Silentpoet Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Today we, I don't what the exact right word is, celebrated, memorialized, or what you would call it the birthday of a child of ours who committed suicide last november. He would have been 16. We wrote happy birthday on balloons and released them on the hill behind the office. We took his picture off the wall and had it on the hill with us. I didn't really know him all that well, but the little I met him I thought he was an OK kid. I was pretty down myself after a bunch of negative events. I was broken up about a bunch of things. He had been through an adoption and after it was finalized it failed. I am not sure how long he was in foster care, but many years. He was at a residential facility and hung himself in his closet somehow. What is sad is all his life amounted to was a small box of belongings in my office. We had one of the workers who got hired this year go through it and throw out most of it. Because I didn't really want to. It was about a month ago. I have a stress ball of his in one of the drawers of my desk. He was cremated and the remains taken to his grandmother in Arizona. So after the balloon release ceremony I took one of the foster kids to Dairy Queen on the way home and got her a blizzard. Her birthday was yesterday. She has been in foster care for almost 5 continuous years. She also has been through a failed adoption where they were pretty close to finalizing it. 3 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
holyjohnson Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 God Bless him. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Walt Longmire Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Tough times. I feel for you. I lost my brother to suicide 5 years ago, and have others touch my life. A good book on the subject that helped me is "Finding Peace Without All the Pieces." It's available on Amazon. I highly recommend it. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
willie-pete Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Prayers for him and you. You cannot save them all; find peace in the fact you save a lot of them. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gwalchmai Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 My sympathies, SP. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G26S239 Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 That's a nice observance SP. I was very close to a suicide in progress back in 1999. It made for a real crappy next 12 months or so. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SC Tiger Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 (edited) 9 hours ago, Silentpoet said: Today we, I don't what the exact right word is, celebrated, memorialized, or what you would call it the birthday of a child of ours who committed suicide last november. He would have been 16. We wrote happy birthday on balloons and released them on the hill behind the office. We took his picture off the wall and had it on the hill with us. I didn't really know him all that well, but the little I met him I thought he was an OK kid. I was pretty down myself after a bunch of negative events. I was broken up about a bunch of things. He had been through an adoption and after it was finalized it failed. I am not sure how long he was in foster care, but many years. He was at a residential facility and hung himself in his closet somehow. What is sad is all his life amounted to was a small box of belongings in my office. We had one of the workers who got hired this year go through it and throw out most of it. Because I didn't really want to. It was about a month ago. I have a stress ball of his in one of the drawers of my desk. He was cremated and the remains taken to his grandmother in Arizona. So after the balloon release ceremony I took one of the foster kids to Dairy Queen on the way home and got her a blizzard. Her birthday was yesterday. She has been in foster care for almost 5 continuous years. She also has been through a failed adoption where they were pretty close to finalizing it. I "thanked" this post because I honestly don't think that people who do what you do get thanked nearly enough. Despite your best efforts to convince us otherwise you're a hell of a good guy SP. Doing what you do can't be easy. I know it's tough but as the kids say "just keep grinding." The adoption process can be brutal. I understand the idea of wanting to keep a family together if possible but it can really jerk the kids around. And when they find out they have to move to another family sometimes they freak out. The wife and I looked at it a couple of years ago but never finished it. I was afraid of the affect it would have on our son. Not because of having to share us, but also because of the horror stories they tell you during the process. The processes is a fucked up mess but I don't know how to fix it. Edited August 22, 2018 by SC Tiger 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deputy tom Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Very sad indeed. Prayers sent. tom. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billkill Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 You are a good dude SP 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dric902 Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 We’ve been keeping foster kids for about 12 years now. Only one “failure” so far but nothing like you’ve gone through. God bless you and your family 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silentpoet Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 2 hours ago, Dric902 said: We’ve been keeping foster kids for about 12 years now. Only one “failure” so far but nothing like you’ve gone through. God bless you and your family You’ve got a tough job. I can generally go home at night and at least get some distance between me and work. The foster parents are on 24/7. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silentpoet Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 The stress ball. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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