most comes in many forms and usually an unexpected way it can be devastating leaving you facing an uphill struggle to go on with life without someone you would always be there but life does go on and even in the deepest despair we can well i'm dr gloria horsley with my co host dr heidi horsley well heidi we've had a special award and i'm excited about it and it's our studio audience and our people out in the community who have made that possible for us and we want our hometown media award or the best educational theory like you said when we want to national award you know and it really is like my mother said our guests like the guests were having on today that are the reason that we won this award we're talking today with three mothers and want to basically transform their lives after a loss absolutely and they've just done great things and that's really an inspiration to everybody because we're talking about suicide today and this is a really tough topic lot of stigma around it right heidi there really is mom and i know that so many families i know that have had someone die by suicide so you know people don't know what to say to us and so they don't say anything and that's very difficult because we all need support after a loss absolutely and so we're going to get some answers and some ideas and thoughts from these people that day and we're going to start out with pamela prime she's a spiritual director and her son sean died by suicide many years ago and we'll be talking about that she's also written a wonderful book that's going to inspire you and then we have surely commit kaminski and her son david also died by suicide and she's with the american foundation for thirty i prevention and you're going to find out that that's going to be a great support for people that you know and for you if you had a suicide loss and then we're going to hear from you want to talk about the sisters side because i know sisters are important to you sure they are and it's exciting to see them both here together to  dow and ruth ward ruth son nathan died by suicide and she's here today with her sister sue who does life quilts and see some of them in a fabulous absolutely really neat and we've brought a few little teddy bears and i know our guest pamela prime but some of hers where we took scotties clothes and pamela took her son's clothes and made some little teddy bears out of him so we'll show that in the lifeboat that should be great let's start out with pamela primer spiritual director emma i have a lovely to be here so great to have you wanted to tell us a little bit about shot and how long ago did he die yeah actually died thirty four years ago very long time he was sixteen you know very sad well i'll you know you want to give people your condolences but also i want to say to you that you're just an inspiration and and talk about what you've learned as experience for those folks that are out there that have had a suicide well i think that one of the things that i have learned is a great deal of compassion and i always say compassion is a hard one gift but i have great awareness for people who suffer suicide in their families i've also i think learned that th ings that are tragic in their lives bring us to new levels of spiritual growth and really even joy there's nothing that's happened in my life that i feel at this point in my life isn't a gift i would never want to have had children die but his death really enlightened me in many ways now you've written a book right i have now can you tell us a little bit about that because heidi and i know a little bit about it if we have our own or a radio show writing right and i love the title yeah yeah tell us your title when the mood is dark we could see the stars and now how did you get that back title is really came as a gift and it seemed to be right because it said so much about the experience of being in a very dark place and coming into the light yet it's incredibly dark place and we know for people that it is such a dark place pamela how long did it take you to even see any alive you know do you remember that it's been some time well i will tell you that just probably even six weeks after he died i was driving to town i don't even think it was six weeks and i suddenly started to sing and i was i literally stopped the car  and said this is amazing that i'm singing but there were suddenly some awareness that life was going to be bright again and so it slowly began my life to come together but i cried for parents i think because here you are grieving the loss of your child but then you've got children and surviving children you have to think about how in the grieving how can i help them and that's a very hard thing to do and i'm not sure i did it as well as i would like to have done it oh my gosh i've got to stop for a minute heidi how many times do i tell you that i was not a good mother after all you know i do i work a lot with siblings and and i see your parents constantly saying we weren't good enough parents we weren't there enough for know i wonder how i could really have been you know they were crying i was crying you know and we all that the best we could and i must say that my children i have three children that are living and they're very healthy and productive  and are happily married so i'm i'm thrilled with that and i can't take credit for it but i certainly brings me a lot of joy now are they close to each other very close to each other i think that's interesting because heidi and her sisters are very close and i think when you've thought was killed in an automobile accident and what you thought about the stigma quickly oh i think it's there but i think it's today i think it's more in the minds of the parents whose child has committed suicide because i think most people are don't automatically think well you didn't raise a healthy son or you weren't kind to him or you did something wrong i don't think that's really happening is as it was in the past but i do think that we as parents have to go through that period of time where we allow ourselves to feel the guilt and to feel shame around having a child commit or or even a spouse commit suicide you