Dear Reader,

After my father’s suicide, I searched for books to help me through my grief process, but there weren’t many available, especially not one page meditations. The nature of recovery from a loved one’s suicide, for me, was silent. The people that knew about my loss did not know how to console, and I rarely spoke about my father’s suicide. I was afraid of what others may think of my father or me. Unearned shame kept me quiet. I needed words and feelings from someone who had walked down the same path. I did not need graphic descriptions of a person’s suicide. I couldn’t deal with words that brought home the horrible scene of finding my father. But still, I needed to know that the churning feelings inside me were normal. With the thought that possibly another person could relate to my feelings, writing them has been a catharsis.

For me writing has always been a release. There was an old game I used to play as a child called pick-up-sticks. The object was to remove one stick at a time without moving the others. That’s what writing these meditations has been like for me; I picked up one thread of a thought at a time to look at and express. Singling out just one thought and developing it into concise words was difficult and frustrating. Yet, it left me with a clear heart and the ability to get on with my life. Writing these one-page thoughts were both my own cathartic attempt to make some sense of what happened to me after my father’s death, and my attempt to help others cope with their sorrow.

Writing was just one tool in my efforts to heal from the grief of losing my father. Professional direction from a psychologist helped me to understand, also, that once I was able to see my father as no longer in pain then I could begin my own healing. Joining a support group gave me confidence to stop isolating and helped me to talk about my father’s suicide.

Efforts at good writing ask the writer to always speak their truth. It was the truth that I adhered to in these reflections. I did not whitewash the pain. If you have lost someone to suicide, I hope my truth will not cut sharply into your agony. And painful though they are, I believe these reflections have a healing grace. I hope that you will find something in them that will help.

Sincerely,

Karen Phillips





Monday, May 16, 2011

FAITH IN GOD


     Since Daddy died, it has really shaken up my faith in God.  Here’s the thing—I  have a hard time seeing the intangibles of God now.  Before Daddy died and when I was naïve, I looked for the good outcome of any event.  If I, say for instance, got fired on Christmas Eve, I felt in the back of my mind it might be the best thing that ever happened—even through the dramatics and hysteria.  Events surely would unfold a path much more fulfilling than the present rut. I was a middle-aged Pollyanna.
  
     Seeing Daddy’s death, I felt that I had run up on an ancient scene of evil.  I couldn’t locate the good outcome of what Daddy had done in any part of my mind.  It’s been five years now.  I still have trouble with the looking. 
    
     My husband and I grew very close after the suicide.  My mother became an independent thinker.  My sister worked toward her own happiness.  And I stepped off my soapbox and learned some new things.  Time is a changer of things.  Surely Daddy didn’t have to kill himself to make change happen. Wouldn’t we have done that anyway? 

     Even though I don’t actually feel the rose-colored shades of optimism as I once did, I’ll cast my lot with Good rather than Evil.  It’s the only way I see of keeping my sanity for the next era of my life.  Isn’t that an act of faith?
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