I had never possessed it. 

I did the best I could and I couldn’t have loved you any more, you were a unique spirit and lived life on you terms, you never followed the crowd. You were introverted, mega intelligent and I do believe that you had a good life, even though it was cut short I gave you the best life I could and I know at the end you had many friends who loved you, I met most of them for the first time at your funeral.

I wonder what they thought of me as I didn’t look like a grieving mum, I delivered your eulogy without crying and even did a little dance at the end when we played the Friends theme song. I can’t explain but I don’t think it had really sunk in that you had gone. I just wanted to celebrate your life and acknowledge the caring, unique, intelligent person that you were.

I like to believe you were just too special for this world and I have to believe you loved me, even though you never scribbled a last note. We shared so many memories of special times, we laughed so much – one thing I can still hear is the sound of your giggles. So much love and so many memories to treasure. I don’t have anyone to talk to about these memories but I do share memories of you often with people. I know it makes them uncomfortable, but I won’t stop doing it.

As usual on your birthday, I wonder what you would be doing now in a parallel universe where you were still here, but I think 23 years was your time. I have found peace and acceptance but part of me that misses you grows a bit bigger each year.

I’ll always love you Toby, happy heavenly birthday x

Ten years…..ten years…..ten years without you, ten years of pain, ten years of trying to live my best life – without you.

In many ways I cope well, everyone says I am so strong and an inspiration – but they don’t really know my day-to-day reality where I think of you ninety-million times a day and I think of how you died and seeing your lifeless body more often than I want to.

I have gone to great lengths to accept and find peace with you ending your life. In many ways my life ended too on that day, but I resolved to rebuild, paper over the cracks and then fill them in as best I could so I didn’t completely fall apart.

There are some things about your death that remain unspoken, a secret, too awful to confront but I feel the time has come after 10 years to confront some of them.

I am a strong believer in rituals and ceremonies to find closure. A long time ago I emptied the ‘suicide drawer’ which had copies of your inquest results, your post-mortem report, police reports and death certificate. I burned everything and scattered the ashes on the beach at Perranuthnoe to separate your ‘death’ from your ‘life’. I resolved to never have to read those things again, and not to dwell on your death but to remember and celebrate your life.

But something that continues to haunt me is the lack of a suicide note. When you sat in that field that fateful night you had a notebook and pencil and you scribbled some notes – but no loving message to me. Did you think of me at all? Would it have been too much to ask for a sentence saying: ‘sorry Mom, I’ll always love you’, which was our sign off phrase. Did you not think that would comfort me?

Of course, I know that these are the conversations that will destroy me if  I let them invade my psyche. For a long time I searched your belongings, looking for clues or for that hidden note that I was sure you would have left for me.

Instead there was a flippant message written at 23.53 on 9^th July – with a sign off message for your friends and online gaming friends, I assume. It said T minus 6 minutes so I know the exact time – give or take a few minutes – when you took your last breath, there in a sugar beet field in Ely.

I haven’t shared the words in that note and probably won’t, but when I emptied the ‘suicide drawer’ a few years ago, I somehow couldn’t let go of those few last notes that you wrote as you sat there and contemplated the end of your life.

The notebook that was found with you was the one I had given you the last time I saw you. I had written some options and sage life advice as you had recently dropped out of Uni and were finding your way in life. Such things as: ‘don’t worry – Uni obviously wasn’t for you’ etc. The last thing I wrote was ‘There is nothing to stop you having an amazing life’.

You were so intelligent, so talented, so special – you could have done anything. Your friends loved you – I loved you, but it wasn’t enough.

On the day I came up to Cambridge to see you at the funeral place, I also visited the police station and the policeman gave me an envelope with your belongings in – your glasses, your phone, the pencil with which you scrawled that last message – and the notebook.

I opened the notebook and the first thing I saw was my writing ‘There is nothing to stop you having an amazing life’. I was shocked, trying to process this – then I realised this was the notebook I had given you. As I turned the pages looking for other notes, I found a page with some writing on it that you had obviously written the day before you died – but this was not addressed to anyone – it was like a diary entry.

