Beyond Goodbye is a podcast that explores dying, death, and grief and therefore may contain sensitive or distressing material that could be triggering for some individuals and is not suitable for all listeners.
Therefore, listener discretion is advised.
Hello and welcome to Beyond Goodbye, a show that empowers listeners to engage with death and grief in a healthy and transformative way.
My name is Angela Sturm and I am your host.
In today's episode, we will discuss ways in which our friends, coworkers, and community in general can support those of us grieving.
But first we begin with our real life story of loss.
And the story we have for you today is about a bright, intelligent, successful man who, unbeknownst to those closest to him, suffered in silence, ultimately leading to his death.
Our guest is his sister, Kelly, and this is her story as well as our second episode titled, Death by Suicide.
There are a lot of things we cannot choose or control, like the fact we are all going to lose a loved one.
Some people are able to cope with their grief and eventually find life again after loss, while others seem unable to do so.
My guest today, Kelly, is one of those who's been able to adjust to life without her brother.
But as we all know, it's a hard road to travel and sometimes friends, coworkers, even family struggle to support us as we navigate our new normal.
We want to talk about that today and hopefully help or at least provide some insight to help guide those, meaning us well, so that the grievous needs are met, and the supporters attempts are understood.
But first, let's welcome Kelly and hear about her lost journey. Kelly, welcome.
Thank you, Angie.
Yeah, so tell us a little bit. Well, tell us, tell us your story.
Well, I am Kelly and in 2015, April 8, 2015, I lost my brother, my older brother and best friend to suicide.
I still feel him and, you know, think about him so often. It's hard to believe it's been eight years.
So he, he was, like I said, kind of the epitome of of big brother took care of me and he was a father and a husband and, you know, a businessman and was also struggling with depression and addiction and things that
we as a family knew just the surface of what he was struggling with. And, you know, his suicide, I think, shocked us.
But also, you know, there's, there's this feeling of what could we have done, what more could we have done. So I think the complicated part of losing someone to suicide and be a being a suicide loss survivor is that you do feel all of these feelings of guilt.
Also of anger.
And, you know, part of my journey through the grieving process is really learning how to handle those emotions as they come and go.
You know, there's this overwhelming sense of loss.
But also of just frustration and, you know, why didn't, why didn't he get the help that he needed. And the answer to that is that, you know, he felt he couldn't he didn't feel like there was hope or help out there.
And, yeah, it's been, it's been a rough road. Thankfully, you know, I have had a lot of support and with my friends and family.
And I've really had to lean in to also professional help.
Because I had never dealt with this kind of loss before.
Sure. I will first off, I'm really sorry for your loss. And I know our listeners are as well.
I've, I've not had a family member died due to suicide. So I don't know what that's like.
It has to be awful.
You said that you had a lot of support from, you know, your friends and family. So how did your friends and coworkers react to the news and, you know, in terms of like supporting you like what did they do that you felt was good and maybe some things that weren't so good for you.
Sure.
You know, I think everyone kind of rallied around us and kind of, you know, made sure that we had all the basics, all the basic things that we needed, you know, that we were eating and that we were taking care of, you know, things for the service and that we didn't need support and that I remember his best friend came with us to the the
funeral home and helped us like right the obituary and kind of did those tasks that seemed so hard in the moment, you know, because we were still in such shock.
Right.
I think we all kind of didn't know how to deal with it. I don't think people knew how to support us, because they didn't want to say the wrong thing. They didn't want to be insensitive and really I what I needed most is just someone by my side, and someone that new bill so what I found comforting
was spending time with his friends and hearing stories and laughing and remembering all of the good times and I felt like if I didn't start if I didn't start like cataloging all of these memories that they were going to go away.
And so it was really important for me to kind of just surround myself with everyone that loved him. And that was what was most helpful.
As time goes on, and you lose someone, you know, life goes on. And, you know, I think what's important for supporters to remember is that, yes, life has gone on, but it's gone on without, you know, my brother, it has gone on and I still feel that loss.
You know, very, very, it's very real every day and I still need the support so I think advice for supporters would be to continue to check in it doesn't matter if it's been a day or eight years, I still need a consistent check in.
And that can just be, hey, how are you doing or hey I thought of Bill today and this is why that that's what's helpful to me.
I found after the death of my kids and my mom, like you I loved hearing the stories I'd have strangers message me or come to my home and tell me things that I had no no idea my kids were doing.
You know they were adults so we I don't didn't live with them as they were adults and you don't know what their adult life was like like what they were doing outside of what, you know, the visiting and so forth.
I hear these stories of things that they've done for their community and the people. I really really liked that it really made me feel good and gave me a rounder picture of them and I like what you said about cataloging the memories I love that I actually have been writing I call it a book but it's
more of a journal for the their Mike children's children my grandchildren about the memories of their mom and dad and from birth and stories and funny stories and things that are good for me helpful in healing but also would be you know I think is going to be a good thing for them.
