Recently I read, in succession, three books on suicide, each written by a mother who lost one of her children to suicide. All three books are powerful, mature, not given to false sentiment and worth reading: Lois Severson, author of Healing the Wound from my Daughter’s Suicide: Grief Translated into Words, lost her daughter, Patty, to suicide; Gloria Hutchinson, who authored Damage Done, Suicide of an Only Son, lost her son, David, to suicide; and Marjorie Antus, who wrote My Daughter, Her Suicide, and God: A Memoir of Hope, lost her daughter, Mary, to suicide. Patty and David were in their mid-20s, Mary was still a teen.

Published in Fr. Ron Rolheiser