Suicide-How it affects those you leave behind.

*****DISCLAIMER***** this post is very, very long & also very raw about a touchy subject. I wrote it before christmas, december 20th. I wanted to wait until the holidays were over to publish it.

Please have this video playing when you read this post, it is the song we sang at my uncle's funeral. It won't have the same affect if you do not watch it. I can not listen to this song anymore, it is beautiful but no matter what i am doing or where i am i burst out bawling the minute i hear it. I am cried out today from my previous bosses funeral so i think i will be able to write this without crying too much.



Now imagine 20 or so nieces singing the chorus (sitting of course, ya know, that thing called copyright) as we are in the funeral home, so we are like the choir in the video.

Back story on this post.

24 years ago November 26Th my grandpa went missing. He was not a nice man, he was an alcoholic who beat my gram & my dad, to me he was good though, treated me special because the other grand kids were not allowed to have anything to do with him. He was dating a lady who's daughter had ties to some really bad people.

December 28Th a policeman shows up at our door.
I remember this like it was yesterday, we were only 2 blocks from the police station so we were the first people they contacted.
He came to inform us they found my grandpa, dead in his truck.
He had "shot himself" (i say that loosely as it is impossible to shoot yourself point blank in the head & start your truck on fire,it is impossible to shoot yourself in the head with a shotgun when the steering wheel is in the way, trust me tried n tested without pulling a trigger).
His truck was badly burnt, the only way to identify him was dental records. A 16 year old boy found him in the rm of Haywood while out hunting (ironically in the area i am getting married).

My dad turned around & punched the wall, while the policeman was still at our door. December 31, 1987 we buried my grandpa. My family has never accepted it as suicide but what can ya do.

Present day 4 years ago, 20 years after my grandpa died. September 2rd, 2007 my uncle (his son) committed suicide.
I normally shut my ringer off at night because G worked nights sometimes & if he got woken up by the phone he would not be able to go back to sleep, but he worked days that day & for some reason i had left my phone on. I NEVER ever did that, ever.
10 am September 3rd i get a phone call, it was my dad, he was crying, he told me he had some bad news, my uncle wally (his only brother) was dead.
I asked him what happened & he said "he hung himself".
I immediately freaked out & asked my dad to come pick me up, i did not have a car & G was at work, we were going to my grandma's.
My dad took over 30 mins to come get me & all i could do was pace & cry, i did not know what to do with myself & i was alone.

I phoned G's work & left a message that it was an emergency & i needed him to phone me. I can't remember if he got the message right away or not but he got the rest of the day off work & came to me so that i had him to lean on. I would not wish the pain my family went through on my worst enemy.

Yes people die, it is a fact of life, but when it happens this way there is a lot of blame to go around.
My dad blamed himself because my uncle called him, he missed it cause he was already asleep.
My aunt blamed herself because she was supposed to visit him that week & never made it.
His wife blamed herself because she had left him.
Everyone else blamed it all on her because of how she left him (took everything).
I didn't blame anyone but him.

He was the one who selfishly decided we were better off without him.
He was sooooo excited to finally become a grandpa, but he robbed his unborn grand daughter the pleasure of ever knowing her grandpa.
He robbed his kids of having a dad, their mom's husband is not even a step dad to them.
He forever marred his now 19 year old daughter (14 at the time) as she was the one who found him, she lived with him. She went crazy partying it up & sleeping around, doing drugs etc. She never went to counselling, she refused to go.
He robbed my dad of his best friend, they were very close, my dad was the best man when he got married. He robbed my grandma of her son.
He robbed my aunts as well as my cousins & myself of a brother/uncle.

Does he care? How could he? He is not here to pick up the pieces or deal with the aftermath.

He left us a voice message on his phone, which was the hardest thing ever to hear, hearing his voice after he was gone tore us up.
He told us to spoil his grand daughter rotten.
That he was sorry, there was nothing we could do, he saw no other way. My grandma (the one i can't stand now) carried his picture in her arms for days, rocking with it & talking to it.
She was devastated.
People played that message over n over just to hear his voice.
His 20 year old 7 month pregnant daughter who was 2000 miles away at the time had to go find her bf camping in the woods in a place she was unfamiliar with so that she wouldn't be alone. He went away for the weekend with some friends & she needed him.

He killed himself on my little cousins birthday. A day his mom will never be happy on again.

See here is the deal, he was a druggie(coke, pot etc etc etc) who had a major major drug problem, he had debts, he hung out with bad people.
He stole thousands from their savings & disappeared for 3 days on a bender, spend over 2500 that weekend, first time ever that no one could get a hold of him, we thought he was missing (which is why his wife took the rest of the money & everything they owned & left him, she couldn't go through it anymore).
He was also an alcoholic, he had a temper problem & could be mean(i don't think he ever hit her though, just mean with his words).
Sounds like a wonderful person right?