I did get a lot of people saying you know which is valid, I you know I don't know what to say, you know I'm so sorry. I have had some people say it will get better, but we know it's that's relative.
My dad used to get real angry when people would ask him if he was okay, really angry, and he'd be like of course I'm not okay. And I had to remind him that you know, people don't know what to do, I mean, death and grief, it's an intense energy.
It's not easy to be around, especially when you don't know what to do to help so they feel so helpless. And, you know, and he knew that, but he was just so in the moment of his grief that he had, you know, he'd get angry.
Did you ever get angry yourself like did you find yourself like there were times when I would get really angry too when somebody done something or I felt like they were making it about them and I had to remind myself that they knew my kids and my mom and they also have their own grief, they're different, but
trying to give them some grace for being for not doing what I felt like they should be doing for me and I didn't even really know what I needed to be done for me though.
Yes, I can relate to that for me.
It was more because another thing that I did early on with my grief is I educated myself on suicide awareness and got really involved with different organizations.
I spoke publicly about my story to other suicide loss survivors and what, you know, and doing this, you know, I became educated and so when I would talk to friends and loved ones who didn't have the knowledge that I had about how to talk about someone who has died by
suicide, one of the things that would really bother me is when they would say bill committed suicide.
For those that don't know like that's that's not something that we say, we say someone died by suicide because this is not an act that they are committing in their right mind this is not a crime.
This is an act of desperation that happens.
And so I think the kind of the just the lack of awareness around really bothered me and made me angry, and then some of the insensitivity that would come along with that.
So, you know, when people, for example, would, you know, oh, I could just shoot myself.
You know, this this is so bad, you know, I'll just why don't you just shoot me this meeting is so long.
And, you know, they'll make like a gesture of shooting themselves and so it gave me opportunities to educate and, you know, raise awareness, which is a good thing.
I still am, you know, trying to raise awareness.
I have a tattoo of a semi colon on my wrist, which, you know, means, you know, period, no period just a semi colon because just pause, pause and it's become a symbol of suicide awareness that I love talking to people about when they mentioned, oh, what does that tattoo
mean I get to tell them about Bill and his story so.
Wow.
That's a lot of people can't do that to just many people shut down and so for you to, you know, being the sister and the baby sister and all that he has done and represents and meant to you to be able to go out there and I mean really you advocated for him.
And so after his passing to help maybe hopefully prevent some other family to have to go through that and at the same time, you were healing you're on this path of healing and this is the way that you healed I think it's really admirable and have a lot of respect for that, going out
and doing that because that's that's a hard thing to do and to continue doing that and to offer that to people I'm, I'm, I'm proud of you.
I think that's it gives me goosebumps, you know, when to say that and to hear you talk about what you're doing for your brother even now.
Because you know, back then I didn't really know what I needed.
And we've talked about this before that it's, it's hard to know when you're in the middle of it. And as I look back in retrospect, it really was just people letting me tell them about my children and my family.
And I think it's really something that I've learned from my mom about my children and my mom. And even if that meant that I was going to cry uncontrollably to be okay to be around that that you don't have to fix it.
When I look back at before I had lost anyone, and being around people who had friends who had, I've always been a fixer.
I was going to fix things and make it right and make it okay. And so that's what I tried to do was oh I'm going to cheer them up, get them to not think about it. And I think it was more really around my discomfort of being around somebody who was that intensely sad.
And so my wanting to fix it and change it was for me more than it was for them. Now that I'm on the other side of that. I understand how I feel bad now that I had done that because it wasn't the right thing.
I wasn't done obviously with malice or intent to harm. And so I know that the supporters out there, even if some one of us gets angry with you, we need you, we need your support.
We just just understand we're in a different place and we now, as it's as I've progressed, I understand that, you know, you didn't, you didn't know what to say, you don't know what to do.
And for me, it is now, especially, and it was then to recognize it now. I did need somebody to listen to me, not to tell me it's going to be okay because it never is. I'll never be okay again.
But I'm really, really good friend. Her name is Iceland. And I like to use her as an example of really what I needed what I think is a good example for anyone grieving.
She would, she would, she would ask, you know, did I need anything, but she knew that I didn't know what I needed. She also knew I wouldn't reach out.
Because that's just not my personality never has been to reach out for help, which is unfortunate because we should not be ashamed to do that and that's more of a shaming myself.
But she would just randomly just come over to my home. She works in the medical field so she'd be work 16 hour shift at the hospital show up after that before going home to her own family and knock on my door and just come in and say,
you know what, I'm coming to check in on you. And this particular day I'm thinking of, I was not having a good night. I was, I was upset. And she came in, she just sat with me and she let me cry. She just put her armor on me and I cried and cried she didn't say a word.
