I'd like to introduce Kendra Nicholson, a new friend, author, and an authentic voice committed to helping others dealing with a family member's death by suicide.

Kendra used to perform and teach comedy improv in Long Beach, CA until she lost her son to suicide in 2018. She began journaling as a way to process his death, and to keep his memory alive. Eventually, her writing turned into a fictional novel for sibling suicide survivors, but has proven to be beneficial to anyone who is grieving the loss of a loved one. You can purchase a copy of her book, The Climb, by clicking here.

This week, I’ve asked Kendra if she would write a guest blog post sharing her story in her own words, which you can read below.

I just turned 50, and I’m weirdly OK with it. However, it has definitely made me a bit more nostalgic. I find myself looking back at my childhood growing up on a farm in the Ozarks, and marveling at how much things have changed in my lifetime. I remember getting two channels on our television, and there was no remote control. I would be in my tiny bedroom of our trailer house that barely held my twin bed and a dresser, reading a book, and my dad would yell, “KENDY!” like the house was on fire. I would run into the living room, where he would be sitting in his recliner, beer in hand, cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth, and he would say, “Change the channel, sis.”
Like many other things in our house, the machine on top of the television with the big knob that moved the antennae, was broken. In order to change the channel, we had to go outside, and turn the antennae by hand while Dad yelled, “MORE... MORE... NO, NO... BACK... BACK A LITTLE MORE... WHOA, WHOA, WHOA! STOP! STOP! THAT’S GOOD!”
I wouldn’t have dreamed of just sitting in my room and yelling “WHAT?!” when Dad called. He was predictably unpredictable, but there were a few things that I knew to be true.
When Dad called for you, you didn’t yell back to ask what he wanted. You came running.
I knew that when he was “having trouble with his nerves”, it was best to stay out of his way. When I heard his car tires crunching in our gravel driveway, I would go to my room and listen. I could tell by the tone of his voice whether I needed to just stay in there until dinnertime, or if I could come out and sit in the living room with him and Mom.
I also knew that once a year or so, Dad would have to go into the hospital for weeks at a time. He was a Vietnam Veteran, and I knew he was in the Veteran’s Hospital, but I didn’t know why. He and Mom wouldn’t tell me or my brothers. We weren’t allowed to visit, and we didn’t talk about it.
It was a secret.
It wasn’t until I was in high school that I found out that he was staying in the psychiatric ward to be treated for his Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from his time in Vietnam.
As an adult with two boys of my own, I always tried to be open about my dad’s mental health issues. Things were so very different than they were when I was growing up. People were becoming more open about it, and it was losing some of its stigma. Times were changing with regard to mental health.
No more secrets.
In 2017, my youngest son graduated from high school, and moved out to attend college. We went to visit him and his big brother during Thanksgiving break, and he seemed to be doing OK. We found out after we were back home for a few days, that he was definitely not OK. He was in a severe depression, and had stopped going to his classes.
We brought him home, and he began intensive therapy. The first couple of weeks were difficult, but then he suddenly seemed to be doing better. He was more active. He began going to the climbing gym like he used to, and he was getting stronger every day. He was socializing with his friends. He seemed like himself again.
On January 25, 2018, he told me he was going to meet his friends, and he walked out the door.
I had no idea that he was keeping the biggest secret of his life.
Instead of meeting his friends, he rode his bicycle over to a large warehouse, climbed the outside of the building, and jumped to his death.
We later found out that even his best friend had no idea that Trevor was depressed and in therapy. He was absolutely shocked to know that he had been struggling.
So, yes. We have made huge strides when it comes to being open about mental health, and that is wonderful, but we’re not there yet. We still have work to do. Until people like my son can talk openly about their mental health without any shame, we need to keep at it.
No more secrets.
-Kendra Nicholson