Forever Young: A mother's story of life after suicide

by Sharon Truesdale

  FOREVER YOUNG

  A MOTHER’S STORY OF LIFE AFTER SUICIDE

  By Sharon Truesdale

  With Sue Leonard

  The Authors

  Sharon Truesdale studied law before becoming a qualified youth worker, currently working in the area of special education. She is the mother of Matthew, who died by suicide aged 17, and of Natasha, Annie-Jean and Daniel. She lives in County Antrim, Northern Ireland.

  A journalist and ghost writer, Sue Leonard is the co-author of two recent number one bestsellers: Whispering Hope: The True Story of the Magdalene Women (Orion 2015) and An Act of Love with Marie Fleming, recounting Marie’s extraordinary life and fight for the right to die with dignity. (Hachette Ireland, 2014). She has worked on five other books as a ghost writer, two, for Penguin Ireland were best sellers. Sue is the author of Keys to the Cage (New Island, 2010)

  Remembering Matthew James Truesdale

  3rd April 1995 – 11 October 2012

  ‘Loved and Remembered Everyday’

  Preface

  On October 11th, 2012, my son, Matthew, hung himself in his bedroom. In that moment, everything changed. The old Sharon Truesdale died along with seventeen-year-old Matthew, and the new one struggled to find a way to live. Dragging myself through the first difficult hours, days, weeks and months, I learned that grief was a roller-coaster ride. Opening my eyes each day, I never knew what to expect. This book is for anyone who, like me, thinks that through their grief, they are going mad.

  Suicide, in Northern Ireland, is all too common. In 2012, when Matthew died, there were 318 registered deaths by suicide in Northern Ireland, (though some of these died earlier.) And in the 10 years before that, deaths by suicide averaged 274, so there are many other grieving relatives.

  I’ve written this book to help others who, like me, had never experienced a loss, or understood what grief actually was. The existing books I read which highlighted the stages of grief made some sense, yet my feelings, actions and behaviours seemed extreme. Was that because losing a child to suicide made my experience more traumatic? I don’t know.

  Every day I wondered how I was going to survive until nightfall living with the immense pain I carried, thinking, always, of the moment that I found my son. Would the pain ever lessen? What did it all mean?

  The book is also a celebration of Matthew’s short life – and explores the elements that led him to take this drastic step. And I look at the services available to him, and how they fell short. Had different measures been taken, could my son have been saved?

  Prologue.

  I awoke, as usual, to the beep of my alarm clock. It was six-thirty on Thursday 11th October, and it was time to get up for work, but, zapping the alarm, I didn’t move. I’m a disciplined person, and my routine, every day, is to leap out of bed – cross the corridor and wake my younger daughter, Annie Jean, then my elder one, Natasha, so that they’ll be ready for school. But that morning I could not move. Something wasn’t right.

  The alarm was set to snooze, and every seven minutes it beeped its impatience. Each time, muffling it, I continued to lie there, staring at the ceiling, noticing, with irritation, a cobweb in the corner. It wasn’t until the clock said seven twenty-one that I realised I simply must get up. I thought, if I don’t, I’ll be late for work.

  I didn’t go and wake the girls. I’ve no idea why. Instead, breaking my routine, I made for the stairs. Normally, the first thing I do when I get downstairs is switch on the kettle. But not that day. Instead, bypassing it, I opened the door and let out Buster, our new puppy. Then I made my way towards Matthew’s room, a specially converted garage. I’ve no idea why. At 17, Matthew had left school. He had a job, but as he started at nine, was able to sleep until 8.0’clock. All I know is that when I opened the door, everything changed. And changed forever.

  I could see straight into Matthew’s room; and I saw him, my firstborn son, sitting at the foot of his four-poster bed. He was staring straight at me, his dark brown eyes fixed, his head at an unnatural angle. And I knew, instinctively, that he was dead. Fearful, I stood as still as a sculpture. Frozen; my eyes fixed on him.

