Suicide doesn't end pain.
It only lays it on the 
broken shoulders 
of the survivors.
Anne-Grace Scheinin

I guess in trying to make some sense of this senseless act, or at least find some purpose for Rosie’s death, I am compelled, 
or was propelled actually, 
to suicide awareness and prevention. It’s out there! Don’t allow yourself or a loved one to become another statistic! 



If someone says they are going to go home and take some pills, believe them and call someone for help!
It’s better to have a mad friend, than a dead friend. 
Leaving a note and saying you are sorry does not lessen the pain and devastation that is left behind. 

If you yourself feel that way, talk to someone! Talk to me!
It doesn't mean you're crazy! And nothing to be ashamed of!Research says that a person "thinks" of suicide at least three times in their lives. And sometimes it's just not that easy to "snap out of it."
The world will not be a better place without you! 
You are loved!! 
By your friends and family and 
our God who created you!

If you are in crisis, call 1-800-273-TALK

Your crisis is temporary, death is permanent!

Please take time to view the following websites, 
whether you are in crisis or not.

http://www.suicide.org/

http://www.afsp.org/

http://www.psycom.net/depression.central.suicide.html

If Rosie knew what this would do to us, she could not have given up. 
Rosie told several people what she planned to do that night. But they either didn’t believe her or as in J.G.'s case, 
told her he didn’t care. 
I think she felt obligated to call their bluff. 
Their heads were spinning with disbelief the next morning, 
as were ours. 


***********************************************
You would not believe the statistics on suicide, 
over 30,000 a year in the United States alone. 

That's one American every 16 minutes, 
of every day 
that completes a suicide attempt. 
A suicide attempt is made every minute of every day.

http://www.suicidology.org/associations/1045/files/2004datapgv1.pdf



More than homicide, more than Aids. It is an epidemic, but you don't see that on the news. Are the schools addressing this? Is anyone???

These figures only represent ruled suicides. If Rosie had not left a note (she did), her death would have been ruled accidental. 
Now figure this. 
Only one in five leave a note.
How many suicides are there really every year? 

**********************************************

Talk about this to your loved ones today. 
Use Rosie as an example if you want to. 
And if you want to know the devastation that's left in the aftermath, contact me. 




Just don't think it can't happen in your family. 

These 30,000 Americans are related to someone!

http://www.we-remember-them.com


http://www.suicidememorialwall.com/page1.php?section=6

PLEASE VISIT
THE SUICIDE MEMORIAL WALL

http://www.suicidememorialwall.com  
Rosie is in section #6

Grief is a tidal wave that overtakes you,
smashes down upon you with unimaginable
force, sweeps you up into its darkness,
where you tumble and crash against
unidentifiable surfaces, only to be
thrown out on an unknown beach, bruised, 
reshaped.
Grief means not being able to read more
than two sentences at a time.
It is walking into rooms with intention 
that suddenly vanishes.
Grief is 3:00 in the morning sweats that won't stop.
It is dreadful Sundays, Mondays that are no better.
It makes you look for a face in the crowd, knowing full well the face we are looking for will not be in that crowd.
Grief is utter aloneness that razes the rational mind
and makes room for the phantasmagoric.
It makes you suddenly get up in the middle of a meeting
without saying a word.
Grief is what people think of you most.
It shears away the mask of normal life
and forces brutal honesty out of your mouth, 
before propriety can stop you.
It shoves away friends,
scares away so-called friends
and rewrites address books for you.
Grief makes you laugh at people who cry
over spilled milk.
Right to their faces.
It tells the world that you are untouchable
at the very moment when touch is the only
contact that might reach you.
It makes lepers out of upstanding citizens.
Grief discriminates against no one.
It kills. It maims. It cripples.
It is the ashes from which the phoenix rises, 
and the mettle of rebirth.
It returns life to the living dead.
It teaches that there is nothing absolutley true or untrue.
It assures the living that we know nothing
for certain.
It humbles. It shrouds. It blackens.
It enlightens.
Grief will make a new person out of you.
If it doesn't kill you 
in the making.
Author: Stephanie Ericsson














I am not who I was.
I don't know who I am.
I don't know who I will be.

Each day a challenge, just to get to the end.
And tomorrow the same thing.
Each day defining what the new normal is.

Without you.

My past and my future clearly divided
between living and existing
before June 14, 2006
and after.

I love you Rosie.
And I always will.

I just wish that could have been enough for you.
And that you could have seen that each day 
brings new blessings as well as new challenges.
I wish you could have stuck it out to see that there is joy in living, even with the ups and downs.

I miss you so much Rosie.
I miss the children that you didn't have. 
I miss people telling me how much we look alike. 
I miss you crawling into bed between 
me and dad each night. 
And even your goofiness and pouting and procrastinating.
Oh what I would give for that today.


Mom
3-3-07