THE RIPPLES THAT REMAIN

THE RIPPLES THAT REMAIN
What Suicide Leaves Behind
Personal Story by Robin Cannon

TRIGGER WARNING
​This story contains personal reflections on suicide, grief, and loss. ​Please read with care.

​There are stories that arrive at AwareNow as submissions that reflect personal truths. This is one of those truths. Suicide does not end pain. It transfers it. Quietly. Permanently. Into the lives of those left behind. Into childhoods that grow up too quickly. Into milestones that arrive without the person who should have been there to witness them. Into ordinary days that still carry extraordinary absence. What you are about to read is not just a memory. It is a lifetime shaped by a moment. It is a daughter’s love letter to the mother she lost and the life she was forced to live without her. These are the ripples that remain…


In the summer of ’88, my mom had me wait in the car while she ran into the pool supply store. It took longer than she expected, and when she came back out, she had me crack the window. The air was on, and she said she didn’t want it to poison me.

That same summer, on July 31st, she parked her running car in the garage, and we were forced to say goodbye.

I was ten years old.

What follows is the ripple effect it had on my life.

There are some things laying heavy on my heart this morning, and I feel the need to share part of my journey as a suicide survivor, the term given to those left behind when someone takes their own life.

I remember the day it happened very vividly. I can still see it play in my mind like a video. My parents were going through a very hard, very heartbreaking divorce. My sister and I were at my father’s house for the weekend, and my mother was late to pick us up. Even at only ten years old, I remember having a sinking feeling in my gut that something really bad had happened.

The phone rang. It was my mom’s neighbor, asking to speak to my dad. My father left in a rush, and it felt like an eternity before he returned. When he came back, he had the neighbor with him.

My sister and I were not standing next to each other when we were told that our mother had died. She was sixteen at the time, and I can still hear her scream and see her drop to the ground in the front yard. That image still makes my stomach turn. I wish I could reach out to that sixteen-year-old version of my sister and hold her.

I remember feeling confused. Everything was a blur.

Three of my best friends came over shortly after. They stayed with me. We talked, and walked, and talked some more. My ten-year-old self was trying to process what had just happened.

​It wasn’t until the funeral that I learned she had committed suicide.

I was sitting in the conference room on my dad’s lap, surrounded by family. The pastor mentioned suicide, and I remember turning to my dad and saying, “I didn’t know she committed suicide.”

He told me they weren’t sure. He was trying to protect me.

As I approached my mom’s casket, I remember thinking that it didn’t look like her at all. She was too orange, and her hair wasn’t right.

This was not my mom.

My sister tried to fix it, but there wasn’t much that could be done.

After the funeral, the nightmares started.

I would dream that I was outside the house, watching her die, but I couldn’t get to her. Other times, I dreamed she was at the bottom of a case of curly stairs, and I was at the top. She was crying my name, begging for me to come to her. I would run as fast as I could down the stairs, but I would never reach her.

The guilt that follows suicide had already begun taking root in my young mind.

As my new life without my mom began, I instantly felt different from my peers. For every Mother’s Day project, the school would special order a Father’s Day gift for me to make instead. The teachers were wonderful. Truly a blessing.

But the world outside was not always so gentle.

I remember being at a birthday party when one little girl told everyone that my father had killed my mother.

The loss of my mother didn’t hit me the hardest until my high school years.

I became obsessed with one question:

Had I told her that I loved her before I left?

What if I didn’t?

What if I had, and that would have made the difference?

So many what ifs.

I struggled with eating disorders, low self-esteem, and depression. I grew up with the overwhelming feeling that I didn’t fit into this world.

​She missed everything…

My proms.
My graduation.
My leaving for Northern.
My return.
My heartbreak.
My marriage.
The birth of my children.
My return to school.
My college graduation.

Every holiday. Every birthday. Every moment in between.

There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t miss my mother or need her. The pain still hits me like a ton of bricks sometimes and takes my breath away. I still feel guilty, but I work through it.

The pain has become a part of me.
A part I never wanted.

As I have gotten older, I have learned that my mother suffered from depression. I believe she thought she was doing everyone a favor. I believe she was lost and broken and felt she had nothing left to offer us.

She was wrong.

She had love to offer. And that is what I have missed the most.

I would have rather had a mom who was struggling, who was broken and broke, who was fighting every day just to survive, than to have no mother at all.

It’s the little things I still yearn for.

A phone call.
Shopping together.
Visiting her at home with the grandbabies.
Simply knowing her presence is still here.

I share this today in hopes that anyone who is contemplating leaving this world will understand that choosing suicide creates a ripple effect that cannot be reversed.

And this is only my story.

There is also my sister.
My father.
My grandparents.
My aunts and uncles.
My cousins.
My friends.
My coworkers.

So many lives shaped by one loss.

Carol Maxine (Cudney) Walker was 37 years old on July 31st when she made the decision to take her life.

The same age I am now. ∎

If you or someone you love is struggling, you are not alone. Help is available.
In the U.S., you can call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.