Table of Contents
Contents
1. Why? Why? Why? 9
2. Wandering and Wondering 21
3. Guilt, the Blight of Broken Hearts 35
4. The Wall 47
5. Depression, the Scourge of Broken Hearts 61
6. Preserving Relationships in the Aftermath of Suicide 79
7. Suicide Survival in Special Situations 91
8. After the Suicide of Your Brother or Sister 105
9. Questions That Remain 117
10. Survival—and Beyond 133
11. Embracing Your New Normal 147
Supplemental Chapter: How to Help Survivors of Suicide 165
Appendix 1 Depression Self-Check 173
Appendix 2 Starting Over:Weaving New Dreams Together 175
Appendix 3 Choosing a Christian Therapist:
Suggestions and Guidelines 179
Notes 181
Resources and Recommended Reading 187
Read a Sample Chapter
Finding Your Way after the Suicide of Someone You Love
Copyright © 2005 by David B. Biebel and Suzanne L. Foster
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Biebel, David B.
Finding your way after the suicide of someone you love / David B. Biebel,
Suzanne L. Foster.
p. cm.
Summary: “This resource provides encouraging and practical help and hope
for those left behind after the suicide of a loved one”—Provided by publisher.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN-10: 0-310-25757-3 (softcover)
ISBN-13: 978-0-310-25757-8
1. Suicide. 2. Bereavement—Psychological aspects. 3. Suicide—Religious
aspects—Christianity. 4. Suicide victims—Family relationships.
I. Foster, Suzanne L. II. Title.
HV6545.B477 2005
248.8'66—dc22 2005002065
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible: New
International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible
Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the King James Version of the Bible.
Scripture quotations marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible®,
Copyright © The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973,
1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission.
The website addresses recommended throughout this book are offered as a resource to
you. These websites are not intended in any way to be or imply an endorsement on the
part of Zondervan, nor dowe vouch for their content for the life of this book.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
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the prior permission of the publisher.
Interior design by Beth Shagene
Printed in the United States of America
05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 /?DCI/ 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
What A Thousand Whys
I look into the Father’s eyes
And wrestle with a thousand whys
Why this? Why now? Why him, not I?
The hurt, the rage, unbridled pain
Erupting from my soul, again.
If that’s the way it’s going to be
Then build Your Kingdom without me.
But then, again, where could I go
To hear a word of hope, and know
The promise that beyond the pain
The ballad has a glad refrain?
But what for now? And how can one
Still vocalize “Thy will be done”?
And soon I hear a song begin,
Celestial, but from deep within,
A new yet ancient melody
Of joy and pain, disharmony.
Or do the strains combine somehow,
A lovely paradox of sound?
—DAVID B. BIEBEL1
CHAPTER 1
Why? Why? Why?
What do you mean, she’s dead?
The words echoed through the chasms of my quickly numbing mind, but
I (Sue) couldn’t make them come out of my mouth as I struggled to make sense
of what the woman on the phone was saying.
How can you know she’s dead when you aren’t even here?
We had called 911 because we couldn’t get nineteen-year-old Shannon to
wake up. Steve, her brother, was trying to do CPR. It was all very strange. She
had a smile on her face. Her body was warm. But her color was wrong, very
wrong.
She’s my daughter. She can’t be dead. She can’t be dead.
“Hello,” the voice said.“Are you still there?”
“Yes,” I mumbled.
“A team is on the way,ma’am.But let me ask again. Can you find a pulse?”
I looked at Steve.He shook his head,with tears in his eyes.“No.We can’t.”
“Then the girl is dead,” the voice said again.“There’s nothing you can do.”
How can you pronounce her dead as calmly and callously as you might
announce the time or the weather? I wondered.My voice said,“Thank you,”my
hand hung up the phone, and part of me disconnected from the rest of myself.
By the time the medical personnel arrived, I felt like I was hovering somewhere
near the ceiling, a spectator at some kind of macabre dramatic performance
in which my intuition said I had a lead part, only I didn’t know the
script.What are all these people doing here? I wondered.Why does the phone
keep ringing? Why is everyone so sad . . . especially Steve?
And Shannon,my dear, beautiful Shannon.
I watched as they wrapped her up and whisked her away,without even giving
me a chance to say goodbye. Didn’t they know that I needed to touch her,
to look at her, to remember her, to say goodbye?
And my mind cried out:Who could have done such a horrible thing to her—
five days before Christmas? Why,we haven’t finished decorating the tree.And the
shopping isn’t done. I haven’t bought Shannon her special ornament yet. This is
just a bad dream, and I’m going to wake up soon.
“Ma’am, excuse me,” a policeman’s voice interrupted my nightmare.“We
found these by her bed.”
He showed me all the empty bottles—Shannon had taken all the prescription
medication in the house, plus a half bottle of aspirin—and that was
when it finally dawned on me that Shannon had done this horrible thing . . . to
herself.
Many Questions, Few Answers
But why? What could have been so painful for her that death seemed better
than life?
My last words to Shannon the night before had been harsh and unkind.She
had come in late from a date with her boyfriend and was making a lot of noise,
which woke me up.“Can you please keep the noise down?” I had yelled.“I’m
trying to sleep.”
And her last words to me were,“It’s okay,Mom. It will be all right now.”
Of course, I hadn’t known what she was thinking. But for months afterward,
I imagined myself responsible, somehow, for her death.
Steve and I both wondered for a long time,since we were both in the house
when she took the pills,Why didn’t we hear her? Why didn’t we know? Why didn’t
God alert us in some way to what was about to happen?
The last question was perhaps harder than the others, even though none
of the questions had answers. After all, we were believers—all three of us.
Surely a good God wouldn’t allow such a thing to happen.How could he? Children
don’t die before their parents; it’s not right. Didn’t he know that Shannon
was to graduate from college,get married,give me grandchildren, and bury me
at a ripe old age? This was senseless.You knew, God, before time began that this
10 Finding Your Way after theSuicide of Someone You Love
was going to happen.Why her? Why us? Why me? Why did you give me this child,
only to take her away?
All day and into the night, people came in and went.My boss drove all the
way from Palm Springs straight to my house (near San Diego) when he heard
the news.He had loved Shannon like a daughter and was devastated. I felt loved
and cared for by so many people who came and tried to make sense out of
something so senseless. I was numb, in shock, and just let people take care of
me.I needed to talk and appreciated those who just listened. I ignored the ones
who didn’t know what to say or who tried to comfort me with comments like,
“She’s with the Lord; it must have been God’s will,”“Thank God you still have
Steve because he will really need you now,”and,“God works all things together
for good.”
I wanted to scream back,“This is not God’s will, and there is nothing good
about this.”The words lay formless in my mouth.
At one point my pastor said, as gently as he could, that we needed to think
about funeral arrangements.Oh no.No funeral arrangements, because if I make
funeral arrangements, it must mean she is really dead, and, God, if I go to sleep
and wake up, you will make everything all right,won’t you? I mean, if I’m really
good, you will make this story end the way I want it to, right?
I wanted to die. I couldn’t imagine feeling any more pain than I was already
feeling.“All of you leave and just let me go to sleep and not wake up”was what
I wanted to say.
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