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Grief Counselor Skip Counselor Brief information is entered into this cell. I'm not sure where the "Degrees and Certifications" or "Professional Experience" fields show up to the client read more

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Caught in the Web
By Patricia Nordman

 No, God, no! In the grip of horror I flipped the pages of my tattered Bible, but what am I looking for, God? What salve do you have for a sudden and fatal wound – my son’s and mine? What thread can you offer to hold mind and heart together now?

Miraculously my eyes fell on 2 Timothy 1:7: "For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love, and of a sound mind." Yes, Father, thank You for the Holy Spirit of love, not the spirit of fear and hate and discouragement that causes death. O my God, take away this agony! I've loved and trusted you – and now this!

In desperation I switched on the electronic desert to get lost in the crowd of nothing, to wipe out the terrible no-sense of what had so recently happened in those dark woods. "But look at what that brand you bought did to our glasses! See the ones I washed yesterday, they're shiny and bright. That brand you used left spots – and there's company at the door!"

In my anger and grief, I cursed their banal worries and inane expressions. The world is full of so much sorrow, and their world was ending because of dirty glasses! In some future, more rational time I could probably accept these idiocies, but now, in the midst of shattered hopes and memories I resented this exchange of the least for the very least.

I loved my son dearly but, like the average parent, I waited too long to convince him beyond his doubts about the world and its confusing values. Thank God I told him with tears not long before he died! He had come home for Thanksgiving deeply depressed. His first day home we had a long talk.

"Mom, I just don't understand myself anymore. I feel like I'm nothing. The kids at school don't like me. I'll be standing there with a bunch of them, and they just ignore me. It’s like I'm not even there." He looked and sounded so defeated.

How can that be, I wondered. He's six feet, four inches tall and so handsome, and such a genteel person?

"I'm afraid to get up in front of the class, Mom. I'm supposed to give an oral report when I go back, and I just can't do it." He dropped his head into his large and strong hands.

"But Chuck, won't the professor understand? Can't you give it privately?" I remembered the kind professor who, years before, had allowed me to give a private, oral exam during a crucial period of my college life.

No Mom, he'd never understand." And then, as if to collect his disoriented thoughts, he asked in a barely audible voice, "Do you have any books on psychology? I want to understand myself better."

I offered a few Christian psychology books that I thought might help him, but I knew how he hated anything that hinted of dogmatism.

"They aren't preachy at all," I said.

No, I don't have time for God, Mom. I keep thinking about suicide." He said it so calmly and rationally that I missed the thrust. He could have said he was going to the ball game with the same tone of voice and cool manner.

Quietly and with such good intentions I said, "Chuck, that won't solve your problems." What an insane and useless remark, I thought weeks later, as I mentally sorted through the last conversation I was to have with my son. I simply hadn't believed it. What parent does?

"Mom, I'm really sorry for the way things have been in our lives. I'm so sorry for the way I treated you these past few years. I said and did things I regret so much now. You’ve been good to me and I guess I never realized it until I went away to school this year." He kept his head down, cradled in his hands. "Will you forgive me?" It was such a gentle plea!

Quickly I went over and sat beside him putting my arms around his slender shoulders. "My dear Chuck, there's nothing to forgive. Each day is new, and God's mercies are new, too. Remember, I need your forgiveness as well. And I want you to know that I love you so much!" Oh, if I could only love him through this terrible time! We wept together for the past – and for his hurting present.

I didn't understand what he meant by all this. Ever since he left for his third year of college I thought life had finally settled into a happy pattern for him. His letters expressed contentment. He loved golf and he was attending a junior college where he started a golf course management program. He also had written that he was playing third base on a softball team. His letters had expressed contentment.

His strained voice now forced me back to desolate reality. "I'm so scared – I don't know what's wrong with me! I can't get any sleep at school. The kids play rock music till early in the morning, and the girls come into our rooms all the time. There's no privacy or quiet. I just can't take it anymore." He dropped his head into his hands, a gesture that seemed habit now. I held him and prayed for guidance for us both.

The rest of the Thanksgiving holiday Chuck tried to help his father and four younger brothers pick fruit at our home grove, but he was sick, and most of the time he slept or wandered through the woods adjacent to our house. He had a shotgun with him, but he had always loved to hunt, and we didn't question him about it. When finally we mentioned his restlessness to him, he put his hands to his head and said, "I have to get my head together." He said that several times those four days he was home.

Sunday after Thanksgiving we waved goodbye to him as he drove off to return to school. "We'll see you Christmas, Chuck. Take care. We love you!" We were never to see him again.