She just held on to me and let me cry. And that's all I needed. And, and it felt, it felt good. It felt validating. And it felt like, I feel like grief is a real, you know, lonely journey.
It's something you could only do alone. But that moment made me feel like I wasn't alone. You know, she was Jasmine's god mom, and has known my family. We've known each other for my gosh, 30 almost 30 years.
And for her to be able to do that, I just, it was something I really needed. And even, even now, just, just last week, I was leaving for work in the morning early in the morning and I come outside and there's a plant on my step with a card.
And she had left me a plant. She had, she was, she had helped me clear out Jasmine's apartment. And Jasmine had this plant there that was at its last stem, if you will.
And I thought she'd thrown it away, but she did it. She had kept it. And she nursed it and brought it back to life. And it was this big plant now it was beautiful. And she put a little card and said, I, I revived this plant for you.
It was in Jasmine's apartment. And I want this to be a reminder of you of life. And I'm summarizing it's, you know, somewhere along those lines. And she says, I love you and have a good day.
And I was like, Oh my gosh, I brought the plant to work. It's on my desk. I thought that was just so beautiful and a really great way, even right now. And it's been just, you know, two years to say I'm thinking of you. I support you.
I love you.
And I think when you were talking, what kind of stuck out for me as something to tell our supporters or if you're supporting someone who's going through a loss is that nobody's, you know, grief journey is going to be the same.
Everyone is different. But the one thing that is, is the same for all of us is that the one thing that we want, you know, you can't give us, you can't give us our loved one back.
Right.
And so just know that it's okay not to know what to do because you can't do what we want you to do. And we may not know, but right just doing little things like that.
Or, you know, I know one of the things that's been helpful for me as friends, like, if they're if they're driving by something, there's this mile marker that goes down to where we grew up and if they pass it on 94 they'll take a picture of it and say hey thinking of you and Billy.
You know, just little things like that, like, to know that there's people out there every day thinking about my brother. And that really, that really means a lot.
Yeah, that's beautiful. And, and I recognize, because we were just talking about this how difficult it is to be around those of us who are grieving, like I said earlier the energy is intense and it can make a lot of people uncomfortable.
And we understand that so hopefully the supporters that are listening understand I'm not.
It's not my intent to make you feel bad, or that you're not doing the right thing because we do need you.
It's just bringing light to some of the ways. Well what we've learned in our own lost journey.
And that's the things that have really helped us and then maybe down the road. One day if you have to support again, or you're still supporting someone just to give you some insight into what has really been helpful for us.
Would you agree Kelly.
I would. I would and I think, you know, it's okay to to for supporters to take a break, you know, take care of yourself, you know, don't always feel like you need to be there.
And you know, you need to be there for the ones to take care of themselves, because then you can't support if you're not taking care of yourself you can't be a support.
So know what you need to as a supporter and know, you know, if you need a break because I think when people get over tired and over, you know, you feel overburdened, or whatever it is, you know, that that can complicate things as well.
And so you can be a good supporter so you can be a good support. Yeah, that's great advice. That's that's great advice.
Gosh, these times these podcasts interviews they go so fast it's only my second one and I feel like they go by so fast. This was, you know, a really good conversation.
We hope that we've been able to provide our support listeners with some suggestions on how to help, you know, when we know you're also feeling very helpless.
But our time on the show today has come to an end.
Kelly, I want to thank you so much for, you know, being vulnerable and I hope you don't mind if I share this but Kelly was a little nervous to come on and to tell her story.
I want to appreciate that she's done that and allowed herself to be vulnerable because what we're trying to do here is to get people to have these tough conversations to get it out there it does help to talk about it.
And this is a little, you know, different scales not necessarily family and friends and people we know we're talking to strangers on here.
And we want to make sure that you know, we're taking the step to do it and you can too.
And so I want to thank you so much, Kelly for coming on and doing that.
And, you know, learn more about how to support someone who's grieving the loss of a loved one.
Thank you. I really appreciate you starting this podcast. I think it's going to help. It's helped me just in the first episode and through our conversations about this episode.
And I know it's going to help other people as well.
We hope so.
Next week, we will ask the question, what is death.
Anyone you know is contemplating suicide, please, please, please reach out to the free 24 hour suicide hotline at 988.
You also might be interested in a site called mental health is health. And that site is mental health is health.us.
This site is an MTV initiative rooted in the reality that we all have mental health and need to take care of it. Like we do our own physical health. It aims to normalize conversation, create connection and resources and inspire action to mental health.
I went out to the site. It's really, it's really easy to navigate and lots of good stuff out there folks. I really encourage you to go out there.
If you can find all the source material and links in my show notes. Please be sure to hit subscribe and like, and we look forward to meeting again next week.
Thank you.