Suicide, Grief and Depression with Rae Dumont

Host Jill McClennen, a death doula and funeral celebrant, speaks with Rae Dumont, a Belgian-born pediatrician turned family therapist, about caring for chronically ill children and why connection and honest, age-appropriate truth matter as much as clinical skill. Dumont discusses her novel, “In the Shadow of Silence,” about a father’s depression and suicide and the different ways children and a spouse who is also a psychiatrist process grief, shame, guilt, anger, and “what if” thinking, especially after sudden or violent loss. They contrast depression-related suicide with end-of-life choices in serious illness, and emphasize presence, compassion, and bearing witness when cure isn’t possible. The conversation also explores embracing mortality, how the mindset at death affects loved ones, preparing children for death through honesty, and the value of end-of-life planning and supportive conversations before a crisis.

01:31 Pediatrics to Family Therapy

03:11 Kids Need Honesty

03:45 Novel and Family Fallout

05:35 Why Fiction Not Memoir

07:22 Suicide Shame and Guilt

09:41 Violent Loss Trauma

11:40 Spouse as Psychiatrist

16:51 You Cant Save Everyone

18:26 Compassion Without Cure

20:48 Accepting Death Frees Life

22:40 End of Life vs Suicide

23:53 Talking Death With Kids

25:36 Hospice Goodbye Story

26:41 Gifts Before Dying

27:03 Tibetan Death Teachings

28:10 Reincarnation And Legacy

29:44 Talking To Kids

32:08 Suicide And Loved Ones

33:16 Facing The Unvarnished Truth

37:03 Supporting Families Too

38:25 Why Write This Book

42:09 Guilt What Ifs And Limits

46:42 Finding The Book

https://www.raedumontwriting.org

In the Shadow of Silence 

Also find the book here

Book Review 

Staring at the Sun: Overcoming the Terror of Death

Transcript

Rae: [00:00:00] I'm old enough that I am looking at mortality on a daily basis. It's a good thing I embrace it. No, I'm not jumping off a cliff. That's not what I mean. What I mean is it's part of life and it's part of the journey, and I aim to do it. Well, 

Jill: welcome back to Seeing Death Clearly. I'm your host, Jill McClennen, a death doula and funeral celebrant.

On my show, we explore death, dying grief, and what it really means to live with intention. In this episode I speak with Ray Dumont, a Belgian born pediatrician turned family therapist about how her work with children facing chronic illness revealed that connection, not just clinical skill is essential to care.

We also talked about her novel. In the shadow of silence, which explores the ripple effects of a parent's depression and suicide on a family, especially the different ways children process loss, and the impossible position of a spouse who is both a partner and mental health professional. Our [00:01:00] conversation dives into the weight of shame, guilt, and what if thinking that often follows suicide.

As well as the added trauma when loss is sudden or violent, we explore how honest, age appropriate conversations with children can help reduce fear and isolation, and why presence and compassion still matter deeply, even when a cure isn't possible. Thank you for joining us for this conversation. 

Rae: Welcome, Ray to the podcast.

Thank you for coming on today. First of all, Jill, thank you for having me. On your podcast, it's a pleasure. I was born and raised in Europe, in Belgium, but have been in this country ever since the middle of medical school, and so this is my country and I am a pediatrician and still be deeply at heart, a pediatrician.

Kids are really central to my. Worldview that they're, what makes my heart beat faster? Because I was working at a referral center [00:02:00] for insulin independent unstable diabetes in kids, and what I learned working there is that it didn't matter how smart I was with the prescriptions, what really mattered was, could I reach the kid?

Could I motivate them to wanna be well and equally important. Could I enlist the family to stop judging or burdening or any of those possible choices that make life harder for a kid who already has a chronic illness? Some 10 years into that work, I decided I also needed to be fully trained as a family therapist, so I ended up being both, ultimately in my later years, only practiced family therapy.

Much of that is at the origin of my book, working with families and working with kids. 

Jill: I think that doctors are sometimes judged [00:03:00] incorrectly in our culture. Some of it is warranted as well, but working with children must be a whole different level of challenge. 

Rae: It's not all verbal with kids. What I find fascinating about kids is that they always know what's going on.

Whether you tell them or not, and they can read their parents, people in general as a therapist or as a pediatrician. The kids could read me, they knew whether I was gonna try to pull a fast one or whether I was really gonna tell them This will hurt, but not for very long. So kids respond to honesty and that's what makes them so fascinating to work with.

