Jackie Baker and Angie Clayton: Walking Beside the Broken-Hearted

Jan's website

Angie's website
https://www.facebook.com/angieclayton.author
Angie@angieclayton.net

• Instagram@Dr.Jackie62
• https://www.facebook.com/jackiembaker
• jackiembaker@hotmail.com
• Jackiembaker.substack.com
• Jackie's books: Messy Mourning and Birth Pains, A Modern Day Scarlett Letter

In this emotional podcast episode, Jackie, a mother who lost her son, Sebastian, to suicide, shares her profound journey of grief and healing. 

From embracing Sebastian's early talents and challenges to confronting the difficult decisions she had to make, her story is a heart-wrenching depiction of parental love and loss. 

Grappling guilt, she speaks on finding strength in faith, support from the community, and the healing power of sharing her story with others facing similar tragedies. 

Jackie’s journey is not just about loss but also about hope, highlighting the importance of building supportive networks for those grieving suicide.

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Transcript

[00:02] Jan: Welcome to just talking about Jesus. I'm Jan Johnson, a seasoned believer who loves relationships and, you know, just talking about Jesus. So let's get started. Welcome, Jackie.

[00:16] Jackie: Well, thank you. I'm glad to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

[00:20] Jan: Welcome, Angie.

[00:21] Angie: Thank you. I'm so happy to be back.

[00:24] Jackie: Great.

[00:25] Jan: Well, I'm gonna start with Jackie. Jackie, tell me about your son Sebastian. What was he like?

[00:32] Jackie: So, Sebastian was my firstborn son, and he came out big, nine pounds, blonde and blue, wide. And I was like, did I give birth to this kid? Because, I mean, I have brown hair, brown eyes, and out comes this huge little blonde hair. I called him my Buddha Boyden. So he came walking right out at the very beginning and very strong willed, curious, smart as a whip. He kept me on my toes right from the very beginning. Started playing chess when he was seven and became a national chess champion when he was nine. And so, yes. Yeah. So just this brilliant young man that my goal was always just try to keep him busy, because I thought I always learned if I didn't keep him busy, he was going to keep me busy. So I was just going to. So that was Sebastian. And then a soccer player, played soccer, did really well in school. And then around 8th grade, then he's decided, I'm not. Didn't want to play chess anymore. He started changing and just struggling with identity and who he was. And he graduated, went off to college, played soccer, got a soccer scholarship, went to northwest Nazarene, and then came home from college and said, I'm not going back. And so we noticed some things changing in him. Suffered with depression, anxiety, became anarchy, probably, you know, was diagnosed with bipolar. And it was. But it threw it all. He did love Jesus. He accepted Jesus when he was, like, ten years old, was baptized, but just had some struggles that he just some, he would say his brain. He couldn't keep up with his brain. He would always tell me that, mom, I don't know why my brain thinks this way. And so we spent a lot of time talking about deep thinkers. Always got him books that he could think about, you know, John the Cross, Augustine, John Foster Wallace, David Foster Wallace, things like that. So. But he was just a brilliant young man. And then. But when he was 23 years old, he was in rehab for some choices that portrays he made with drug use and stealing, and it was facing jail time or rehab. And then it was in rehab that he had his first suicide attempt, and he was sent to another place where he could get medicated. And then six months later, then he had a second suicide. And he. And he died in September of 2017, so almost seven years ago. So. That's my boy. That's Sebastian. Yeah, boy.

[03:16] Jan: Hard to watch, you know, with any of our kids, it's hard to watch when they, you know, they're going along, going along, bumping along, and then some of them just kind of, like, get this little veer off, and it's just like trying to drag them back in and.

[03:30] Jackie: Right. Always had hope because I kept thinking, trust, passion. You just got to get through this. You got to get through this. Gotta lean on the lord, you know, been trying to always try to be positive for him. And I did a lot of praying, but it just came a point in my life where, as a mother, you can only do so much. Especially. He was a young man, 23 now, so he was an adult out of the home and wanted to come home. But I didn't let him come home because of the. Of the choices he made. It just wasn't a safe place for him to come to our home time, and so. So he didn't. But we always talked. In fact, the day he died, our last conversation was, I love you, mom. And I said, I love you, too. You know, and that. And little did I know that, you know, a couple hours later, that I.

[04:19] Jan: Would get a knock on to.

[04:21] Jackie: Yeah, yeah. So we always knew that. And we always used to tell each other, we love you. Yeah.

[04:26] Jan: Yeah. Thinking back, did you feel guilty because you didn't let him come home?