After he left, I called Chuck's roommate who planned to go back later. "Jay, this is Mrs. Nordman. I'm quite worried about Chuck. He was so depressed over the holidays, and he talked of suicide. Have you noticed a change in him?"

"No, Mrs. Nordman, I haven't noticed anything different."

"Jay, I wish you'd do me a favor. If you see anything unusual, please let me know right away. Something's very wrong. Chuck's never acted this way before." It never occurred to me that peer loyalty would transcend parental claims.

The next day, Monday, I got in touch with any and all I felt could be of help. I was advised to call a local psychologist who had lost a child in an accident. I was told that she would surely give us sound advice.

"Just don't worry about it. A lot of college kids talk that way today. It doesn't mean a thing. I can assure you that as long as they talk about it, they won't do it."

"But what I've read on suicide says that it's when they do talk about it, that's exactly when we must pay attention." How strange, I thought. You're wrong – maybe dead wrong!

When I phoned and was told the professor in charge of Chuck's program was out of town, I wrote him a note so it would be there when he returned. A few days later I received his reply agreeing that there was room for concern about Chuck's behavior and suggesting that we all meet for dinner to discuss how we could best help Chuck.

When the professor and his wife and my husband and I met at a Holiday Inn for dinner and discussion, his reversal of attitude shocked me. "Chuck's doing fine, and he's making A’s in the course. In fact, I would suggest that you cut the apron strings and get off his back. I wouldn't even go to the school to see him."

We had never bothered this professor before about Chuck, and although I couldn't understand his attitude or his advice, we assumed he probably did know more about Chuck's problem than we did at that point. We came home, our consciences mollified that we had done all we could. We should have followed our hearts' warning....

Just before the Christmas holidays Chuck called and asked if he could bring his girl home for a few days so we could meet her. Thrilled that he seemed back in stride with life again, I said, "Of course, we'll figure out the sleeping arrangements when you get here."

After some small talk, Chuck said, "We'll see you Friday afternoon, Mom. So long." Those were the last words I heard him speak.

Thursday afternoon I decided to take a rest, something I seldom did. Perhaps with a refreshed mind and body I could figure out where and how we would bed down five sons, one girlfriend, and father and mother. Since I had never faced this combination before, it would be yet another parental challenge. Soon, I fell asleep to Brahms playing softly through earphones.

In no time I heard my husband saying, "Where's Chuck?" the question startled me. Struggling to let go of a pleasant dream and re-enter reality, I mumbled that he was still at school – or he was supposed to be. "But his car is out there packed to the roof, and the front end is still warm...."

Quickly I sat up, fully awake now. "He and Debbie were supposed to come home tomorrow," I said.

Surely there was some logical reason for them coming home a day early. We reasoned that he and Debbie had come in two cars; that they were in a hurry to start enjoying their vacation so they hadn't come in and disturbed me when they saw me resting; that they had decided to go the golf course and would be home in a few hours. Kids are kids – they just didn't think to leave a note.

At four-thirty, the phone rang. "Mrs. Nordman, has Chuck come home yet?"

"Yes. His car is out here, but we haven't seen him. Who is this?"

"Mrs. Nordman, I have some bad news for you. Chuck tried to kill himself here at the school three weeks ago. I'm the school counselor. I told Chuck that if we didn't hear from you or him by four-thirty this afternoon, then I would call you to see how he's doing."

The counselor broke in on my disbelief. "We've had someone with him for three weeks, twenty-four hours a day, but he promised he'd talk with you today and call me back. Mrs. Nordman, I hate to even suggest this, but I think you should check your guns."

Yes! Check the guns. He walked around at Thanksgiving with a gun! Quickly, I shouted to Charles to check where the guns are kept. It took only seconds for him to yell back that the shotgun was missing.

"Well," said the counselor after I told her, "the only consolation I can give you is that Chuck told me this morning that he didn't want to go out messed up...."

Consolation?! Dear God, I thought, they knew for three weeks and they let him come home alone after making sure someone was with him twenty-four hours a day. Impossible!

Scribbling down her number with an unsteady hand, I promised to call her back after I had searched – particularly down at the pond near our house. I replaced the phone and ran outside and through the woods, scratching my legs on branches I didn't see or feel.

"Chuck," I shouted, "Chuck, please answer me!" No, my heart kept telling me, this can't be happening; he seemed so happy on the phone last night. How can he be here with a gun, with such a terrible purpose in mind? Maybe he just went for a walk, waiting until I woke up. Surely he'd answer. I felt better. After all, life is logical.

