What I learned from my husband's suicide Lori Prichard TEDxOgden 720p

The day was August 16, 2019.

It was a Friday.

I got up at 3 a.m,
like I did every morning,

to get ready for a show
that starts at 4 30.

I went downstairs and my husband Travis
did like he did every morning -

he laid out coffee and my breakfast.

But this day was different,
it was my birthday.

So in addition to that,
he'd left me gifts and a card.

Later on that morning,
he got our kids ready for school.

Got them up, got them dressed,
fed them, kissed them goodbye.

That was the last time
any of us ever saw him.

He was 44 years old.

My husband killed himself on my birthday,

which, if I think about, it is outrageous.

We were happy

We were happy he was educated.He was a

successful

physical therapist.He had two master's

degrees

and a doctorate.His had wonderful

parents and made

no sense but i've come to realize now

that my husband didn't kill himself

because it was my birthday.

he killed himself because he simply

couldn't live

another day.And I know that now

because he left a paper trail.My husband

and i had been married for 15

years two months shy.In fact,

and as embarrassing as it is to say it,

I never knew he suffered from depression.

My guess is he was clinically

depressed, but he was active, he was

engaged.

He got more done in a day than i ever

did.

But i look at him now, pictures of him

on her son's birthday or at christmas,

we're sitting in a restaurant in tokyo,

he looks miserable.

And our children singing him happy

birthday.

Happy birthday to you,

happy birthday to

you, happy birthday.

i don't know how i could have been so

blind

it's as plain as day and it haunts me

i told you travis left a paper trail

and a couple weeks after he died

i found these their notebooks he'd been

riding in

since 2016. there a window into his mind

and a side of my husband that i never

knew one entry that's particularly

stunning reads

i have to choose to let my pain consume

me

or find strength in the pain and find a

purpose

in my life my husband was a master

at hiding his depression he never talked

about being in pain

he never talked about seeing himself as

a complete and utter failure

but it's there it's in his journals

he called it the bully in his brain and

that bully

was relentless it refused to surrender

its power over him and i think about the

man i knew

and the qualities that made him such a

great husband and father and i realized

so much of who he was

was fueled by his depression nothing was

ever about travis

ever all he ever wanted to do was to

make us happy

but the problem is i don't think he knew

how to make himself happy

i used to tell him all the time how much

i loved him and how thankful i was to be

married to him

and in those last few years he would say

to me are you sure

there's 7 billion people in the world

i thought that was such a funny thing to

say i didn't understand why you said

that but i get it now

he didn't feel like he deserved to be

loved

this is where i could rattle through a

list of statistics

that show the link between depression

and suicide

but i'm not going to do that because

travis is

the statistic this is his story

of how he tried to pull himself out of

that hole of depression

after he died i checked the browser

history on our computer

i was astounded at the breadth of

research that he had done

on suicide and depression there were

hundreds of journal articles

and i found out later that the day

before he died

he spent 12 minutes on the phone with

the national suicide hotline

but when he came home from work that

night

he didn't say a word to me

there were times in our marriage i knew

travis was struggling

but he was always centered around his

job

he thought he should be further along in

his career and to me that is an

easy problem to solve you just change

your circumstance right

and so i encourage him to do other

things

anything deeper than that he would say

he didn't want to talk about it made him

feel weak

i let him get away with that but there

was one conversation

that we had about a month before he died

that was a little raw it was the first

time he gave me any indication

that his depression wasn't situational

it was more systemic it was coming

from within who he was and how he felt

about himself

and to be honest it scared me

and the next morning he left me this

note

lori i love you your goofball husband

and that's what travis did he downplayed

it

he didn't seem to worry so i didn't

worry it wasn't until

after he died i realized just how

serious his depression was

but it took him dying to get me there

please don't be like me don't let

the person you love talk you out of your

concern for them

i don't blame myself for my husband's

death i blame myself i was so blind

to that illusion that he created i

didn't act fast enough

to get him help

my therapist is a professor at the

university of utah she's an expert in

mental health

she often says if only people

would view depression like they do

cancer

depression is a medical diagnosis that

deserves

medical treatment depression is not a

character flaw

depression is not a weakness you are not

a goofball and trust me you are not

going to snap out of it three years of

journal entries prove he could not

dig himself out of that hole so

how do you silence that bully in your

brain

i am not an expert but i know this

you can do everything right to get

yourself through a day of depression

but what happens on that one day

that one day you just don't want to work

so hard anymore

who's going to carry you through for

travis

that person should have been me

but i didn't know

if you hear anything from me please hear

this

tell someone you love your struggling

yes tell a professional

but tell someone you love i knew

something was wrong that morning

i didn't know something was that wrong

had i known more

i could have done more

i'm not here to romanticize suicide or

make a martyr

out of my husband what he did and what

he failed to do to get help

is not okay no family should go through

the pain

the heartache and the disbelief that we

have gone through

people talk a lot about suicide they

don't often talk about the people who

are left behind

and the worst moment of my life was not

the police telling me that my husband

was dead

the worst moment of my life was telling

our children what happened to their

father

thankfully i had help the head of ksl

got me in contact with the woman who's

now my therapist

the university of utah professor i was

telling you about she told me flat out

no matter

what i said to them i had to tell them

the truth no matter how awful it was

that's the thing i wanted so i didn't i

wanted to tell them that their father

had fallen and hit his head or

had a heart attack anything but the

truth

but anne told me what to say and i said

it verbatim

your father died from depression

he took his own life

my son was 10. my daughter was 13.

how did he think that this was the

solution

because above all else travis loved his

children

had he understood the pain that he was

inflicting upon them

he never would have done it

now i will spend the rest of my life

trying to keep

my children alive because now they're

more likely to die the same way

so not only am i mourning a past i

cannot change

i am terrified of my future and what

suicide

brings with it

despite that people say to me suicide is

selfish

and i will say to you

travis honestly thought he was being

selfless that bully in his brain

made him believe that we would be better

off without him

it would be comical if it weren't so

tragic

i would say to you suicide is not

selfish

it is just really stupid

suicide will not get you the relief that

you're looking for

it only causes a whole other cascade of

problems

that the people you love most in the

world have to pick up

and carry for you

don't leave that legacy to your family

or to your children

i'm telling you this but in reality i'm

talking to him

i'm giving you the plea that i wasn't

able to give him to convince you

whoever you are please

don't take your life think about the

people you love

they will not be better off without you

i know

a year has gone by and a birthday is

past

these are the gifts he left me that

morning

i can't open them they're a painful

reminder

of what was meant to be

a life lived together

Thank you.