So very sensitive and they're impacted by what goes on in a family. So a major part of my book is a couple bringing into being these three wonderful young folks and then watching them parent. Through good times and [00:04:00] difficult times, and ultimately the arc of the story involves the impact of one parent's depression and decline on each of the children.

So the children in my book are fictional characters, but they're chosen so that I could. Show different ways that different kids might respond to the same set of events. 'cause as, as a mother, not every child responds identically to the same set of events. 

Jill: One thing I found really interesting about your book, 'cause I do have authors on fairly regularly that where they're writing about their story, I don't often get to talk to people that write a fiction book that deals with.

Somebody ending their own life. And that is one of those things where the impact is so different depending on the person, their relationship, what happened leading up to it, like the whole thing, right? It's just, it's really, it's [00:05:00] different than somebody having cancer and dying. And so I found that really interesting about your book, where you're using real.

Stories, right? Like real people in the sense that these are things that real people go through, but using it as a story that is fictional, but, and I didn't, I think put that together that it's like that all the children are having those very different experiences and it's based off of how people really do react to somebody.

Yeah, 

Rae: exactly. How people do react. And also, let's back up a little bit, after many years of. Academic medicine first, and then private practice as a family therapist. You acquired this publication list, right? It's, it's like almost like a millstone. You carry your mouth. I could have written an academic work about this.

But I didn't wanna do that. I could have written a self-help book about [00:06:00] it, but I didn't wanna do that either. I could have written a memoir, but I definitely did not wanna do that because what I wanted to do was find the story underneath the story and do a bit of digging for the deeper story that happens to.

People who go through something similar to what I describe. We've already mentioned each of the children respond very differently, but also the wife of the man who becomes depressed has two lenses. She is a psychiatrist and she is the wife of someone she deeply loves, but whom she can't help. And so that too was something I.

My goal in writing this was to connect with people who've gone through any version of any aspect of this kind of story. And I just want people to know they're not alone. So I wanted to [00:07:00] make it vivid. And a self-help book doesn't do that, or an academic text doesn't do that. I wanted to make it intimate stories that people could.

Relate to or understand their friend better or feel as badly that they had, that they were also angry after a suicide, which also happens. 

Jill: Yeah, I'd Suicide is one of those things that I find, again, with talking to people and being somebody that lost a loved one to suicide as well. Is it so? Challenging in a way that other deaths are not, because I think our culture also views suicide in a way where we make it as if the person didn't have an illness.

It's like they just chose to do this thing, but there is an illness that leads up [00:08:00] to suicide. And it's so challenging too because there's this. Sense of wanting to protect a person. I don't wanna talk about it too much because I don't want people to know the truth about this person and everything that was behind it.

And it's so complicated where somebody has cancer and they die. We're like, oh, it's, it's terrible. They, it's like a whole different way. And then it leads to shame and it leads to people. That are maybe struggling with some mental illness and feeling a little bit of suicidal ideation of not wanting to talk to somebody about it, not wanting to reach out, not wanting to ask for help, and we get stuck in this spiral, which I find frustrating.

Rae: And since you mentioned the word shame, I think you've put your finger there on something really important. There's shame on two levels. The person who has depression carries shame about having depression. It is still. Too often viewed as a weakness [00:09:00] or just get over it. There is help. Why aren't you better yet?

And there's all of that shame that is directed or and felt by the person who has depression. But there's a whole bunch of shame carried by the loved ones. And they'll hear things like they'll hear it explicitly or implicitly. You must not have been there for him. In my novel, the suicide happens while the family is away.

He is home because he in the novel doesn't choose to go on that vacation with everybody. And so everyone is loaded up with guilt at having left him. And then there's another point I wanna make. That is another aspect of the pain for the survivors. It's one thing announcing to your loved ones that you just can't do this anymore.

I really need a way out and saying goodbye [00:10:00] and going gently. It's a whole other thing to have a violent suicide and no matter what the suicide note says about, you'll better off without me, or these are some classic things that go in these suicide notes. It is such a violent trauma. I have a colleague who, Dr.

Sue Chance, years ago, she wrote a book that was part memoir about her own son's suicide, but part psychiatric excellent academic writing, and she wound up calling suicide and active aggression. And there is that. There is that in there. And whether the person who's depressed is at the time of death even well enough to be conscious.

