Eleven months ago today, my world and my heart shattered. My husband, Jeffrey, the man that I wanted to grow old with, died. My husband’s death was complicated. Maybe all deaths are complicated. I don’t know. All I know is that Jeffrey’s death has been hard, extremely hard, for me to process. And this post is difficult for me to write, but I feel like in order to help myself heal, I have to put it out there. I have to share. I don’t know why, but sharing this journey with you all helps me. Writing helps.
When I got the call from Jeff’s sister, Abby, on December 6th, 2018, telling me that Jeff was gone, I assumed he had a heart attack. We don’t always (or usually even) eat the best, he smoked quite a bit, and he only went to the doctor one time in all the years we were dating and married. That is 20 years of one trip to the doctor. I had begged and pleaded with him to go many times, but he never budged, and his dad had a heart attack at a similar age. So, yeah, a heart attack made sense to my stunned brain even though he was only 46-years-old.
My co-worker, Marcia, drove me to Jeff’s office. After awhile, the detective came and told my mother-in-law, father-in-law, sister-in-law and myself that Jeff had been shot. Later he stated that the gunshot wound was self-inflicted. I absolutely, without a doubt, thought that they were wrong. We all did. My husband did not take his own life! I was positively sure that someone did this to him, and they needed to find the person. I had no clue who it would be. Jeff was well liked, but he did work on the south side of Peoria. Someone could have come in and done this to him. Maybe someone was hiding and waiting for him. I didn’t have any answers, only questions, but I did not believe he did this to himself.
Talking to the coroner about a month after he passed did not help me believe it either. He talked about the angle and the fact that the gun was put right up to him. I stated that the gun was on his desk and not right by him. He said that he would have had a few seconds to do this. Nope, still didn’t believe it. I was convinced that the bullet did not come from that gun.
I went for months working through varying stages of shock, anger, and denial...all while trying to parent and comfort my grieving children. Right around the 8 month mark I called the detective again, I usually called every two months, and I left a message asking if they had any more evidence back. He returned my call and said that he wasn’t sure what more I wanted because we knew the bullet came from the gun. No, we didn’t. I didn’t. I had no clue until that very moment standing in Walmart, grocery shopping for my family, that the bullet did indeed come from my husband’s gun. He then stated that the only results they don’t have is the gunshot residue test, but he firmly stated that because Jeff was shot at such close range he absolutely will have residue on him.
For the last three months I have worked on trying to wrap my brain around this. I have struggled with suicidal thoughts since I was about twelve. Jeff knew this. I have gone on medication for depression, as well as for the suicidal thoughts, a couple of times during our marriage. The most recent time was the summer prior to his death. He knew that I felt like our family would be better off without me. I told him that I needed to see the doctor and get medicine, and he encouraged me to go. I struggle with suicide. He has never once shared with me that he struggled. Never.
So, how do I understand something that doesn’t make sense. Obviously, I can’t just ask him. So, I constantly run everything through my mind. He acted like everything was fine. Sure, I knew he wasn’t really happy at work anymore. He would say “I’m off to the salt mine” and groan most days. I would ask him about work. He didn’t want to talk about it really, but this was nothing new. He would share little stories about work, but never anything serious and never about money. He never let on that anything was horrible. However, going down to his office after he passed, which I admittedly don't like to do, you could see by the amount of mail he avoided opening that things weren’t fine. He had lawsuits and debts that he never told me about. He was an absolutely great guy with a wonderful heart, and he was super smart. However, he struggled to share deep and meaningful things and let people in. He struggled to ask for help. I think many men are like this.
But did he take his own life? I started doing some research. There wasn’t a suicide note. I just assumed most people leave a note. Right? According to Dr. Antoon Leenaars, only 12-15% of people who die by suicide leave a note. Others say, 25-30% leave a note, but that is the highest number I found.
There was no warning. He had a respiratory cold, and he went and bought Mucinex and was taking it. He whistled at me in the shower and flirted with me the night before for Pete’s sake! He told our daughter, Ali, that he would see her later. Who does these things if they are going to take their own life? Dr. Michael Miller, assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School says that “Many people who commit suicide do so without letting on they are thinking about it or planning it.”
I found these other facts…
--About 123 Americans die by suicide every day.
--Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the United States.
--In 2017, there were 47,173 deaths by suicide, and there it was estimated that there were 1.4 million attempts.
--In 2017, the highest suicide rate (20.2) was among adults between 45 and 54 years of age.
--Males take their own lives at nearly four times the rate of females and represent 77.9% of all suicides.
--In 2017, the use of a firearm accounted for a little over half of all suicides.
(Facts are compiled from the following websites: World Health Organization, American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, TheHopeLine, SAVE, and CDC.)
So, I’m coming to the realization that he could have done it. Maybe. That doesn’t mean I have to accept it though. I wish that last sentence were actually true. For me it’s not. I tried to let it be true, but in order to move forward, in order to find some peace in all of this, I am realizing that I have to accept that he likely did die by suicide. In order to not be constantly running it through my head a million times a day, distracted and haunted by it all, I have to come to terms that the police and coroner are probably right.
There was no sign of a struggle, and Jeffrey would have put up a fight. He would not have just sat there and let someone harm him. He never would have let anyone get close enough to his own gun so that they could use it on him. He clearly was in over his head and wasn’t happy. He hid that from everyone, but it was pretty easy to see once he wasn’t there to keep it all hidden. I hate that I could have been fooled. I wish he felt that he could share with me, or anyone, the big things that he was going through. I have apologized to him for not knowing, and I have told him that if he did this, I forgive him. I would forgive him of anything. I just wish it didn’t have to be this.
You will notice that last paragraph has words and phrases like could have, likely did, and probably right. I admit that there is a part of me that still hopes this is wrong. I don’t know how to explain this. For the sake of moving forward, I have had to accept that it is true, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t hope we will learn that he did not take his own life. Is that still denial? Maybe it is a sliver of denial, but I am okay with that sliver.
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