Where were the signs?

Beautiful Boy. That's the song that his parents played at his funeral and every time I think about Rohan that song floods my head.

I have waves of emotion flood over my body and there are times when I just cant control myself. I can remember every single event of the day I found out.

It was a beautiful summer evening when I sat down to a bbq with my family when all of a sudden the phone rang as per usual I raced my sister to the phone only to be beaten once again. She picked the phone up and it was for me anyway.

On the other end was my best mate sounding very down indeed. I asked him what was wrong only to find out that one of our closest friends had taken his own life. What? I thought. No he didn't!

As my denial started to take over. This joke is not funny. But after talking more to all my mates reality hit me and it hit me hard. Rohan is dead. I will never go to the movies with him again, I will never play a game of 'b' ball on his front drive way with him again and never work on his car again.

This hit me hard. Was it my fault was there some signs I missed? Why would he do this to me? We had planned stuff. This just wasn't fair! I felt intense feelings of anger, guilt, remorse and hate. My life did a total back flip I quit footy, my grades dropped and I stopped hanging out with my friends.

After two months, with my life slowly slipping away my family and friends took it upon themselves as their duty to get my life back on track. I started talking with them and my intense feelings of anger, guilt, remorse and hate slowly died down.

I was amazed that just by talking about my problems with other people I could start to get my life back on track. Although the feelings were gone I still was very depressed.  My parents suggested I talk with a youth worker, which didn't seem to help a bit.

My brother then found Reach Out! and told me all about it so with this in mind I read some of the stories and some interviews and realised that I was not the only one who had gone through this and they helped me to realise that there was a light at the end of the tunnel and that I could get through this.

Now with my life back on track I have definitely have to thank my friends and my family.

Need some help on how to deal with grief or the loss of someone close to you? Have a read of some Reach Out stories or fact sheets on coping with grief...

Suggestions for managing grief (Factsheet)

Dealing with suicide (Story)

Suicide stole a friend of mine (Story)