Of that aspect or not, doesn't really matter very much whether they've thought about it or not thought about it. The impact is that everybody else is gonna feel [00:11:00] terrible, blamed and ashamed in addition to bereft. 

Jill: It's a very interesting point that I think my brain has danced around that idea a little bit, but I've not actually really.

Ever thought of it that way? 

Rae: Yeah, 

Jill: because I have heard of one case in particular that I'm thinking of. The person was on the phone with somebody when they shot themself, and I've never been able to understand how they could do that to someone. Somebody 

Rae: that they supposedly cared about. So here's another point that I.

Try to include in the novel is the hollowing out of a person by this illness called depression Handy to have the wife in my book be a psychiatrist 'cause she's capable of going back and forth from the professional. This needs [00:12:00] help. But the professional will also assess risk and am I over underreacting?

Should I intervene? Do I call 9 1 1, don't I? All of that. But as a. Loved one. She goes from compassion to being pissed. And what gets her in the book, the most pissed, which I have seen families go through that is when she watches the impact on her children of the father's depression as he declines and she has to.

Answer to her children about why is he being such an idiot? Can't he be nicer? We're all together for once and he's just checking out. So she is. She betraying him when she validates her daughter's feeling that dad is not being. Present or, or is that actually the truth? And does she owe her daughter, in this case, that validation of her impression?

And same thing after [00:13:00] the death. They're all going through storms of contradictory feelings, and she is trying to cope with her own feelings while trying to honor and support. All these contradictory things her kids are going through. So where I'm headed with that whole diversion is that as a mother watching your beloved partner do this to your kids, that'll set a person's teeth on edge and they'll become less nice.

Jill: Yeah, because I love my husband. I really love my children. I would be mad too. 

Rae: And I'm a Lions, right? And so he's in my cubs and don't you dare touch my cubs, right? So there's a scene or two where she says that to her husband, but afterwards. She can yell at him when he's gone, but that doesn't do her or them much good.

Jill: Yeah, and I, [00:14:00] in some ways can really sympathize with the wife, having that background as a professional, but not also being able to help the one person that she really wants to help. And I feel like a lot of us that are in careers where. We help people and we do it because we love that type of work. But it's so hard when you can't help somebody in general, especially somebody that you really care about.

Rae: Exactly. And in my office, if I can't help someone, they don't go home with me in my office. I can keep that sober. Part of my. Brain in my heart looking at a situation and simply ask myself professionally, have I done everything I can think of? I can introduce more stuff to do, but I have days in between to reconstitute myself.

When it's someone you [00:15:00] live with, you don't get that respite. As a helping professional, which as you said, one chooses that for a reason. You become a helping professional because your heart resonates with other people. And when you can't, when you have no respite, no distance from the person who's suffering and you know what might help and they don't wanna use any of it, but you also can't walk away, that is very difficult position.

That's what the main character of the book finds herself being in, like almost doubting herself. Am I overreacting? Wait, am I underreacting? Wait, I don't know. 

Jill: Yeah, yeah, because you can't turn it off even if you want to. No. When you have that professional background. You're going to assess the situation, like you said, even if it's in your home life, your brain is still gonna go through those things.

And God, that must be exhausting. Like so exhausting. Yes, 

Rae: [00:16:00] it is exhausting. And that exhaustion when it's a friend, right? E even with a friend, you can't quite turn it off, but you get a little distance when it's your life partner. And everything you do falls flat. That is a very difficult story. So I say it in the author's note, and again later in the book, anyone who's ever loved someone who's struggling with depression and tried to help and couldn't get through, I feel for you.

And you're not alone. And one of my favorite reviews was from a colleague actually, who highlighted the point. It's one of the blurbs in the book. She highlighted the point that even the greatest love cannot save everybody. That's not a pleasant truth, but it's true. 

Jill: It makes me think of how there's this idea that.

Especially when we're working with individuals, whether we're [00:17:00] therapists or social workers or whatever it is, we're not really there to save people, and there's that line. That a lot of us, I'm not really a social worker, but the work that I did before this was basically social work with no training, which led to a whole lot of stuff.

But there's this desire in us that we want to save and Yep, we can't, like that's not really the role that we're even supposed to fill. 

Rae: So I'm gonna sicken that plot a little bit. My early career, I was working in a major referral center. We got referrals from really all over the world. That was really a position in diabetes care where the truth was, this was where the buck stopped.