Well no matter what he was still a person.
A person who was loved, a person who had a family that still cared about him despite his faults. He knew that, he believed that, no one judged him or ever told him how sad they were over his actions.
Maybe if someone had spoken up instead of worrying about angering him he would be alive now.
A person who had people he could count on. He also knew this.
He had places to go & people to turn to.
Unfortunately that night every human he contacted failed him. He tried over 20 people including my dad & his ex wife, everyone was sleeping. It was after 1 am.
NO one answered. I truly believe though that if someone is that desperate they will do it anyways, just later.

My 14 year old cousin got up that morning & went downstairs to do laundry, it was 8:30am. She saw his feet, ran upstairs screaming & called 911.
They asked her to cut him down, she freaked, said no way (wth were they thinking), she had run outside & was not going back in the house.
She phoned her mom who paid $25 to take a cab there (who cares about money, bus would take too long & her daughter needed her).
Someone phoned my dad, i am not sure who.
The police got there around the same time as her mom & they cut him down.
He had a journal, not sure too this day what it says. They took it as evidence.
There were beer bottles on the table. He had to get drunk first, in order to have the guts to do it.
They just treated it as another drunk who commited suicide. They were horrible, they were not very comforting to my cousin what so ever. 

I have been to a lot of funerals in my lifetime.
Some for people i was very close with, grandparents, my cousins grandparents who passed away a week apart, whom i knew all my life, family friends.
A 14 year old neighbor who i didn't know but who also committed suicide due to bullying, i will post on that another day.
Other than her funeral i have never been to one with so much sadness.
As much as well all loved our precious grandparents we knew they were getting older & their time would come.
My uncle was only 41 years old.
We went through a full week of pure torture, his funeral was the day before my birthday & the day after my cousins.
You would think we would be all cried out but each day we continued, we were up all hours, we drank (not me), we smoked, we talked, we sang, we mourned.

I was the only one working during that time but i had to, it kept me going.
I had something to do with my time other than sit & cry. I worked in retail though & i just was not myself, i could not be happy with my customers like normal.
I was extremely sad.
These days i still get sad, i cry in my sleep, i dream of him often, but i am also mad, mad at him for being so selfish.
4 years later i still carry the burden as if it was yesterday. I am still not over it.
We have all moved on but i am positive none of us are over it & now grieve in private. 

Right now there are a lot of videos posted about suicide & bullying.
Those are teenagers, there are many adults who suffer silently as well who get forgotten about.

The biggest lesson to take away from this is even if you have nobody, it is never that bad, there is always help even if you feel like you are constantly hitting brick walls.
My uncle had a family that loved him unconditionally.
All he needed to do was reach out & truly accept the help offered to him.
He had went to dry out centers before, but never rehab. See my uncle was macho & could never swallow his pride. If he could, he would still be alive right now.
If he had asked for help & taken it he would be alive.
We would not have to go through what we went through. 

If you ever feel so low as to contemplate suicide think about the people you are leaving behind, yes you will be free from pain because you are dead but theirs is just beginning!
I lost it today when i seen my previous bosses wife's shoulders going up & down as she was sobbing.
They had been married 31 years & he was only 56. He had a sudden death as well but it wasn't suicide..
Think about all you are leaving behind.
Do not think of you, cause at that point you do not care about yourself.

When i was younger i was suicidal, i even went so far as to cut myself, but one night i had a dream.
I was at my own funeral, i tell ya, that scared the shit right out of me.
I had put myself in my families place.
I still have dark moments now where i think people would be better off........... but would they be?
How would G feel, how would my son feel? Why would i want to make them feel that way?
They would be totally devastated.
G told me today he never wants to go through the pain paulette went through as she had to say goodbye to her partner of 31 years, of her partner that she thought she would have for 20 more years.
He says he hopes we go together so we do not have to experience that.

Every time i hear about someone that age passing away i think of our parents, when i hear about teenagers i think of my son.
I could not imagine having to bury my son due to suicide, but i am fearful every day that he will do that, that he feels unloved etc because of what my gram is doing to him, he is also bullied bad & a bully.
Can you imagine what it would do to your loved ones?

I am going to post a picture of my tattoo, i am deathly afraid of needles, i took a lorazapam before i went into the shop, it did not help me relax much like it normally does, that is how hyped up i was about getting a tat, but i felt i needed to get it.
I believe in angels, i believe in spirits.
I have always felt my grandpa was my guardian angel.
I always wanted to do a tribute to him but i didn't know what.
After my uncle died & this song was at his funeral i knew what i had to have. 1 year & 2 months later, around the time of his birthday i got this tattoo. I designed it.
It is backwards because they screwed up the order of the initials. It looks like my uncle is leading my grandpa, but it is the other way around.
It is not complete because after an hour & a half i could not sit there anymore. It has a bit more scenery.
The point of it is they are both angels, my grandpa called my uncle home with him. He is leading him up to the gates, they are through the trees (in my vision).

The lines are the trees unfinished, they are on the path. It is in shades only for  the right effect. They are holding hands because i believe my grandpa is leading him.

Please pass this post on if it touched you, i do not care if i get any more followers but you never really know what someone is going through, maybe it can touch them, maybe they have been thinking about something they shouldn't have & need to read it. Whatever it may be i just hope it makes someone think.