[04:34] Jackie: You know, briefly, I thought about it, you know, a wise person said it was interesting because he said, you know, if you had brought him home, he could have died at home, you know, and I didn't think about that, you know, but when he. I said he couldn't, you know, I couldn't because, yeah, he had made some choices, and he had stolen from me. And my husband said, you know, it's bad when mom says it's time to leave. And I. He had been stealing money from my debit card. I never changed my, you know, my password. And one day I noticed money, you know, I was withdrawn. And so I confronted him, and this is before I kicked him out. And he, you know, I asked him, and he said, yeah, I took your money. You might want to change your debit card number. And I was like, okay, all right, then I'm done. I mean, that's where he was. You know, he was just. I don't excuse his behavior. It was not. You know, I don't. You know, don't make any excuses for it at all, he made some poor choices and I couldn't bring him home because of that. Right.

[05:45] Jan: And you made the best choice that you should at the time, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[05:50] Jackie: But it killed. I mean, literally, it was hard. I mean, you know, I think about that, you know, and I was like, no, it was the right decision to make. I mean, maybe someone might not agree with it, but for us it was, you know. Yeah.

[06:03] Jan: Oh, and I think, too, it was God's protection for you, you know, in a lot of ways.

[06:09] Jackie: Cause I have, I have interacted with mothers or with that have found their children, you know, and that's something that would be, that'd be awful too. I think that God saved me from that.

[06:23] Jan: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I think that'd just be, oh, my goodness. You know, and so when things like that happen, your first question is, like, why God? But it's like, how did you deal with that? Where did you see God in the midst of this?

[06:40] Jackie: You know, it threw it all. Well, he was, of course, the, the first thing we, we did was pray. When we got the knock on the door, it's like my husband and I said, where else would we go but to God? We, there's no place else. There's no way you can do this without God's help because there's, I always say it's one of the lies is that God gives you. He doesn't give you anything you can't handle. But you cannot handle this. You cannot do this on your own. You need support, and you need support from people, from God. And I always said, I remember at the funeral at our church, the sanctuary was filled. There must have been at least 6700 people there. And there was a line. And all I kept thinking was, people would say, you don't remember, but you did this for us. And you did this for us. And all I kept thinking was back in revelation when God said, you know, there'd be no more tears. There's going to be. I go, this is what heaven is going to be like because there's just going to be no more tears. It just, we were just felt so lifted up by the body of Christ. And that was just the only way. I mean, I have no memory the first few weeks, you know, of this, of what happened, but I do know that I was carried through it, you know, and, and so that was the only way, I mean, and I cried to the Lord all the time, you know, just, you know. Yeah. And grief and pain and the psalms were a lovely place. They're filled with laments. And, you know, why God? Why God? But it's always to God when we pray. It's always to him. And he doesn't give us. What I just remembered is that, oh, but Jesus, God watched his own son die on the cross. He knows how I feel. I mean, he, of all people, knows exactly how I feel. Yeah, yeah.

[08:32] Jan: And I mean, even more so because it was so brutal.

[08:36] Jackie: Right? Yeah.

[08:38] Jan: You know, I mean, even if we watch our kids getting bullied and whatever, your heart is hurting.

[08:46] Jackie: Yeah, yeah.

[08:47] Jan: But to have something like that is. Yeah. So you have moved into an area working with women who have lost children through suicide. Tell us about that.

[09:02] Jackie: Well, it started. It was within, like, weeks after our son died. I got a call from someone whose son had. Who had attempted suicide. And it was just this surreal place. They're like, well, can you help? Gosh, I just. You know, I just got through this, you know? I mean, I'm not even through this. I'm still in it, you know? And. And I. We've. So that was the. That was just, like, a couple weeks later. And then a month later, I had another friend that said, hey, so and so lost their husband and child to a tragic accident. Would you. Would you meet with them? And again, I was just like, you know, okay, lord. You know, only. So then I started meeting with this woman, and then once again, someone said another friend of ours had died, their son had died, and would I call them? So all of a sudden, people just started calling me, you know, out of. When looking back on it, it was kind of. They didn't know who else to call. Yeah. Who do you call on a time like this? And they're like, well, Jackie's been through this, you know, she would know. And back then, I didn't know. I mean, I always used to say, I'm just one step ahead of you, you know, because I'm still trying to figure all this out, you know? And so I just started walking alongside women, mother. You know, mothers. And I would just sit and cry with them, and we would cry together, and we would pray together and. And mourn together and. And just, you know, talk about. I always say, you know, stupid things people tell you, you know, when you're like, I can't believe you just said that to me. You know, but we were going to. We always talk about writing a book about things you shouldn't say to people when they lose someone to suicide.