And when you're inhabiting a position where. It's not just your grandiosity, but the fact is this is where the buck stops. If I can't come up with it, then I can ask [00:18:00] my colleagues standing next to me, but after us we're out of options. Then you do, or I did Anyway, I began to feel that I had to save people because there was nothing after our.

Unit, you will break your neck on that feeling that you just have to save everyone that comes to you for help. One thing I discovered in that context, which was medicine, was that it's almost a concept that I later read about the Dalai Lama doing something like that, but I'm not at al la. But when you cannot fix the illness, you're not done.

You can still offer compassion. And companionship, you can be there and bear witness to the suffering. The thing about depression is that the person who suffers from depression also withdraws from their loved ones. [00:19:00] They block themselves off from compassion and very often, and the character in the book certainly does that.

They become irritable at compassion. They become annoyed at the caring. It's like a door gets slammed shut that for a true compulsive caring person, that's really hard to be blocked from even the compassion. 

Jill: I was thinking when you were saying we maybe can't cure somebody of a disease. We maybe can't save them, but we can still show up for them when they need someone.

And as somebody that works with death exclusively at this point. Right. I do work with people who are ill, but like my whole goal is getting them to a place where death is just an accepted part of life. It's really challenging because I think sometimes people can [00:20:00] view the way that I approach death as like cold or uncaring or whatever else, and that's not really, it's just that I know that.

Death is inevitable. Mm-hmm. All of us will reach that point at some point, and it doesn't mean that we shouldn't try everything that we want to try to prevent it from happening sooner than later, but getting to a place where we say, maybe the goal isn't to stop death, it's to just support somebody through.

Their feelings and their emotions and their questions, right? And all of the things that are coming up for them. Maybe that is the goal. Maybe that is the role that we're supposed to fill, but our culture is just still so resistant to that. Again, it's the fight. Fight. That's the only thing. That's the only choice we have.

Rae: And you're, of course, you're aware of that wonderful book Staring into the Sun Ya's book about death. 

Jill: Oh, I don't know if I knew that one. 

Rae: Yeah. His point is that once you've looked at death and [00:21:00] accepted it, the rest of life becomes better. 

Jill: Oh, 100%. I agree with that. Yeah. 

Rae: And there's that fantastic Tibetan Buddhist saying that says, death is certain, it's timing is unknown.

Then relax, then you can't know the timing of it, so why bother worrying about it? And a third point about death is I'm old enough that I am looking at mortality on a daily basis. It's actually a good friend. It's part of my daily life because I don't have to fret about it. I know it's coming and it's there, and then I'm free to just.

Approach what's left of quality of life to me with grace and gratitude and make the most out of it. But when I say to people other than yourself, bless you, that I know death is coming, usually the response is, oh no. You're so healthy. You're gonna last forever. To which I have to say, no. Humor [00:22:00] me. It's a good thing.

I embrace it. It's fine. No, I'm not jumping off a cliff. That's not what that mean. What I mean is it's part of life and it's part of the journey and I aim to do it well. 

Jill: That's the way that I wish more people could approach it. And some of it is, like you said, the reaction that other people have. Yes. When you're saying like, I know death is coming for me, it's probably sooner than later just based off of my age and whatever else it is.

So I'm not going to fight it. I'm not gonna be afraid of it. I'm just going to be present and understand that I don't know when it's coming. I even have talked to people where going through illnesses, treatments, whatever else that have said to their doctor, I, I am realizing that this is probably not doing what we hoped it was gonna do.

What are my other options? And then they start talking about end of life. Then the doctor calls in the [00:23:00] social worker because the person's suicidal. 

Rae: Yeah. The person might just realistically be thinking, there's ways to die. 

Jill: There's ways to end my suffering. I don't wanna die. I don't wanna have this cancer.

But the reality is, I have the cancer, the treatments aren't working. I'm going to die. I wanna control when and how that happens. That's different than being. Depressed and wanting to end our life because we feel like there's no reason to live. 

Rae: It is so fundamentally different and on a light node. When I've had a wonderful chocolate MOUs and I even had a second one, do I really need a third or am I, I've had my fill of chocolate mousse.