know that's interesting because you do feel a shame to my son was in an automobile accident i felt like i could have taken care of him better depression i was twenty when my mom die from suicide and that was an event that shook the very foundation of my life we're given an opportunity to share and take what we've learned and help others this is one way that we keep his memory alive the fact that we're sharing the story you're now part of me and i will be part of you in hundreds of cities across the country we walk together breaking down t you can help with the american foundation for suicide prevention you can help bring the issue of suicide out of the darkness if you've been touched by suicide if you struggle or if you just want to help you should join us support  s p and the out of the darkness community walks this past tuesday would have been my dad's forty six point eight jane was a wonderful light of a person and i miss her very much but we're happy to be walking in our hon today between how we treat hope for our south if we've lost a loved one to the side of struggle personally and we bring hope for a community that one day one day we will create a world without to walk with us donate learn more or even or own out of the darkness community walk please visit our website at a f s b dot org heidi don't you love the internet and the fact that we're able to bring this kind of thing in and that people can go online and see it being get the support i am folk ledge surely going to be with us today and once a greeter to come out a show and talk about this wonderful organization i surely i absolutely and you know i was talking before the show initially and i was saying it's interesting because every time i give service and we give service we also help ourselves absolutely absolutely surely you've got some kind of tips and ideas for that they can do all right well i think st of all in the very beginning when you suffer a loss from suicide i think one of the most important things is self care taking good care of ourselves nurturing ourselves because we've really taken a major hit  and so i think self care is really good even the basics such as eating well getting sleep getting exercise getting outside some of those very basic things that we kind of forget about and let go by the wayside when we when we're in deep deep grief and drinking water simple as that add plenty of fluids absolutely absolutely so i think that's one of the st things and we could go into great detail about that and the nd thing that i have found very helpful is joining the community there's a huge community of us who are survivors and none of us chose to be in this club wherever we are and i think that when we can connect with other people who've had similar losses we can gain support from that as heidi mentioned earlier often times when we've suffered a loss from suicide people don't want to talk to us because they don't know what to say and i think there still is a great amount of stigma around the word suicide and around the suicide death it's better than it was twenty six years ago but we still have a long way to go you know that's why t v is so great in your walk and that kind of thing and well i think you got one more point and then let's talk about your wife and the rd point is becoming involved i involved in giving back as family and and there's a lot of ways that we can do that in the way that has been so meaningful for me over the years as being a part of the american foundation for suicide prevention so that we  recovery have done such great things it's a real inspiration to meet people like you talk a little bit about the foundation how people can find it and talk about the walk and it and how can i get involved and what do i know i'm ready  call and you know i'm in so much pain do i wait until i'm not in pain you know their sibling things you know they're just so many well the readiness i think is a very individual thing and i'm i'm a big proponent of people having therapy and individual counseling and i needed that myself for long over a year after my son died and and i think again it's an individual thing but our general recommendation from the foundation is that people don't get really actively involved in some of our programs until they're about two years past their loss now that having been said people can participate in the community walks as soon as they feel that they're ready we have the community watch which you saw the video about and i love the name out of darkness  even light light you really know that started with a signature overnight walk where we walked all night long and two thousand and two in washington d c and that was the st overnight i participated in the walk with my daughter and that's how i found out about fs p and i've been involved with them ever since i'm one of the founding members of the san francisco chapter of s p and we've been doing community walks which are smaller walks the out of the darkness overnight is eighteen to twenty miles and well that's a long walk to do and the walks are not only fundraisers which is very important to keep our foundation viable and do the work that we do but i feel it's a huge community builder  it's a way of people who suffered a similar loss to be involved to connect with other people who understand i've met some wonderful wonderful people through my work with the office and you very well as heidi said we do not grieve alone you are talking about very famous luggage therapy and after world war two even way back he said that we don't grieve on we need to grieve in community it's a collective experience yes and i love these walks they're so powerful i live in new york city and you know not only and  seen them and it also builds awareness to so many people and they're just so powerful and so emotionally charged all these people together you know walking and building awareness and walking is a tribute to someone that they've loved and i was thinking to i mean it  the opportunity for the whole community be involved friends neighbors it doesn't have to be somebody is that it a suicide death well heidi why don't we go out into the audience and take some