[10:50] Jan: That has some of that in it. Right, angie? Yeah.

[10:53] Jackie: Yeah.

[10:54] Angie: Well, yeah, I mean, my friend that lost children of suicide. And I have this little saying that people are stupid, right? I mean, they mean well. They mean well. They just. Things come out before they.

[11:07] Jackie: I know. Yeah, but. Yeah, so that's where I started. And then, so over the years. So then I started writing, and that's where my writing. I used to write before, but I started writing in my grief, and then I would started sharing my grief story on my substack and essays and just sharing with people. And then I just really felt compelled. I wanted to find a better way to help other mothers and who lost children to suicide. And so I started a support group at church that's just in its infancy stages right now, but I meet with a couple gals that, who have lost someone, not a child, but other family members, to suicide. And just that common thread, you know, just a safe place to talk about grieving a suicide. It's, you know, I have found that it's different suicidal grief than similar to traumatic grief. But there's a lot of the things that are different are, you know, if someone dies from cancer, you know, people are walking alongside them. We know it's coming. You know, they were brave. If there was an accident that happened, you know, it was tragic, but, you know, they lived a good life. But then when someone dies of suicide, you're like, no one knows what to say, right? Because you have a lot of things, but no one knows what to say. And if they do, they don't say it sometimes very well. And so that's what I started thinking about, because the grief is complex, and I think you're going to talk about that as well. You know, it's. There's a lot of guilt and a lot of shame because there's the what ifs, and I could have. Could I have done something I should have been able to do something I shouldn't be able to know, you know? And so there's a lot of unanswered questions that people feel like they need to try to find the answers, and they can't. So that's where it came from, is just letting people that the grief process takes longer, that it's. That there's no timeline for when grief ends, because people think after a year, you should be done right? And we're like, well, no, you're just almost. Just beginning. I find your. What I noticed for me is, like, after the first year, the numbness starts going away, and then you start feeling all those things that I think God protected you the first year because you were numb and you didn't remember it. And all of a sudden you're like, why is it worse? It said, the body grief is coming out as you're starting to feel things again. And it hurts even more the second year round, I think.

[13:35] Angie: I think, right. I've touched so many people that have said exactly what you said. The second year is harder. The anniversaries, the holidays, all of it.

[13:44] Jackie: Yeah. Yeah.

[13:45] Jan: There are things that, in your working with other women, going through this, are there. Do you ever come to some resolution or something that helps you understand? Are there. Are there certain things over others that help you understand how this could happen and maybe that it wasn't your fault or. I don't know.

[14:11] Jackie: You know, that's such a. Every family is unique and how they deal it with it or what they. What they just ever like for us. I knew once. So once a child has a suicide attempt, then the risk factors are higher that they will attempt again or be completed. Of course, boys are more likely to complete a suicide, statistically than. I mean, you complete it by kill themselves than a woman. The fact that our son had already had one unsuccessful suicide, you know, the risk factors had gone up higher. And it comes to a point where I found. Where I just had to let him go. And, you know, I mean, I'm still going to help him. We got him into rehab. We found him a psychiatrist, you know, but I can't control what he's going to do all his life, you know, and that's. I think that's the hardest part, I think, for moms, is we want our children to be safe, always, even our adult children, right? And then. But there's no guarantees in life, and we're all going to die. You just didn't. We didn't. You know, the trajectory was, your child wasn't going to die this way, was going to die from old age after we're gone. Right. No one wants to bury your own child, so, you know. Yeah. So I find for us, once Sebastian died, it was almost a relief, you know, our suffering was. Of course it changed, but we no longer worried about him anymore. I knew he was safe because his pain was gone, his suffering was gone. And I used to be really ticked. I'm like, well, he's better off than I am right now. And I remember after his first attempt, and I was in the ER with him, I was so mad. I mean. I mean, I had. And I don't know if it was right or wrong, you know, but I was just really angry because he had the rope marks around his neck. Were raw from, you know, the rope broke. He was missing for 24 hours after, you know, and he was finally found and was admitted to a hospital. And. And I was just like, sebastian, I go, but when you die, I go, you leave me behind. You are good. And I am going to be hurting like hell. You know, I mean, it was just. And I was like, I don't know if that was the right thing to say, but I was just saying.

[16:30] Jan: But there is no right thing to say.

[16:32] Jackie: Yeah. He's so mad.