So I kinda feel that way about life at some point where you've had your fill and how about being grateful for that? So not everyone gets that analogy, but I feel that way. The other aspect is, as a mother. Who is aging? Letting your kids know [00:24:00] that you're not gonna be around forever. I think it took me five years to get my children who are both in their forties, they're adults, but I wanted them to understand, I wanted them to not be shocked when the time came.

I wanted them to be prepared in a positive way. So one of the things. That I had to repeat to them multiple times is that statement. It's not like I'm jumping off a cliff and I'm not about to off myself. That's not what I'm telling you. What I'm telling you is it's fine. There will be an end, and I want you to be prepared.

I want you to be ready, so I want you to know. Whatever it was they needed to know. It took them both a long time, but it was very gratifying when I saw each of them at different timing. They finally got it, and I feel like for them [00:25:00] too, it gave them more pleasure in the time we do have, 

Jill: yeah. Because that is the thing.

Death is going to happen. It is still gonna be sad. Even when we're prepared, when we lose somebody that we love, we are going to miss them. There's gonna be sadness. But I do feel that I live my life better. I am more present. I am more just appreciative and grateful for everything. Now that I've become okay with the fact that one day this life will end.

Rae: It's such a gift, isn't it, when you can get there. I have another anecdote about that. I have a dear friend, I've been friends with him and his wife for 40 years, and I get the news that he, his illness has progressed to where he's entering hospice care and he and his wife lived far from New Jersey. I moved to New Jersey since knowing them.

But [00:26:00] I decided I wanted to go say goodbye to Jim. So I got on an airplane and spent two days with this man who was just melting before my eyes. He looked me straight in the eye and he said, you might think that's strange, but I'm not afraid of death. I said, no, I don't happen to think. That's strange. Um.

Really glad that you can see it that way. That man proceeded to get everyone to come to his bedside, to whom he had something to say he hadn't said before. So what a gift he made of his dying weeks. An opportunity to tell people. What about them? He had appreciated and thought he was remiss in telling them.

One knew because he was that kind of person, but he decided that the best way to spend his last bits of time was to distribute [00:27:00] these gifts of love. 

Jill: I love that so much. I actually just recently watched a YouTube video and it was about the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and I have the Tibetan Book of the Dead.

I've actually read the entire thing. Yeah, without having a teacher to really explain and ask questions. There's definitely parts of it that my brain is just, I don't really get what's going on. So this video was actually interesting because it really simplified it. I'm sure we missed a whole lot, but it still helped me understand the book a little bit better.

And one of the things that it explained that I. Was like, yes, this makes so much sense to me. Was that part of what the Buddhist believe is that whatever state you're in the moment of death, that will really influence your next life, your rebirth? I don't know if I believe in past lives. I don't know if I believe anything.

I'm open to all of it, but I do find. [00:28:00] That idea of really interesting of how we feel at our moment of death. Beautiful way to spend your last time, right? Oh, and this earth, in this body, at least telling people how grateful you are because on the other end of the spectrum. I know of a person that as they were leading up to their end of life, totally in denial, fighting with everybody, fighting with the doctors because the doctors wouldn't do treatments.

That is not how I wanna die. That is not the energy that I want. 

Rae: Has to be so painful, so riddled with anxiety and fear and, yeah. Showing that the way a wild animal will but all claws out and teeth out and hurting everybody around them. Though I don't actually believe that I'll be reincarnated or have a next life, but I believe this, which is a very close relative and that is the state of mind [00:29:00] I'm in when I die will leave an impact on those around me and it will live on that way.

Jill: And that's true. Maybe that's what reincarnation is, how we impact the people around us. 

Rae: Mm-hmm. 

Jill: Mm-hmm. That is us living on again, I dunno. I really don't know. 

Rae: I don't know either. And we don't have to know. 

Jill: And I'm okay with not knowing. I know some people get freaked out by not knowing. I'm okay with not knowing what comes after this.

Rae: Yeah, I wish I could be more helpful to people who freak out. Now I try, 'cause I'm, of course I'm compulsive helper. I try to spread that news that it's just another stage of life. It happens to be the last one and. It's all good. 

Jill: Exactly. It is all good. And I actually, with your background working with children and working as a family therapist, I've had this and we, you even mentioned earlier about being honest with children, right?

Yeah. A big conversation that I have with so many people is like. How honest should we be [00:30:00] with children about illness, death, dying again, even the afterlife, right? Like when kids have these questions and having my own children who are now 12 and 15. But again, like when I first got into this work, my daughter was in kindergarten, right?

