On Friday I was filing some bills and important notices in my filing box. I haven’t been keeping up with it too well, so I decided to give everything in there a once-over and determine if I could shred any of it. I came upon a vaguely-worded folder and started rooting through it. In it I found a photocopy of my dad’s suicide note.
I wasn’t expecting to find it there. But like watching a train wreck, once I had it on my hands and was aware of what I had, I couldn’t help but read it.
It was awful. My dad’s note is made up of many different emotions…reflective, angry, depression, and regretful. He openly acknowledged it would be hard on me, dealing with his suicide. He mentioned how he grieved twice for his father who died without warning (before I was born). He called them “shock waves.” Indeed, I had my first shock wave when I found him. I think I may now be heading into my second “shock wave.” I’ve dreamed about my dad a lot recently, and I experience a lot of flashbacks to the room he died in.
He made it known how much he loved me. I wish I could have saved him. I mean, that was my dad. He would have turned 68 this coming July. He was 53 when he died. I put my dad through a lot, and I can’t help but think if my problems hadn’t existed, he’d still be alive. His last words of the note are “And so, good- bye!”
I guess I just miss my dad today. Watching my wife interact with her family yesterday (Easter) made me long for my parents. She’s almost 40, and has both her parents. Her brother is 53. I was an orphan at 19. Lost my mom when I was 11. How did this happen to me? Why did it have to happen to me? All questions I struggle with. I wish my dad was around to meet my wife. I wish he could have seen my wedding, met my in-laws and celebrated birthdays with my wife and I.
I’m sorry to hear that @anon40540444 . It must have been very emotional to find the note. My husband’s parents are also dead, but from diseases. He is sometimes sad and misses his mom and dad. That is natural to miss the ones you have loved and lost. Don’t think what you could have done different. You were a kid, you did not know. And he didn’t let you know. As a parent myself, with several suicide attempts, of wich two were after my kids were born, it is NEVER the kid’s fault. I had voices telling me to end my life. Also depression makes you not think clearly. Please don’t blame your self.
Don’t blame yourself for your dad’s death. Sometimes I think that when a person blames himself for something awful it is a way of trying to regain control over the situation. It’s easier to blame yourself than to realize it was beyond your control. The problem with that is that it burdens you with guilt.
I was going thru some papers and came across a report card with a couple of failing marks on it and I broke out in a cold sweat thinking it was my report card. It was my brother’s. I was thinking, I know there were some difficult years, but I didn’t know they were that bad. My brother turned out to be a financially successful person for most of his life and I didn’t. He just refused to let flunking as a child affect him whereas I was a nervous, stressed and frightened student because I had gotten the idea that I must not fail, like my life was at stake.
I know this has nothing to do with your father’s death except that I think going thru your belongings once in awhile is a good thing in that it can jolt one. I’m sorry for your dad’s death. I’ll bet he had thought about it for some time and I think he thought it was what he wanted, not knowing any different.
I am so sorry for you losing your father before he reached a ripe old age. I have two grandparents who both committed suicide and it was really hard on both my parents I know. Make wiser choices than your father did and stick around for a while!
suicide is a long reaching action. My Great Grandfather committed suicide when my grandfather was ten, he had been diagnosed with heart failure, and back in 1944 that was a death sentence, and life insurance didn’t cover it, so he went into the bathroom and shot himself, apparently back then suicide WAS covered.
It affected my grandfather right until he died, and affects me even today, because my branch of the family is viewed as ‘weak and stupid’ by my great grandfather’s brother’s family. (they split off because my great great uncle married a former prostitute…they called us stupid, but everyone one of them, since her, has ended up on drugs or selling their bodies)
Just try to remember the good times, I lost my friend to suicide in November, and I just thik of our time in high school together.
wow, @anon40540444 I had no idea you led that kind of childhood…I’m sorry for the sad news. Makes me just want to drive over there and give you a great big long hug. I would probably cry. I wish I had money to travel. I would love to see you.
