Her Suicide Note

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

I’m coming up on the anniversary of losing my mom, next month will be 18 years. I came across a an old blog post on Blogger that I wrote shortly after she died. It was a piece about how I hoped she and my grandma and my dad all knew how much I love them before they died. It also included what I hope my children and friends and family would know if I wasn’t here anymore. All of it always about love.

And it made me think about my mom’s last words.

When my stepdad called to tell me that he had boxed up some things of hers for me, I felt a familiar heaviness. I’d been feeling like that for most of my life when it came to my mom. I was always on high alert, extremely hyper vigilant, waiting for something to happen, weighed down by the inevitability that something always would. Acquiring some of her things brought that feeling to the surface, unease at what might be there.

Shortly after his call, I made the trip home to Vegas from Tucson, a record 4.5 hour drive and I remember none of it. Memory is funny that way, what it keeps and locks away.

When I pulled into the unpaved driveway, I had to convince myself to get out of the car. I stared for a long time at the old brown dilapidated screen door, the crumbling blocks that were supposed to be the base of her tiny garden that was never planted, the faded paint trim that flaked off in the wind. Death hung all over the house, it became the drapes.

I walked in and realized nothing about the inside had changed, except that she was gone, so really everything had. The dark wood paneling, the threadbare brown carpet, the little table against the wall still home to the black and gray telephone from my youth, and the long couch covered in afghan throws - her final resting place. He couldn’t throw it out he’d said. It was her favorite spot in the house. I sat at the opposite end of where she took her last breath and wondered if she’d known. Did she know how much I loved her? How much I missed her?

My stepdad handed me her box, saying something about how he thought these were things I’d want - her jade elephant necklace, some shirts, all of her pictures, some books she’d been in the middle of reading, important documents like the divorce decree from my her marriage to my dad. None of it was her, even though all of it was hers. Things she’d touched and held and worn and combed through. He offered to let me go through her closet and take other things if I wanted to.

I went into their bedroom and immediately saw her purse sitting on their dresser, wide open. I didn’t want to look, but I couldn’t help it. Right on top was a baggy full of all the different pills she’d taken - the killer cocktail, and a tiny black pocket notebook. For some reason, none of this had been given to the police. I guess I was meant to find it. I gingerly pulled the notebook out, looked around waiting for her to catch me. Irrational as that was. She didn’t appear of course, so I went ahead and opened it.

Her familiar neat text filled nearly every page. I skimmed through it until I got to the last few pages, the ones I knew were most recent. Pages of regret, pain, sadness, and the wish to make it better. Believing the only way to do that was from above, whatever heaven she thought existed. She didn’t want to be a burden anymore. She didn’t want to disappoint me or hurt me anymore, she fully believed I would be better off without her. She ended it with the hope that she’d be able to take care of me better by being gone. And so she left. I was left holding everything, including myself, together.

Her words mirrored the words I’d written years prior when I thought everyone would be better off without me. The letters that no one knew I’d written. The letters I was able to retrieve because I didn’t die. Her letter I retrieved because she did.

I didn’t take it with me. I left her pain in the notebook and put it back in her purse. It was not mine to keep or carry.

I think about now, how many times I’ve felt that dark pull, and instead of succumbing to it, I reach, I claw, I scratch and pull and drag myself back into whatever speck of light I can find. And I hold on tight to the knowledge that I am so loved and that the dark pull is only a moment, it’s not the total of my life. It’s just a sliver that I refuse to let grow.

Her words haunt me sometimes, like now, little word spectres floating on the air. I wonder what the last thing she said out loud was. Probably something to her beloved Puppa, her forever faithful all white bat eared chihuahua, corgi, Pom mix. She wasn’t alone when she went, her animals were surrounding her. And I’m glad for that. We should all be so lucky to be surrounded by unconditional love that way.

I miss her every day. I always will.

Don’t wait to tell people that you care, that you’re there, that you love them, that it’s just a moment, this life is just a moment.

If you or someone you know is in need of help please call 988 or if it’s an emergency- 911. Don’t be afraid to reach out. Just remember HOPE - hold on pain ends. 🖤