November 19 is International Survivors of Suicide Loss Day. On this day survivors of suicide loss gather at hundreds of simultaneous healing conferences around the world every year to connect with others who have survived the tragedy of suicide loss and express and start to understand the powerful emotions we experience. For more information about a conference near you visit the American Foundation of Suicide Prevention HERE.

My story of suicide loss begins more than 35 years ago. My cousin’s mom died by suicide when he was just a baby. All these years it never occurred to me that she was probably suffering from postpartum depression — or perhaps even postpartum psychosis — at the time of her death.

It’s not something my family openly discussed, but my perception had mistakenly always been “Oh, she must not have wanted to be a mom.” How very naive of me.

After years of experience with my own depression and mental health issues postpartum, it’s become clear to me that she was suffering like so many women from a postpartum illness like postpartum depression. She needed treatment that apparently she never got, in a time when such topics were even more taboo than they are today.

Last year, my life-long friend Dina died by suicide at Christmas. She wasn’t in the postpartum period at the time. (Her son was 15.) But many years ago when he was just over two she came to me with suicidal thoughts. We were in our early 20s and I had yet to experience mental illness.

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