Brave Survivor, You Are Not Alone

Dear Brave Survivor,

Nothing can prepare you for the pain you will feel for the rest of your life when someone close to you dies by suicide. Your life will be altered forever and at times you will feel like no one could ever understand how you are feeling. You will rage through a platitude of emotions and at times it will seem as though you are stuck in a movie reel, replaying the day you receive that unimaginable news, but worse yet, some days you will feel so very, very alone. As a recent survivor of my father’s suicide, I would like to tell you that you are not alone.

When you hear the news and you lash out, sit and stare, cry in a fetal position for days, you are not alone.

When you still cry a year later and others think you should be more stable, you are not alone.

When you go through your lost loved ones things and you smell each t-shirt while sobbing into the fabric, you are not alone.

When you keep the suicide note to read every so often because you know it’s the last thing they did, you are not alone.

When you choke on your words, trying to spit out how your loved one died and only get out a faint whisper or even a lie, you are not alone.

When you begin to hate any holiday that revolves around your loss, you are not alone.

When others unknowingly of your loss comment on suicide and you retreat to the nearest restroom to cry alone, you still are not alone.

When you think to yourself you’d try anything to see them again no matter the consequences, you are not alone.

When you have one of your bad days, and there will be plenty of really bad days, and you think about how easy it would be to end it also, you are not alone.

When you lash out in anger into the dense air of your bedroom, screaming at your loved one, you are not alone.

When you feel extremely guilty and at fault, you are not alone.

When you think you simply cannot move forward without them in your life, you brave survivor, are not alone.

You will never be prepared and healing will always look a little bit different each and every day. There will be terrible, awful days, and there will be ok days as well. You will learn to create space for your pain, but you will never control it. It will surface, simmer, hide and flow at its own pace and time. Let it. And remember in all of this, you brilliant, brave and wonderful survivor, you are not alone.

-A recent survivor