So like she has spent a good portion of her. Childhood now being around a mother that literally talks about death all the time. And so it's been interesting to go through this arc with her, of her really realizing that I am going to die one day. And she really doesn't like that idea because she just doesn't wanna live without me.

So trying to be open and honest and have conversations, it's tricky, but I always err on the side of. I wanna be open and honest with my children about everything in an age appropriate level, whether it's drugs or sex or death or whatever it is. And if I'm uncomfortable, I [00:31:00] try, 

Rae: we could be best friends. It was my approach with my children.

I remember my daughter asking some embarrassing question about, she was a teenager and she was. Getting hormonal. What did you do when you were a teenager? That was a long conversation, but I needed to be honest. And my grandson, who's now 11, we've been discussing death since one of his grandfathers died.

It's been five or six years. And, uh, with him, I, I think he got it too. Grammy's gonna die, but I had to promise as long as I was alive, he was getting a chocolate cake on his birthday and occasionally he makes a joke out of it. What a gift that child like your children has been able to get comfortable with the concept.

It is not a disaster. We have to avert. Be afraid of or be anxious about. It is part of life and there's ways to do it. All of life. There's ways to do [00:32:00] it. 

Jill: Yeah. And I, I try to again be like, there's not right or wrong ways, but also I think there's better ways to do so things 

Rae: and as because of the subject matter of my book, which is a father getting suicide and what that does to his kids and his wife, I.

All professional and personal. Co compassion for people who suffer from depression stays in place at the same time, in as gentle a way as I could, I inserted a message that said. Don't do it to the people who love you, just don't do that to them. Compassion and choices. There are countries where it extends to mental health that resists treatment.

I don't think we have that in our country, but even there are ways that don't hurt everybody you love. I'm thinking of the anecdote you shared about this person who was on the phone [00:33:00] when. The friend or the partner shot himself. That's how the man in my book dies. It's just not an image. You want to choose to imprint and your loved one's minds and hearts forever.

They'll never shake it. 

Jill: I'm a funeral celebrant now, not just a Dettol. Also, I do funerals and when we did our training, one of the things that I liked so much about the training was that. The examples that we used in class were like the worst examples, like the worst of the worst that we would potentially ever have to deal with.

A lot of suicides, overdoses, children. Mm-hmm. It's not the grandma that just ice peacefully in her sleep, though it was interesting to, in some ways get some of the harder stuff out of the way. But one of the things that has stuck with me from that training was a story that they told. About a mother whose teenage son died by suicide, shot himself [00:34:00] in his bedroom.

Um, and the mother was never able to see him. She never saw the room, like she never saw anything until they went in and they cleaned everything out, right? Took everything out. 

Rae: So they took that from her. 

Jill: So that's where it got really interesting, because then she was in like a support group. And they said something about the photographs and she said, is that something I can see?

Can I ask to see the photographs? And they said, of course, you can ask to see the photographs. And so she went and asked to see the photographs of the scene, exactly how it was when they found it. They didn't wanna show her. She had to fight with the police to see the whole thing. And then what she said when she saw him.

It's nowhere near as bad as my imagination had of what he looked like, and that to me, I get goosebumps when I think about it because our imagination is so. Wild. 

Rae: [00:35:00] So 

Jill: wild that were gonna think the worst. Of course. And it wasn't as bad as she thought. 

Rae: And especially someone you love so much, a mother and her, oh 

Jill: God, 

Rae: child, right?

So her imagination had to have been torture. Torture. Torture. Just torture. Yeah. It's an interesting thing about our culture. We're so afraid of just truth. 

Jill: Yeah. 

Rae: We like the varnished pre prettified truths. Oh, there, there it'll be. Okay. As a provider, my whole career, I never found that was helpful either.

They're there. It'll be okay. I can't promise that. I can promise I'll be there if I'm alive. That last I've only started adding 'cause I'm coming of age. 

Jill: Yeah. But yeah, I've actually even had that conversation with a client that I was working with where this one of those things of, as strange as it sounds like if I.

Get better because they were still doing treatments. Are we still gonna have a [00:36:00] relationship or are you gonna stop seeing me because now I'm not dying? And I said, no, if that's not how this works, right, you don't have to just be dying, you're still gonna go through treatments. You're still gonna be facing this illness that is going to lead to your death.

