Healing.

by Mom101 on 10.8.10
in Uncategorized

Yesterday, Nate and I got word that a relative of his had committed suicide together with her boyfriend. She was 23.

She’s someone I had only met once. I had no relationship with her. Nate had no relationship with her. But people who care about her are people we care about. 

Writing that condolence note to her parents just about near broke me.

You know you’re a mother when you put yourself in the shoes of every parent who loses a child.  I can’t help but think that she used to be a baby in someone’s arms too. A toddler who took her first steps for the camera too. A little girl who went to her first day of kindergarten too.

All I wanted to do yesterday was get the hell out of the office, go home and hug my kids.

We watched Nickelodeon together. We sang songs. We talked about school and birds and bullies and magic tricks and ravioli. Sage fell asleep on the couch at 7:30. Thalia stayed up way too late.

God, I love them.

{36 Comments}

36 thoughts on “Healing.”

  1. Oh, gosh. Just… oh, gosh. (Since becoming a mother, I can't read newspaper articles dealing with children and… abd things. It just messes with my head too much. My thoughts are with you & your family.)

  2. Oh my gosh, honey. I'm so sorry for your family. Pardon me while I go hug my baby girl as tight as I can without her protesting.

    <3

  5. Oh, that's so sad. My condolences to you and your extended family.

    Three years ago, few weeks after my sister lost her 3 year battle with cancer, my cousin jumped off a bridge. Both left behind 4 year old daughters. I've always wondered what the hell my cousin was thinking. She must have been hurting so badly. It also makes me angry because my cousin chose to die and my sister didn't. Yet both kids lose…and so do the rest of us.

  6. Very sad (and scary) will hug my kids extra hard when they're home from school (so, so sad, really) logging off and going to hang out with my little pukey-monster, right now!

    Have a peaceful and sunshiney weekend.

  8. What a terrible tragedy. I'm so sorry for your family.

    There really is something about becoming a parent that connects you even more deeply to these terrible things that happen. I've been a complete wreck over this whole LGBT teens and bullying and suicide and the “It Gets Better” project. Me? I have happy, healthy three-year-olds. It's not a part of my day-to-day. And yet, these are someone's children, and my heart breaks almost as though they were my own.

    Hugs to all of you, hugs to all of our babies, no matter how big they've gotten.

  9. I'm so sorry for your family… suicide is such a different kind of loss, so different from other deaths. I just can't imagine losing one of my daughters this way. Impossible to think of.

  10. Thank you so much everyone.

    @Goddess in Progress, oh God, yes. I've been crushed over those deaths too, to the degree I'm barely talking about it.

  12. Oh, ouch. I am the same way. I can barely stand to think about these sorts of things since I've become a mother. And they just make me want to go hug my girls. I'm so sorry for you and your extended family.

    I've been so glad to see the “It Gets Better” campaign… even though I for the most part can barely stand to hear the stories. I think it is a brilliant idea to use the internet to help some very vulnerable kids. We have a family friend whose child has realized that she is transgendered. I know that she struggled with this greatly, and I hope that the It Gets Better campaign can show her she's not as alone as she feels. I'm just so grateful that she reached out to her parents and got help.

    Also, it is the same message that I have always wanted to go and give to the kids who are just geeky misfits in high school and never get dates. You know, the kids like I was. High school was far, far from the best years of my life. They were nowhere near as bad as they are for some LBGT kids, but they weren't great. Things did get so much better.

  13. Oh, how I struggle with this. I feel as though it is a product of my age that I truly grasp the notion that things shall and do pass. I wish so much that there was a way to have made every one of these young lives lost believe it before it was too late, and to understand that their loss would leave an eternal valley of pain and regret for those they leave behind. I am so sorry for your family.

  14. No matter what the comments on Babble say, you're a GREAT mom, Liz!

    Am sorry to hear about the passing of your relative. Can't imagine how bad things must have been to take ones own life at the tender age of 23.

  16. I just want to gather you up and hug you tight.

    I'm so very sorry and I send my condolences to your family and all of your extended family.

    A loss such as this is so hard to grasp. I wish nothing but peace for her soul.

  17. Yesterday I found out that a guy I went to school with died this past June. I didn't like him, but it didn't change the fact that his kids lost their father.

    So I made a point of giving these kids of mine an extra hug because you just never know.

  18. I'm so sorry.

    Since becoming a mother, I often look at people and remember that long ago, they were infants and toddlers and children as innocent and good as any other. It's humbling, and it helps me hold my own children a bit closer too.

  24. Oh, Liz. So sorry for you and your family's loss and the repercussions this has on the loved ones involved. This very thing has hit me and a very close friend of my hard in the last year. We will be supporting the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention's annual Out Of the Darkness walk on Nov. 6 in memory of two recent lost loved ones. There are no words to describe the loss and almost no consolation. Hugging your kids just that much more is a very appropriate and, I think, a very preventative measure. Give them a squeeze from me. And one for yourself.

  25. When I was 19, a best friend of mine from high school shot himself. For years, I blamed myself for not seeing the signs that later, were plain as day. I'm so sorry Liz, suicide is incredibly painful and difficult to deal with. For me, I felt like nobody ever understood unless they had been there too. If you need to chat, just holler.

  26. I can't begin to feel what the parents are going through right now. I pray for all the hurting souls that were desperate to get to the next life, the family they've left behind.

  28. Just reading this post choked me up. I'm a new mom and I had zero idea about the kind of love I was in store for. It's a love that terrifies me. To. The. Core. I've never loved so deeply.

    I saw the movie “Lovely Bones” and that near broke me. I remember reading the book when I was not a mother, and truly loving it for lovely literary purposes, but in retrospect had no idea about the depth of it.

    I will say that loving this hard and deep is truly a gift. So is the ability to now have empathy for every other parent in the world now. And every day I try to appreciate this love surrounding me.

    I'm new to this mommy (and blog world!) and I'm so happy I found you!

    I'm your newest follower.

    With love xx

    November Grey

  30. I'm so very sorry to hear about such a tragedy. You're 100% right…when I hear of such a thing, I immediately think of the parents and their heartbreak. I can't begin to imagine what they're feeling.

  31. Oh God that is just awful. My condolances to the family. I think having your child die is the absolute worst thing for any parent. So sorry.
    I just learned today that one of my good friends has cancer after surviving it 5 yrs ago, the fucker is back. Tough times.

  32. Oh God Liz, I'm so sorry. I came here looking for something else and stumbled upon this. Someone I knew killed himself last month. We hadn't had any contact in several years and hadn't been that close (he was a friend of my husband's), but all I could think about was his parents, and it was almost too much to take.

  34. I am so so sorry. And, yes, being a mom has now elevated every emotion I have when I hear a story about a child. My heart breaks every time I read a story like this. I talk to my husband all the time about communicating with our kids and how it is so important to LISTEN to them. I am making that a priority.

  35. I felt exactly the same way about 6 weeks ago when a friend of mine got killed riding his bike in Williamsburg. He was 29. He was a PhD student. He was my best friend's “The One.” Watching his mother as they turned off his life support was the worst thing I've ever seen. Literally. Our babies will always be our babies.

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