I have never shared much of this but in that writing was one sentence that has haunted me over and over again, and so yesterday I decided after 10 years to also destroy that notebook and the other notes you left so I don’t ever have to see them again.

You see the sentence you wrote was ‘Today is the most satisfying day of my life’.

How do I cope with that? What do I do with that? After 10 years, thinking I am doing OK, coping well, living a reasonable life – I have to live with that thought. That after 23 years of loving you, raising you, supporting you – the day you ended your life was the most satisfying day of your life. Really? That sentence is like a knife right through my heart and out of everything has been one of the hardest things to process.

Of course I know rationally that you were in mental pain, you felt lost, hopeless, maybe like a failure – I will never know – but that notebook has gone up in smoke now with your last words, now ashes to be blown away up into the Universe.

I have to believe that you loved me, that you didn’t mean to hurt me. I can’t imagine that you even thought about those words being found at the time you wrote them – maybe you were just cementing your intentions by writing them down. I know you wrote them the day before you died (from other information) – so I know you had planned this – it was a conscious decision, a plan that you carried out – not a rash moment.

I nearly phoned you that day – 9^th July, but I was walking from Porthcurno and had no phone signal. Did you think of me at all? I will never know but I know after 10 years I can’t allow it to destroy me anymore so by burning the notes and writing this blog I am releasing the burden.

We are all carrying burdens and secrets that people know nothing about. With all grief comes guilt, with suicide grief that guilt can be a huge burden, with suicide of your child you have loss, grief, guilt and stigma. I was ashamed to tell anyone that my son had written those words – what did that say about me as a mother, as a parent – what would people think? This was ‘the me you can’t see’.

But I’m not ashamed anymore – you can criticise Prince Harry as much as you want but it was watching his documentary yesterday ‘The me you can’t see’ that prompted me to pull out that envelope out of its secret hiding place, process the anger, hurt and shame and let go of this secret which can only hurt me over and over again if I allow it.

I don’t blame you Toby for writing those words. I know now that many young people feel lost, troubled and hopeless. You had struggled in pain for years maybe, we don’t know – so you saw that day as the day your struggle would end. Maybe I should feel comforted by those words.

Today it is time for me to forgive you and to ask you for forgiveness. I was the best mum I knew how to be, and now, after 10 years, I know I must close this chapter and even though I may think about it at times, the physical reminder of your last words and thoughts are now just ashes blowing in the wind, so no one needs to see them. I have not shared details of other things you wrote as I know you wouldn’t want me to but I will always love you no matter what.

Image – Getty images

One of the traumas parents often face in the complex and tragic aftermath of losing a child to suicide, is the feeling of being a complete failure as a parent.

We are supposed to protect them. From the time they are born we sneak into their room at night to check they are still breathing, we put plastic protectors on sharp corners and locks on the kitchen cupboards. We sacrifice our own social lives to drop them off and pick them up rather than allowing them to travel home on their own, and when they are grown, we can’t sleep until we hear the key in the front door indicating they are home.

How often do you hear or read about parents feeling proud when their children achieve milestones such as exam results, University degrees, getting married having babies or getting a new job or a promotion? ‘We must have done something right’, they crow. ‘Oh, you must be so proud, their friends say’. Continue reading →

Today, 7 years and 6 months later, I’ve finally decided to throw out the shirt Toby was wearing when he died.

It is so hard to let go of anything that reminds me of Toby, but the other day I was rooting around in my drawers under the bed looking for a pair of black tights and suddenly came across it.

At that moment it struck me that every time I see it, I get a feeling of dread punching me in the gut so why do I want to keep it, it symbolises death, just like the black colour? Every time in the past I looked at it, then put it away again, I just felt I couldn’t let it go as it was the last item of clothing to touch my son’s body. Continue reading →