When I was at the AFSP NYC Out of the Darkness walk on October 25, as the walk ceremony concluded and the actual walk commenced, a lady walking alongside me tapped me on my shoulder and asked if I was Yvonne, who gave the speech on stage. I said I was, and she proceeded to give me her business card and introduced herself as J. She thanked me for my speech and said it really moved her, then burst into tears. I hugged her (well, as best as I could since we were a sea of walkers at that point along a route!), thanked her for reaching out to me, and let her know that I’d contact her after the walk.
I did what I said I would: I emailed her after the walk. She replied back within a day and we set a time to meet, which ended up being late afternoon today. We met at a little cafe close to Kaia’s school so I could pick her up easily after. She shared her story with me about how she lost her younger brother to suicide last year, how it took her by surprise because he was so high functioning, with a “picture perfect” life: married with two (now adult) kids, high powered, high earning career, living in the ‘burbs. Growing up, they lived in an affluent neighborhood and were part of a loving, “very functional” family. She said she’s trying to put together bread crumbs for why he took his life because she truly saw no signs, and that’s why it still hurts her so much. She has two brothers, but this was her closer sibling. She’s been in grief counseling every other week since his passing; she’s trying to find ways to support others to reduce the stigma around suicide and to get people to open up more about their struggles, their depression, their thoughts.
On the morning of the walk, I was interviewed by a New York City storyteller who asked what I wished more people understood about suicide. I only had time to give part of my answer, but one piece of it came back to me when I was talking with J this afternoon. I shared with her that some of the people who struggle most can also be the people who seem the most capable, successful, and the most put together from the outside. This is also known as “high functioning depression.” I’ve come to understand how easily impossibly high expectations can turn inward: when someone feels they are constantly falling short of the standard they’ve set for themselves, that disappointment can start to feel less like “I failed at something” and more like “I am a failure.” And in a very dark place, that belief can become the idea that they don’t deserve to be here, or that the people they love might somehow be better off without them. It was like a light went off in her head; J immediately responded to this and said this description was definitely her brother.
“Your speech was really beautiful,” J said to me over tea during our meeting. “I just thought it was so well written and spoken. It really spoke to me. And you and I are the same: we have both lost a brother we so dearly loved.”
She’s right: we are both sibling loss survivors. We are bonded through a shared experience of tragedy and despondency. I smiled and thanked her. It made me happy that at least one person in this audience felt something from hearing me speak. And it made me even happier to see that she was getting herself help and also trying to find ways to use her grief to help others in reducing the stigma around depression and suicide. That’s all we have left to do in life now to keep our brothers’ spirits alive.