Breaking the silence

Nearly forty years after losing his mother to suicide, writer Andrew Best reflects on the profound impact of unaddressed pain and the silent struggles many Canadians endure.

I was furious when my mother locked herself in a room, took enough medication to kill a horse, and wrote: “I love my children” in lipstick on the mirror!  How dare she be so selfish?  Mothers are supposed to give and sustain life, not end it! It has taken me almost 40 years to understand that nobody wants to die by suicide. What they do want is for the …