  ‘What have you done Matthew,’ I whispered. ‘I’m trained in first aid, but I can’t help you. I can’t help you if you’re not breathing.’ It was obvious that he had strangled or hung himself, and though I was horrified, I didn’t scream. I couldn’t.

  Had I suspected something was wrong? Was that why I had stayed lying in bed – to put off the moment when my life would change? I don’t know the answer to that.

  I went calmly up the stairs, collected Annie-Jean, and brought her into my bedroom. Then I collected Natasha. ‘Don’t go downstairs,’ I said. ‘Just stay here.’ Did they ask me why? Did they wonder why I wasn’t shouting at them to get ready for school? I can’t remember, but I didn’t tell them about Matthew. And I didn’t cry. How could I, when I was frozen in time?

  Downstairs again, I rang 999. ‘My son is dead,’ I said, when a woman’s voice answered. ‘He killed himself.’ My words sounded flat and remote – it was as if my voice had detached itself from my emotions.

  ‘Do you want an ambulance?’

  I thought, what a stupid question. Hadn’t she heard what I said? ‘I don’t think an ambulance will help.’

  ‘Would you like the police to come?’

  I sighed. I could no more make decisions at that moment than dance a gig. ‘Just send who you want,’ I said. ‘Nothing can help him now.’

  PART ONE: BEFORE

  1

  How it Started

  From the first time I saw Matthew – from the time I first held him in my arms, it’s always been him and me. It was brilliant having a baby boy, the first grandchild. He was just my boy. The baby I had hoped and planned for.

  Whatever happened afterwards; whatever we both went through; it was us against the world. I never doubted that. A few months before he died, when his girlfriend asked him who he loved most in the whole world, she expected him to say it was her; but he said he loved me best; his mum.

  I was equally smitten with Matthew’s dad James when I first caught sight of him. I was nineteen years old with my whole life ahead of me, and everything seemed possible. I was in Sleepers Nightclub in Antrim with Julie, a friend since primary school, and it was the place to be on a Saturday night. Julie saw him first. ‘Don’t look now,’ she said, ‘but there’s a guy over there who can’t take his eyes off you.’

  Of course, I looked over straight away, and she was right. This handsome, dark haired guy was staring at me, and when he noticed me looking at him, his face relaxed into a huge grin. He sauntered over with a swagger and told me his name was James. He was lovely! Easy to talk to, and charming. I noticed other – prettier – girls giving him the eye, and I couldn’t believe he had chosen me.

  We arranged to spend the next evening together, and from then on, we were inseparable. James was working for the Antrim Council at the time, doing garden maintenance. We'd meet in his lunchbreak, and would wander around, holding hands.

  We spent the whole summer together. I had been in Middlesbrough, in the North of England for the past year. I was studying law at Teesside University, but was considering chucking it in, a decision that seemed inevitable after I’d met James. I was enjoying the course but had found it hard to make friends. I’m half Chinese – and there, away from my family, I felt that nobody accepted me. As I wasn’t white, I wasn’t accepted into the white community – but I wasn’t accepted into the Chinese community either. And at the end of the summer, I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving James and going ba
ck to that loneliness. It would be so much harder now that I had someone to miss. I thought James was my saviour.

  I expected James to be happy for me to stay, but he surprised me.

  ‘Don’t rush into a decision,’ he said. ‘You worked so hard to get on that course; it would be a shame to chuck it all now.’

  I think he was proud of me, and felt it reflected well on him to have a university going girlfriend.

  ‘What would you do instead?’ he asked me.

  I laughed. ‘I haven’t a clue,’ I said, and that’s when he had his bright idea.

  ‘Go back,’ he said. ‘Finish your course, but I’ll come too.’

  I laughed. ‘But you’ve got your job here.’

  ‘Yeah, but that’s not for long,’ he said. ‘My contract runs out at the end of the month. I might as well look for a job in England as back here.’

  It was decided. We travelled together and found some accommodation. And if my heart sank when I saw the tiny bedsit, which had a sink and cooker, but only just enough room for a sofa-bed, I didn’t care. Even the thought of sharing a toilet and shower didn’t daunt me. I had James, and that was all that mattered.

