![]() Families have sides - his and hers - and grief may be refocused through blame. I was my husband's spouse, my sons and daughter were his children, and he also had siblings. When somebody ends their life, everybody has their own different relationship with that individual. The bereavement then becomes a secret that must be hidden from others and coped with alone. Some people have felt they had to move house to escape their notoriety. This feeling of social stigma can have dangers, because it's all too easy to withdraw from a society that we feel still brands and condemns us. People can feel isolated within their communities and as individuals within families following a suicide death. It can become the question that never goes away. ![]() Why did I not see? Why did I not prevent it? Why did you not turn to me? Why is the question that can only be answered by one person - and they can't be asked. I found myself thinking: 'Why was I was not good enough for you to stay alive with me?' You endlessly ask yourself why. There is also often a strong sense of having been rejected. Guilt is present when any loved one dies, but is magnified to a far greater degree in cases of suicide. Disturbed sleep patterns, insomnia and nightmares are common. You have no concentration and are completely unable to retain any information given verbally. It's like being sealed in a Perspex bubble in a parallel dimension, able to move around, go to work, watch others who are living, but not able to join in. It feels like no one else has ever felt like this before. The real world goes on around you but you are apart, alone in a nightmare that has no end. Your world has been fragmented and you have no control over any of it. ![]() The press are at liberty to invade the family's privacy and to publish 'facts', real or invented, often in a sensationalised way that causes further pain. Your father/mother/husband/ son/daughter must, by law, be subjected to the indignity and mutilation of a post-mortem examination. For the bereaved, this part of the procedure is yet another invasion into their privacy. No crime has been committed but the police and coroner's officers have the authority to make searches in your home and, in many cases, have to do so if no note is found with the body. When a loved one dies by suicide, there is a strong feeling of helplessness. To have to sign a consent form for surgery that was potentially life-threatening without him there made me cross with him because I was having to cope alone when we so needed his presence and support. I'm thinking in particular of the time when my daughter was critically ill in hospital and crying for her daddy. I admit there have been rare occasions in the last nine years where if he had walked back into the room I might have been less controlled. I can't say I know what Mrs Kelly is feeling, but I know how I felt in the immediate aftermath - stunned, certainly, and angry, because my husband had been so pressurised at work. And my second son was only a few weeks off taking his GCSEs. If I went to work, they had to go to school. Looking back, it was probably too early but I felt it was important to get the children back into a normal routine. I went back to work two days after the funeral. There's something horribly mundane about having to make sure there are still clean socks or having to put a meal on the table, even if it all tastes like ashes. In a strange way, that was probably my salvation. I had to try to shield my children from public curiosity and the sort of intrusion that can follow a suicide death, and also ensure that I would be able to continue to provide them with a home and upbringing as we intended. I was faced with a situation I could do absolutely nothing about, but there were certain things I could see I had to do. The other thing I hated was being told I was brave. I remember nine years ago, when I was in the position the Kelly family are in now, feeling angry when I felt I was on the receiving end of any pity. When I read of Dr Kelly's death, I had a great feeling of empathy for the family. Because he was a successful professional man, the press descended at the inquest. On the Saturday, his body was discovered. One Monday in the coldest February for years, Philip disappeared. Please tell me what is wrong', and they won't or can't, you feel very helpless. But when you say to someone: 'Let me help you. I knew that there was something very seriously wrong. Like Dr Kelly, my husband, Philip, had been subjected to intolerable pressure at work.
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