questions ok and you name dave kirkpatrick and we've heard really touching stories about the loss of a son or a brother are males more likely to take their own life than females yes they are statistically it shows that more males do take their lives than females and more females attempt to take their lives however there's more and more females that are using more lethal means now and so that number is rising female sitting suicide it will bring it to the surface and then you can work with them around that you wouldn't ask that question less you had a sense of their incre so i think it's for me it would be an important question to ask surely do you have an income i agree with pamela it's definitely a myth and it's important that if we do sense that someone is in distress that we do question them we ask them if they're thinking of suicide we ask them if they if they have a plan in place and it's very important that way we can help that's often a relief to the individual that we do ask direct questions great well listen i want to thank you both so much for being on the show today and for bringing us out of  shining some light in our little corner and thank you for everything you've been doing and heidi why don't we go and take a look at the memory quilt and i know that with sue and ruth and we've got some little teddy bears and you recognize them we'll talk about those a little bit it out of a jacket of his and and yeah you can show that out of a sports jacket the interesting thing is it's been many years since scott died we just did it a few years ago and i know pamela prah him brought some of her little teddy bears and it's been years for her too so if you got some clothes out there and it's been years and years that somebody died in your family you can go online and find some people who do some of these crafts well and i that's why i love it because you know a lot of times you have a lot of clothes you how you have no idea what to do with them and to me there is an amazing thing you can give them to friends etc out of your loved ones close absolutely so let's talk about these memory quilt ok you want to introduce the ladies heidi ok we've got ruth ward and her is such a great idea where did you get the idea for the pattern but it would be this way usually if there's a quilt you need to have a picture before you can complete it so this way it all comes apart it stacks walks the packet you know which we asked for their survivor data but the what i do is i makes a frame so to speak and then with this they put the picture on anything they want to any information they want to about their loved one and then i when they've had a lo know a great way to pay tribute to me it is wonderful and what if i wanted to have you if i have a chapter heidi and i are very involved with the compassionate friends and i was wondering if you had any ideas about if i wanted to do something for the compassionate friends can can they get in touch with you and have you help them do it  about family members and support well i think just showing up is the best thing that you can do and not as what sue has done with her if she's shown up and she hasn't run the other way and she's been there for her i think that's really great and i want to thank you guys for coming in today and for showing this memory for what you've done and you know it's just as we say it's all about community all about being together and all about dealing with our losses together because that's the way we learn and grow and become more compassionate and i love what pamela said about how we can be more involved with each other and we hope that you will tell everybody about our show the grief really show and let people know about it because we want to get the word out it's important to get the word out as an id absolutely and if you've had a suicide or know somebody that has raised go and just tell them you're sorry and acknowledge  keynote speakers at the compassion and friends national conference in boston this year and we hope that you will join us july th weekend they're going to be a lot of workshops and there'll be workshops with people had suicide losses right absolutely love the workshops and everything and one of the two of the workshops i do which i love is i will go and work with siblings and i walk into the workshop and i say to these kids these siblings of all ages i say what is it you want your parents to now and we spend two hours talking about that and then i go into a parent workshop right after that and i say parents this is what your kids want you to know and those are very powerful workshops and i'll be you know doing a workshop on long term loss and this is important because we have found that there are people who have not resolved their loss after many years and people really need to think about this traumatic loss if you have for maybe six or seven years and you're still anger or depression or resentment it may be time to take a look at that and our friend catherine shear at columbia university has done some research on that and will be presenting some of her research you'll be able to on our website and take a look at some of the research that tells you about traumatic and will also be keynoting approved parents right here in sacramento california this summer and that is all going to be about hope and healing and so anyone out there that just feels like they're alone please rea on our hotel you found your own and attend one of these conferences and i believe that that's why we call ourselves open to hope because we believe that you need to keep yourself open to the idea that there could be hope again because we know for those folks who have had a los this is been grief really hosted by the mother daughter team of dr gloria and dr heidi horsley the show's been brought to you by the open the hope foundation helping people find hope after a loss be sure to visit dr laura and dr heidi and open to hope dot com where you can listen to radio programs watch past episodes of grief relief read articles and view books you can also join them on twitter and facebook and put your events on their international calendar thanks for watching and remember