  Another couple lived upstairs, and I’d thought, maybe, they’d become friends, but that wasn’t to be. They had a volatile relationship to say the least – and it was clear that he was an abuser. Our lives were punctuated by the sound of him beating her, and of her screaming. One night, after they’d had a particularly noisy fight, a police car drew up. Watching the flashing lights through the thin curtains, I wondered, aloud, who has reported the domestic, and waited to hear the police stomp up the stairs. But the footsteps stopped on our floor and went along the corridor.

  ‘We’ve a search warrant,’ they said, and it turned out that this quiet guy who kept himself to himself, had got himself into a spot of bother. The police were checking for stolen items, and after that, they became frequent callers to the building. None of this mattered to me. I felt safe with James.

  I settled down better at college, too. Nothing seemed so bad now that James was with me. He was happy too. He found work in an elderly care home, and it suited him. He’s such a charmer, and that smile would light anyone’s day. He loved the old people, and they, in return, seemed to love him. When he talked of them, and told me of their past lives, his face would soften. He wasn’t earning much – there was enough for us to live on, but I was paying college fees, so I got a part-time job with the Royal Mail, and that helped to see us through.

  At Christmas, when James asked me to marry him, I jumped at the chance and said, ‘yes.’ It was everything I wanted. Every time I looked at the beautiful emerald and diamond engagement ring, he’d bought me, I felt like the luckiest girl in the world.

  ‘Let’s just go away and do it!’ he said. ‘Let’s go to Cyprus. Then we just do it quietly.’

  Kissing him, I agreed. It seemed like the most romantic thing in the world! So, we booked the tickets.

  James’s sister Eleanor, and my elder sister Kathy were my bridesmaids, and Gary, Eleanor’s boyfriend, acted as best man. A friend of Kathy’s came, but there were no other guests – we didn’t need anyone else - but I wanted tradition.

  ‘I have to have a white dress,’ I said. I’d been dreaming of a white wedding since I was small. I bought a beautiful white wedding dress, and felt I was floating on air! I’d chosen purple striped dresses for the bridesmaids. The colour complemented them all.

  Making my vows, looking into James’s eyes, I felt an overwhelming sense of happiness. I hadn’t the slightest doubt that I was doing the right thing. The only thing. Nothing else made sense. I was 20. I loved James, and believed he was the only man for me. I wanted to be married to him, and I longed for a family.

  I passed my exams in the summer and James was still happy in his job, so instead of returning home, we decided to stay put. My brother came over to join us. We had a wonderful time. But at the end of the summer holidays, when my brother had returned home, and I was due back at university, something had changed. I was homesick and decided not to stay. This time James didn’t try to dissuade me. We were now married!

  That was all very well, but where were we to live? We’d decided to stay in Northern Ireland, but we hadn’t thought beyond the wedding and had no concrete plans. When we started looking for somewhere to live, we became disheartened.

  ‘We can’t afford it, James,’ I said. ‘What are we going to do?’

  ‘We could live with my mother,’ he said, and reluctantly, I agreed. And that’s when the honeymoon ended.

  We both found jobs – mine with the Royal Mail sorting office in Belfast – and James worked as a welder in Fruehauf, Newtownabbey. James’s mother, Joyce, spoilt us. I’d come home and find dinner on the table, and our bed made.

  The trouble was, that, being under his childhood roof, James’s behaviour changed. Bad memories surfaced for him. He’d never got on with his dad. He craved his father’s attention but ended up getting regularly beaten; it was his sister, Ann-Marie who his dad loved. Sensing this, trying to make things better, his mum spoiled James. It was a toxic combination. There were stories; stories that made my hair stand on end.

  I came to realise that Joyce hadn’t had an easy time of it either. She eventually left Jim, James’s dad, but he had always treated her badly, and she had accepted this as normal because she truly loved him. I suppose it was a sign of the times, but it came as a terrible shock to me.