[16:34] Jan: You're coming from the depths of your broken heart.

[16:37] Jackie: Yeah. And he was just. You know, he was just like, whatever, you know, I mean, because he was so sick mentally, you know, just. It was just so mentally distraught that he couldn't. He couldn't go there. But. Yeah, that answers that question. But it just. I think for when he finally passed, it was almost like, oh, I can breathe better at night because I have friends whose sons are still struggling with different things, and, you know, they don't know sometimes if they're safe or not. And I have that. At least I have that assurance to know he's. You know, he's good. Yeah, he's. Yeah.

[17:15] Jan: I think the other thing, and I haven't lost anyone through suicide. My niece was a heroin addict and she overdosed. You know, that's the close come with that. And. And even still knowing and trying to get help and trying to do whatever you can, you can only do so much. And nobody, I truly believe that nobody commits suicide who is mentally healthy.

[17:44] Jackie: No.

[17:46] Jan: You know, they're. They're in a place where that seems like the only way to stop it.

[17:53] Angie: You know, often I'm not going to speak for Sebastian, Jackie, but often what I see is that it was. The decision was an instant, terrible decision, and the consequences were life ending. But it was one probably of a series of terrible decisions. You know, the kid or the young adult usually has. Has made. And this one was just the last one.

[18:18] Jackie: Yeah. We have a friend who's a palliative care doctor, and she called. What Sebastian was going through was like. How did she call it? Like, it was a mental health cancer. She called it a cancer of the mind and that it was terminal, you know, and she said, of course we're always going to try and help and the chemo of whatever, you know, but. But she said, sometimes we have to look at it that way. That. And that is kind of. In a way, it is kind of reassuring, like, oh, yeah, this, you know, but. But there's always still. You want. You always hope that something, that all of a sudden this miracle is going to happen and they're all better.

[18:55] Angie: Right.

[18:56] Jackie: But, you know, it doesn't always. There is no guarantees in life, you know, except for that God is good. You know, that's what I always tell people. And through it all, God remained good and present. And my husband and I would say that we both know this. We have grown closer in our faith since we've lost our son. I haven't seen that a lot. I mean, but we just clung to him. And I always said grieving would be easier if it was just me, you know, and not my husband or my child, because we all grieve differently, right? And we just, you know, I'm like. And having to learn to respect the way other people grieve in your family. And it can be frustrating at times because I'm like, well, I'm grieving. How can you be grieving? Like, wait, we're all grieving, you know? Right.

[19:42] Angie: You know what she said? A really good point. And men and women grieve differently. Introverts grow differently. You know, there's a million reasons why we might do it differently from our spouse. And it is really hard. Why am I wailing and crying and can't stop and you're sitting over there on your phone, you know, or whatever. Those are extreme examples, but you know what I'm saying? And he's grieving just as hard as I am. It just looks different. But being able to respect that, to recognize it for what it is and which is a grief and respect the differences is so good.

[20:19] Jackie: Yeah. And then over the years, on the anniversary, we always call. The anniversary is the day our son died. We call his homecoming anniversary. That's what we call it. And we always take a trip. So that's something that we've done, too. It was a way that first couple years was, I just didn't want to be home. Right. I just didn't want to be around. And now it's come, we're happy. We're on year seven, and now it's like, okay, we're going on the anniversary trip. So we always took off two weeks in September, and we go someplace fun and new and do something different. And then. And even last year, we were. We went to Sedona, Arizona. That was fun for a few days with our, my daughter, Sebastian's sister, and my husband. And we cried for, like, about an hour, talking about how our grief has been for this last year and or this past, how it's changed, how it's morphed. And then we went hiking and laughed and told. We can tell the stories more fun about Sebastian now because over the years it was so hard to see who he was outside of what he did, you know, and forget because people like, oh, he, you know, oh, your son committed suicide, but he was more than.

[21:33] Jan: Because that defined him. Yeah.

[21:36] Jackie: Yeah. Does not define him. Right. Yeah.

[21:39] Angie: That's just the last thing he did. I mean it.

[21:41] Jackie: Right? Yeah.

[21:42] Angie: Even say much about who he is.

[21:44] Jackie: Right? Yeah. Yeah. And so I always like to. Because people are always. When you, I always call it lobbing the hand grenade because people will say, so how many children do you have? And then you're like, how do you answer that? Yeah, how do you answer that? You know, and it's, I wrote a whole essay on it in all these different ways that you can, you know, answer that. And most of the time we try to avoid even, you know, answering that by deflecting. We got really good at changing the subject really fast or talking about someone getting married and, you know, and avoid that because it does get awkward. And now, and, or now my husband in law will be in a room where like, oh, these people don't know, you know, and then we just kind of, then we have our game plan in place about, you know, what do we say or how do we say it? You know, but it's gotten easier over the years. Now we just say it. But those first three or four years, it is awful to.

