SOS

Survivors Of Suicide:  This is a group you don't want to belong to.  Because there are no answers when someone you love commits suicide. It's been 12 days since I found my son, Brian, and I'm beginning to realize that there are very few people in my life who knew Brian.  Which leaves a kind of hole in my life that can't be filled.  There isn't anyone to share in my memories, someone to talk about what he meant to me.

Brian was a special needs kid: he was visually impaired from birth.  This created issues with school work and relating to others.  When someone calls out from across the room, he depended on voice to get the gist of the message as he couldn't see visual clues from a distance.  He adapted, and the rest of us adapted to his needs as well.

After a divorce, and creating a blended family, it made some difference, but in the long run, it was just me and my son.  He lived with me until he turned 30.  While we were roommates once he became an adult, he depended on me to get him around town, and I depended on him to be my handyman.  He could fix anything -- he gets that from me, and my dad. 

I was the one who helped him navigate the adult world, creating a bank account, appointments with Social Security or the DMV, and any other adult-ing that needed to be done.  They were things that needed doing, and if I didn't prod him along sometimes, it didn't get done. 

When he started attending Mesa Community College, he had to learn to navigate the bus system.  We followed the bus route in my car a few times so he could become familiar with the route, and the landmarks he would be looking for.  The first time he rode the bus alone, I followed along behind, making sure he was able to transfer from one bus line to another.  He knew I was there, that way if something went wrong, there was a bit of a safety net. 

We did this because in Ohio, one night Brian decided to take a bus "down town" and ended up getting confused on the dark streets.  He called me and asked me to come get him, he was "at Burger King".  There was more than one Burger King in town and it took a while to find him!!!  It was one of those panic moments in a mother's life -- and maybe a bit for him too! 

Once he got the bus route to MCC figured out, he had much more freedom and traveled a bit more on his own.  One day, he was transferring buses, and had to run from the first bus to the second, and he dropped his cell phone.  He told me about it later, and we decided to go see if we could find the phone. We wandered the street in the dark, found the first half of the phone, then the back was found too!  Thank goodness, because his phone had insurance and this was covered!!

I'm writing here because I feel like no one else will tell his story, and he will be forgotten, a vague memory.  And because of the taboo of suicide, people won't speak of him. 

"Death is not the greatest loss in life. 

The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live."