And it's actually been, originally, it was six months or less when I first met the person. It's now going into year four because the treatment that they tried. Did work, which is cool. Great, but there's definitely been times when I've said, of course I could die tomorrow. I can't make you promises, but. As long as I'm here, as long as I am alive, I'm not gonna stop seeing you just because the cancer hasn't taken you yet.

Rae: Exactly. It's good for you. Hey, will you be my best doula? 

Jill: Of course. I am happy to do this for everybody. It's like it's, it's not even meaning that you're gonna die anytime soon. Like I, I've been trying to encourage people more and more, especially. To get clear on some of these things earlier than later.

We don't wanna wait [00:37:00] until we're actually dying. No. To try to have these conversations. 

Rae: There was a novel I read that involved the Death Doah and some Egyptian archeology, but I'm blocking on the title. You probably know the, 

Jill: yeah. You know the book and I'm blocking on the title as well because everybody told me about it and I tried reading it a little bit and right now it's my attention span for things is I want something totally different than what I did.

Rae: Absolutely you need to cultivate the other parts of your brain. But one of the things in that novel is how beautifully she describes that. It says much the partners or the rest of the family that you help. They're getting born into a new reality and they need care and help and support as well. Even if your primary attention goes to the person who is ill and.

Dying at some point. 

Jill: Yeah. A lot of it is working with the family members. Just helping people have [00:38:00] conversations and get clear on why somebody is choosing to do the things that they're doing. It is not just the one person, like it really does impact the whole family. 

Rae: And if you don't also deal with the family, then they are going to put layers of anguish and discomfort on the person who's already struggling.

'cause they're all communicating vessels. Right? 

Jill: Yeah, for sure. And so with your book too, like what is it? What is the biggest 'cause I know you said one of the things you want people to take away is like they're not alone. Right? For sure. But we're not alone in this. But what was like your biggest motivation in writing the book?

What did you really want people to take away from it? 

Rae: Okay, so the best way for me to tell you this is to give you the seed of personal experience. And it had to do with watching people. Young people, young adults or teenagers, but watching them have to [00:39:00] grapple with. The violent death, self-inflicted violent death of a parent, and my first impetus with the book was to reach out to anyone who's had that experience.

To be honest, when I started writing it contained a little bit of a rant, like, how could you do that to your kids? That's actually in the text somewhere. At some point the wife says, how could you do this to our kids? Reasonable thought. But, but beyond that, I just wanted to humanize every possible position to be in as the person suffering.

The partner of that's ADD friends of someone who's really struggling with depression and not wanting to live. I wanted to humanize that because the whole. Sequence of events causes so much suffering and it spreads. Whenever [00:40:00] people ask me, what's your book about? If I actually mention what it's about, there's a better than 50% chance that the person I'm speaking with has had an experience in their life of losing someone That way it's that common.

So I wanted to remove. The sense of shame that the survivors have. If I could, by helping them not be alone and maybe provide some comfort about all the complex, contradictory feelings, they're all likely to go through and you can always hope, maybe convince somebody to go on living. Or at least not die in an aggressive, violent, destructive way for the sake of the people who have loved them.

So will it have an impact? I don't know. 

Jill: It'll for sure have an impact. I do believe that will never see the full impact of things like this that we [00:41:00] put out into the world. Right? Yeah. But the ripple of anybody that reads the book can, even if we could all just. Understand the impact that suicide has, right on people.

Then we could maybe approach others in our life. 'cause one of the things that struggle with myself, with the person that I know that died by suicide was they even made a comment about having a gun. And I was like, what do you have a gun for? And they were like, in case I wanna kill myself. And I was like, aha, sure.

Whatever. Sure. Because at that time there was no reason for me to think real. Everything from the outside, bubbly, happy, full of energy, everything that they exuded on the outside covered the pain that they had on the inside. But now I know 

Rae: now, 

Jill: yeah, that a comment like that. [00:42:00] It was just a little warning belt.

It must have been even at that time, because I never forgot that comment. I still remember where we were standing when they said that to me. Am I 

Rae: allowed to soften that for you? 

Jill: Yeah, of course. 

Rae: It may or may not have been, it might have been a marker of a mind that intense, that it went from that really bubbly, creative, very alive impression that you had into dark times and that.