  One day, when I got home from work, Joyce poured me a cup of tea, and sat down with me at the kitchen table. Something in her expression made me realise there was something important she wanted to say to me.

  ‘Sharon,’ she said. ‘A wife has certain duties. And one of them is to agree to have sex whenever her husband wants it. If she doesn’t, she has no one to blame if he looks for it elsewhere.’

  I looked at her, open mouthed. It so happened that the night before James wanted sex and I didn’t, but how did she know I’d turned him down? Had he told her? Surely not! Blushing with mortification, I said, ‘Last night we had an argument. We weren’t talking.’ Under my breath, I added, ‘not that it’s any of your business.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘Argument or not, a wife should give her husband sex. A man has certain needs.’

  Astonished, I simply walked away. Or tried to. But she followed me out of the kitchen and told me that she never turned Jim down. ‘You think you have it tough, but I’m telling you. My Jim slept with other women, and even so, I never turned him down. And one day he picked up an infection.’

  ‘What? You mean an STI?’ I shuddered.

  ‘Indeed. And do you think I turned him away?’

  ‘You didn’t?’ I widened my eyes. Was she for real?

  I found James lying in front of the TV. Assuming he’d overheard the end of Joyce’s advice, I muttered, ‘What was that about? Did you tell her about last night?’

  Flicking channels, he didn’t answer, but he coloured.

  Another night, I came home, and couldn’t find my hairbrush. It wasn’t on the dressing-table as normal. Looking for it, I noticed that everything had been moved – and some ornaments were missing. I couldn’t understand it. ‘Oh yes,’ said Joyce when I brought it up. ‘I had a little tidy-up. You don’t mind?’

  I stared at her. ‘I left the room tidy this morning. It’s just that everything has moved.’

  She didn’t say anything, but I saw her glance over at James.

  ‘What?’

  James picked up his jacket, and walked out of the house, slamming the door behind him.

  I turned to Joyce. ‘What happened?’ I wasn’t going to let this go. And, finally, she told me. ‘Poor James,’ she said. ‘He had a bad day at work.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He’s frustrated,’ she said. ‘He deserves something better.’

  ‘He wrecked the room, didn’t he?’

  ‘That’s men for you,’ she said, nodding, and I felt a knot of dread
in my stomach.

  The more I learned of Joyce’s old-fashioned views, the more astonished I became. She believed, sincerely, that a woman’s place was in the home, at the kitchen sink. Sometime later, she let slip her view that married women should not work. She virulently disapproved of those in a male role – like a woman ambulance driver.

  Over the years, however, I began to appreciate that Joyce was a dedicated mother who was simply a woman of her time. And she did change, when her daughters entered the workplace. I was astonished the day she entered it herself! She worked in Muckamore Pre-School Nursery, the one Matthew would attend, and helped distract him, when he tried to follow his other nana – my mum, out of the school.

  Whenever James brought up the subject of his father, and of the many rows and beatings, I expressed shock. But James would just shrug as if this was normal. Then he’d point out that I hadn’t much experience of fathers. And that was true. Mine had left my mother when I was just ten years old.

  He had an affair and simply abandoned us. One day he was there; the next he had gone. We’d recently moved from Chester to Northern Ireland; my dad was in the army, so we were always being uprooted. Mum was bitter. Having been offered security by the army for so many years, it felt especially tough being abandoned by them too, with no help or support.

  He left us on the Springfarm Estate – which, whilst originally used to house army families, was now also taking in civilians. Being Chinese, we didn’t fit in. It’s not just that there were no Chinese families around then – I never met any mixed-race children either.

  She never forgave my father. She sank into a torpor, and then into deep depression. At 10, I didn’t understand what had been going on, but I remember the whispers before we’d moved.

  I also remember arriving at St Patrick’s Barracks in Ballymena; I remember all our boxes stacked around the rooms. Mum was happy at this fresh start; she’d known that Dad had had an affair, but he’d assured her that it was now over. But one day, emptying his jacket pockets before she sent it to the cleaners, she came across a letter.