..to the story of a mother surviving the suicide of her daughter…

How odd and uncomfortable does THAT sound? A “welcome” page to a site no one should want to enter. A “home” no one should ever have to visit, much less live in.

When friends arrived at my home the night I learned my daughter was dead, they did not ring the bell and wait for me to welcome them inside. They let themselves in. The urgency of tragedy overruled the protocol of everyday life.

As time passes, life returns, more or less, to normal. My friends went back to the “more normal” ritual of knocking on my front door and waiting for me to let them in.

Grieving parents find their lives remain somewhere on the “less normal” end of the spectrum. After all, normal ends when a child dies before their parent. Normal questions like “how many kids do you have?” become a choice of uncomfortable confessions or half-truths. New acquaintances are met uneasily, life’s details carefully guarded so as not to ruin a party. When suicide is involved, things feel even less normal.

The “less normal” end of the spectrum can feel lonely quite a lot of the time. Hopefully this blog will alleviate some of that loneliness for people whose lives have been touched by loss and suicide. At the end of each post, there is a comments section. Please feel free to share thoughts, perspectives and stories.

I wish this weren’t my “home”, but it is.

Welcome.