Could make jokes about it, but you'll never know. And so one of the young people that became my impetus to write a book, went through the last few days of contact with. Their father and went through an agony of what if, what if I had taken that joke seriously? Or what if I had insisted on getting help sooner?

Or what if every family I've dealt with that had to cope with [00:43:00] that kind of loss? The various family members in different ways go through the what if, what have I missed? What didn't I do that I could have done, that I should have done? And why do we think that? Because we have this belief that it has to be preventable.

It has to be prevented. So that's the other message of the book, right? You cannot save or help everybody. You can offer your love and you can try. 

Jill: Yeah, and that's sometimes what I think about too is yeah, this person knew that I was there and I supported them through many things over the years. If they didn't want to do it, if they really wanted the help, they know they could have reached out to me at any point 

Rae: that they always know who they can reach out to.

There is a stage of depression. Where people become. I try to cover that in the book too. One of them is that [00:44:00] version of depression where a person identifies with their depression, it becomes who they are and who they wanna be, and in that state of mind, help is anathema. And they might then make extra sure that when they get around to wanting to end their life.

Nobody can stop them. So as a friend or as a partner, you can ask, wait, are you thinking about dying? Now as a professional, that's an obligation that's in my license. My board requires that if I get any wind of suicidal thoughts, there's a protocol I have to go through. But whenever I had to do that, I was always very clear.

I would say so that they might not choose to give me a true answer if they were serious about it, and I understood that nonetheless, we had to come up with some kinds of contracts. [00:45:00] The contract isn't you're gonna allow me to prevent you from ending your life. The contract is, depending on the circumstance, it, it might be.

You're not gonna hurt our kids with the way you do it. Whatever it is that is suitable to the relationship. Somebody might say, I would like some warning, or I, there's one family where someone said, at least let us know where to find you. So there's all these things that are. Not about preventing keeping it from happening, because if you know that you can't always do, that's not the end of the conversation.

There is still things that you can ask and agree upon, and thankfully, I've only had two of my patients commit suicide over the years, but. There is a relief to people who have not died, but have had it acknowledged by a professional [00:46:00] or a loved one that there's times when they've really had it and they don't wanna continue, and that's been accepted, but then a contract is made to have it accepted as not evil, as not shameful as not absolutely.

Unforgivable. It's a lot like that image you gave of the woman who felt lighter when she saw the pictures of her son's suicide scene. The converse of that, a person who feels suicidal at intervals has a similar relief at being allowed to feel that and having another human being look at them and accept that truth as well.

Jill: Oh, that's beautiful. We are just about the end of our time, so I do have your book here in the shadow of silence. It's a beautiful cover too, by the way. Can you tell everybody where they can find you and find your book? And I could put links in the show notes. You don't have to spell anything, just let us know.

Rae: Okay, good. The book is on [00:47:00] Amazon. Amazon at the moment is the only place you can get the audiobook for now. It'll later get distributed on Cobo and libraries and whatnot. The paperback and the ebook. Sorry about that. No, it's 

Jill: okay. 

Rae: They are also available on Barnes and Noble, Walmart of all places, target and especially your local bookstore.

It's on bookshop.org and your local bookstore can order it or carry it. At the moment, the only restriction is the audible version is only on Amazon. 

Jill: Great. I will put links to all of that in the show notes. Thank you so much, Ray. This was beautiful. I really enjoyed talking with you. 

Rae: I enjoy talking with you, Jill.

It's very humbling and inspiring what you do. It's really wonderful to hear. 

Jill: If you've been listening to my podcast for a while and you hear me and my guest talk over and over about how important it is to create a plan for the end of life. And to have the conversations with [00:48:00] your loved ones about what's important to you, and you're thinking, okay, maybe it's time.

Maybe I should actually sit down and figure this out instead of just hoping it all works out later. I get it. These conversations can feel overwhelming or scary or just like something you'll deal with another day, but you don't have to do it alone. If you wanna help creating an end of life care plan for yourself or for someone you love, maybe it's your aging parents, a spouse.

Whoever it is in your life, you can book a complimentary 30 minute call with me and we'll just talk. We'll get clear on what's going on for you and what the next right steps might be. There's no pressure. Just support the links in the show notes. Whenever you're ready. And if this episode made you think of someone, a sibling, a friend, or another caregiver, feel free to share it with them.

Sometimes these conversations are easier to start when someone else opens the door. First, thank you for being here. The fact that you're even willing to listen to this kind of conversation means a lot.