Families Who Lost Loved Ones To Suicide Open Up About Effects, Need For Awareness

By KENNETH DEAN
Staff Writer
LINK to Tyler Morning Telegraph
Emotions rack the mind with numbing pain, mixed with feelings of disbelief and seething anger, as friends and family struggle to find words to comfort those left behind when a loved one commits suicide.

Society has placed a stigma on suicide, which not only condemns the person who has committed suicide, but in many cases, sees people abandon their friends and family because they fear the unmentionable act might spread to their own family.

"Talking about suicide is like saying 'sex' and 'pregnant' in the 1940s and 50s. Everyone is afraid it will spread and it's not sociably acceptable to talk about," David Terrell said.

If you are experiencing thoughts of suicide and wish to talk to someone, call 1-800-273-TALK (8255) to be connected to a suicide prevention and crisis center in your area.

A suicide and crisis number for the Dallas area is 1-866-672-5100.

For more information about the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention visit the organization's Web site at www.afsp.org.

Touched by Suicide, contact Carol Johnson at 903-574-3127.

Terrell and several others agreed to sit down with the Tyler Courier-Times--Telegraph recently and speak candidly about the effects suicide has had on themselves and their families.

One main point the group wanted to punctuate is that any family can be touched by suicide. Statistics now show every 16 minutes, someone commits suicide in America.


THE ANGER
Those gathered talked about a wide variety of emotions they have dealt with over the years, but they all agreed anger surfaced more than the rest.

"The worst thing is there is no one to blame. You have all of this anger but no one to really be angry at because that person is the person you loved. If someone walked up and shot my son dead, then I could be angry at them. But I loved my son, so how can I be angry at him?" Terrell said as tears filled his eyes.

Terrell's son, John Andrew "Andy" Terrell, was 31 when he took his life by hanging himself at Pier 1 Imports in Tyler on Nov. 25, 2003 after struggling with marriage and financial problems.

Terrell said he talked to his son the night before he died and the conversation was of pending plans for Thanksgiving, with no indication anything was wrong.

"He told me, 'I'll see you this weekend,' and the next morning I was called and told he had hung himself," he said.

Joy Biggs said she was mad at the doctors involved in her son Josh Dunlap's care because instead of giving him psychiatric counseling for his Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, they prescribed a variety of medicines.

Josh Biggs, who had just completed his master's degree in landscape architecture, took his life in a motel room on May 24, 2004, after at least two attempts at the age of 32.

His mother said her son was tormented with his illness for years and suffered greatly from long-term insomnia, which only served to intensify his mental illness.

"He was just worn out with his battle with OCD. He was so ashamed of the illness that his closest and dearest friends didn't even know he had a problem," she said.

Biggs said psychiatry has moved too far into medicating the patients and away from psychotherapy with one-on-one treatment.

"You do have a lot of anger and it has to go somewhere," she said.


A DIRTY WORD
The word "suicide" is met with thoughts of weakness, one's inability to cope with society and a litany of other stigmas, but the loved ones left behind say it can happen to any family.

"It's not a weak person who commits suicide. It's a person with an illness. You don't just wake up and decide you're going to kill yourself," Carol Johnson said.

Johnson's 18-year-old son, Jared, shot and killed himself in a bathroom inside her home in Lindale on Sept. 27, 2005.

"He borrowed a gun from his grandmother to go "target shooting," hugged her, then went home, locked himself in the bathroom and shot himself," she said.

Johnson said her son had been treated for having thoughts of suicide, but had a lot of love and support and had been doing well up until his death.

"Suicide many times leaves loved ones being ostracized. I had people I knew that when I saw them in the grocery store after Jared's death they would walk the other way," she said.

Biggs agreed and added her thoughts on people and their beliefs about suicide.

"The ideas which are still circulating around in our society about suicide are archaic," she said. "We need some discussion about this because only that will get this out in the open."

With a raised quivering voice, Terrell said he had people tell him his son was in Purgatory because he took his own life.

"That is not something a parent wants to hear about their child and it is something that should not be said," he said as tears filled his eyes.

But, dealing with others and losing friends because a suicide has struck a family is only half of the effects -- the other is coping with the aftermath.


STRAINED RELATIONSHIPS
At her special place in the Tyler Children's Park, Biggs remembers her son, Josh, and exhales to catch her breath.

Biggs explained Josh had been a part of the early planning of the park and he told her one day she would need a special place all to herself.

"I go there to think and be close to him. It is my special place," she said. "This was my son and I loved him and I just want to be close to him."

Terrell said his son's death changed his family forever and left it shattered.

"My (former) wife has a different husband and I have a different wife. Suicide changes everything and nothing is the same from the day it happens," he said. "I am not the same before Andy's death and neither is my wife."

Biggs and Terrell agreed, saying they lost friendships and relationships within the family unit are strained to breaking points.

"Suicide leaves a fractured family. My daughter said our family was like Humpty Dumpty. We've been put back together, but the cracks are still there and they run deep," Biggs said.

As a family struggles to find itself after suicide, there are many issues to deal with to attempt to move forward.

Johnson said for her, the main obstacle to overcome surrounding her son's death was the guilt.

"As a mom, the guilt was horrible at first. I loved Jared and still love him, but I am finally free of the guilt. After a lot of time and talking to others, I finally know I didn't do anything wrong," she said.

Monday: The series continues with a look at prevention and services for families struck by suicide.