I went back to the house, reported to the counselor, and promised to keep in touch. Putting down the phone, I tried to trace this strange course of events rationally. The facts added up to jagged and scattered pieces suddenly interlocking.

God forbid, was he dead already? It would be so easy for him to have slipped into the back of the house without my knowledge. The shotgun was in an open closet, resting against the wall. I was asleep in the front of the house. Yes, it would be too easy to get the gun.

It was now about five-thirty p.m. Charles and I got into the Jeep and searched the woods, each calling his name, pleading with him to answer. It was deathly silent, nothing moving. Had he already killed himself? Or could he still be out there, his mind and heart still struggling with the fateful decision?

Back at the house, I again ran through the grove, calling and praying. As darkness closed in, I asked Charles to go down to the pond in case Chuck was cold, to take him his sweater. Perhaps he had built a fire to keep himself warm, as he had done several times during Thanksgiving.

Meanwhile, I started making frantic phone calls. First I called Chuck's roommate and told him we were afraid Chuck was in the woods with a shotgun and that he might kill himself. I asked him to come over and be with us, but he said he was eating dinner and would come over when he was through. Incredible, I thought. Jay was probably one of the people asked to guard Chuck those three weeks. Why won't he come now, when possibly he could help Chuck – and us? Does he know something we don't know? Does he know the time and place of death?

At six-fifty-five p.m., the phone rang. I prayed it would be Chuck, but it wasn't. "Mrs. Nordman, this is Debbie. Chuck told me he was going to kill himself in your woods tonight."

I was stunned. What should I say to this girl I had never met, but known well enough by my son to confide that he would kill himself this very night? It was insane, incomprehensible and reprehensible! They all knew about it but us, his parents. How many "theys" are there, I wondered.

Now I felt an edge-less knife going through my emotional vitals, so slowly and surely! The die is cast, it's a stacked deck – all the stupid clichés for the inescapable fates of life! Are "they" waiting for the death bell – the phone – before they get involved? Who are "they," anyway? It seemed that all the players were on stage and the ending was already written for us. Only we, his parents, didn't have the script, and the end of the horror was about to be played out. Indeed, for all we knew, it may be finished. But was there any more time to help him?

I ran outside and relayed Debbie's shocking message. "Now it's urgent – we know he's out there!"

Charles ran inside to call the sheriff's office for a posse and then came back outside to tell us they were on the way, when suddenly we heard the most ungodly scream, and immediately after the scream, a shot that split the blackness of that dreadful night. I knew it was Chuck who screamed, but my mother's heart refused to believe that he was dead. Charles grabbed and held me while his brother ran to the spot where Chuck was – only two hundred yards from us all that time. Paul came back, put his arms around our waists, and said, "You don't want to go down there."

Our son was dead.

I know that our kind Father never allows such deep sorrow, except that good must follow. This has been the sustaining thought for us and for Chuck's four younger brothers. Chuck had so much to live for and so many to give to, but life closed in like a cruel vise. He must have gone though great mental agony thinking about the "why" of life during the five hours he roamed the woods behind our house before finally deciding to reject the gift of life.

After Chuck's funeral, his girlfriend and her family spent much time reviewing with us his recent behavior. Only then did we find out that he had been on drugs, apparently for several years, but had tried to quit when he went away for his third year at college. We finally concluded that he must have had a flashback from the drugs he had taken earlier. He had been taking downers during his depression and this triggered the sense of worthlessness, the fears, and finally, the suicide.

There's much, much more, for no life is simple, especially the life of one who finds its burdens too great. The seeds of answers lie within every tragedy – not always to our whys and hows, but answers for our faith when we allow God to take the yoke of our unbearable grief.

We will never again be able to hold our firstborn son in our arms and tell him how much we love him. Caught in the web of drugs, a fine, handsome young man, whose future was assured, is tragically gone.

"He giveth more grace when the burdens grow greater, He sendeth more strength when the labors increase; to added affliction He addeth His mercy, to multiplied trials, His multiplied peace. When we have exhausted our store of endurance, when our strength has failed ‘ere the day is half done, When we reach the end of our hoarded resources, our Father's full giving is only begun. His love has no limit, His grace has no measure, His power no boundary known unto men; for out of His infinite riches in Jesus, He giveth and giveth and giveth again." James 4:6 (Lyrics by Annie J. Flint)

Source: http://www.goodgriefresources.com/articles/article13.htm
 
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