A bereaved father describes losing his son Jesse to suicide, then spiraling into alcohol and pills while his surviving children grew distant. He talks about the guilt that consumed him and why silence from his family hurt more than any words could have.
I was on a, we'll just say a slow, a slow path to death, to suicide. I didn't want to live. I had really nobody in my corner to support me in the way I needed to be supported.
Now, when your son passed and you said you went dark and you got involved in the Jack Daniels and the prescription pills, what was going on with you? Were you feeling guilt? Were you feeling shame? Were you feeling regret? Like, uh, around Jesse's passing, like, what, what caused you to go off the deep end like that?
I was I was feeling regret for the things, not showing up like the father that he should have had.
I had so much guilt and pain that I couldn't express it any other way than just going inside of me at the time. And I was just so lost and I couldn't find a way out. I couldn't see a way out at all.
Thanks for sharing that, man. Let me, uh, let me ask you this, brother. How did your other two kids— how did they deal with Jesse's passing?
Um, in their own way. They both kind of shut down. I attempted to try to set up counseling for us as a family, but unfortunately my wife at the time was not willing to go to counseling, and no healing ever happened. I've talked with my son now that is 26, and Austin is an amazing young man, and he has so much depth within him. And we've had some really great conversations about Jesse, my accident, and my dark places that I went. And he has forgiven me for everything that I've done, you know, to him, which he is light years ahead of where I was at that age.
Let me ask you this. Your daughter was how old when Jesse passed in 2011?
Maya would have been 10.
So she was 10 and then let's say 15 years old when that situation happened on Christmas. And it sounds like to a large degree, the only truth about who you are and the story about who you are is, is a one-sided biased story really coming from her mom. Is that correct?
Correct.
Okay, so what the roadblock is, is basically you've never been able to tell your side of the story.
That is correct.
Now, what do you feel like you're more stuck on? The fact that you haven't been able to express yourself and tell your side of the story, or is it the pain of knowing that your daughter doesn't want to connect with you and not have a relationship and
