[JennaE]

Hi. This past Monday, my ex-husband hung himself where I do volunteer work. We have two children together (b/18 and g/16) and now they blame me and they do not want to come live with me but, instead, want to live with their uncle from his side of the family. I cannot even begin to express the amount of guilt I feel right now. In my right head, I know that I am not to blame, but I cannot deal with the fact that he was in that much pain that he could do this - not to mention, that it obviously had SOMETHING to do with me. This whole thing is a nightmare!!!

[HALLIEBETH87]

I cannot find words. Only love. <3

[vonmoxie]

I'm so very sorry for your loss and for what you are going through. I can relate somewhat closely as my own husband suicided a few years ago; no kids though. I have suffered greatly from what they call survivor's guilt, the condition of thinking that we've done something wrong by surviving a traumatic event when others did not, and it's applicable to feeling that way after someone's suicide. Logic doesn't really come into it -- I know logically I didn't do anything wrong, but the feeling of wanting to somehow turn back the clock and do something differently is intense.

My number one best piece of advice I can give: I highly recommend finding a local support group specifically for survivors of suicide loss that you can attend. That's my sincere personal recommendation based on my experience, which is actually that I didn't go soon enough and I know now that it would have been the best possible tool for preventing the depression and PTSD and complicated grief that developed for me, which I'm still experiencing and are far more difficult to battle. But it's also the number one recommendation based on this recent article provided by the National Institutes of Health.

It's so valuable to have the opportunity to regularly talk to others going through or who have been through the same thing (those who haven't will not understand many important aspects), and I think you may meet people there who have gone through similar situations as the one you find yourself in with your children, with whom you could talk through that aspect.

I know this doesn't fully address what you're going through with your kids, and I wish I personally had more advice about that because I really feel for what you're going through. What I do know is, it's dangerous to try to get through this alone. I got through everything in my life alone and like a champion, before going through this; not this though.

From the NIH article:

Survivors can locate support groups on Web sites belonging to groups such as the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) and the American Association of Suicidology (AAS) which host directories of over 400 suicide support groups throughout the United States. To locate support groups worldwide, survivors can visit the Web site of the the International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP), an organization officially affiliated with the World Health Organization. With membership in over 50 countries across the globe, the IASP postvention (suicide bereavement) taskforce offers a multitude of resources to survivors including survivor guides, 24/7 helplines for people of all age groups including child survivors, and does so in multiple languages. (more)

Wish you all the best.