[22:40] Jan: You.

[22:40] Jackie: Just hated going anywhere because.

[22:43] Angie: Well, yeah, and I mean, it's not just that I have one living and one not living. Right. It's way more complicated than that.

[22:51] Jackie: And they want to know what happened.

[22:52] Angie: Exactly. What do you say? What do you not say? I'm not going to tell you this about myself and. Yeah. Very, very complicated.

[23:02] Jackie: Yeah, it is. And that's what I notice about suicidal grief. Well, it's complex and it's, it's not your, I mean, all grief is complex, but there is something unique about suicide. And even still in our culture, even though it's like one out of every eleven young people die a day from suicide, I think it's more one like eleven. Yeah. One in eleven. Yeah. A die a day of suicide that there's still the stigma about it even in the church, you know, still, even though I would say most churches don't believe that the catholic church denounced it. Used to be, you know, you'd have a separate burial place. They couldn't be buried in the. But even.

[23:45] Jan: What would you, what would you say to someone who was in newly, in this situation, what. What could you say to them?

[23:55] Jackie: The tendency is to isolate and which is, I think you need a period of isolation, but you also need to be taken care of. I think we talked about the Elijah when he was out in the desert and God cared for him and fed him. I learned to say, when people asked if they could do something, I learned, yes. It allowed people to care for me because I'm pretty independent person. I think most women are, you know, we can do it, right? But I found I couldn't do it. And my husband was like, if people say, can they bring a meal? You say yes. Okay. You know. Cause you just don't want to bother people, right? And you're in your. In your grief. We're still caregivers, but I just learned to say yes a lot and just allow people to care for me, you.

[24:44] Angie: Know, and for those of us who are on the outside. Right. Of the grief. But we want to care for you some. Sometimes it's more helpful to say, I'm going to bring you dinner this week. Which night is best, because that's an easier decision to make. It's an easier. Yes, maybe, right?

[25:01] Jackie: Because you don't know, you can't think about. I don't know, because a lot of that is. I said no, what a good night. I don't know. I didn't know exactly. So I'll bring a meal and if I really appreciate it. When someone said, I'm going to drop by a meal on Wednesday, I was like, thank you, you know, or, you know, can. I wanted someone. Oh, it was so funny. I wanted on Facebook, I ordered, it was recover, taking an old tv stand and making it into a hutch. And I just remember thinking, I need someone to pick that up. And then all of a sudden someone went and picked it up and brought it and, you know, but I just let that need know. But it was just little things like that, you know, that, because life was still going on, right? And I. But it was really. It was so great the way people just cared for us and, you know, and just did things and thought for me. I needed someone to think for me. Save people to think.

[25:56] Angie: Yeah. And to do that, to be able to think for me with you around you, I have to get in close to you, right? I can't, like, stay on your doorstep. I put my planet in alignment with your planet, which is a greek planet, and I gotta come in.

[26:12] Jackie: Yeah.

[26:12] Angie: If I can help you, I have.

[26:14] Jackie: To come in, right? Yeah. And that was, like, with my. My friend who lost her husband and son in a tragic accident. And I said, I think it was just like, five months after Sebastian died. So I'm still. And all we did was, you know, I'm like, okay, I'll come over. I didn't feel like I could contribute anything, but. But that we had the shared trauma, you know, of losing, you know, I hadn't lost my husband, but, you know, just losing, you know, a son and just recently, and we would just cry together, just allowing me to cry in a safe place and not worrying about. We always. Whenever we cry, don't we always say, sorry? Sorry, sir. But just, you know, I would tell people, I'm in a season of crying. I'm going to cry, so just know that. I used to tell people that all the time. I'm just going to cry. Cried at church, cried everywhere.

[27:03] Angie: You know, I started crying about the time I started walking along with these really broken, grieving women. I started crying all the time, and I have not stopped. So, I mean, I cry in church every Sunday. I never used to cry, but there's just a tenderness that has come up in me, I guess, that won't leave my husband.

[27:22] Jackie: Same thing. He cries every Sunday at church. Every Sunday for the last seven years. Yep. There's a tenderness there I'd not seen. He's always a sensitive guy, but even. Yeah, yeah.

[27:35] Angie: I just got to say, Jackie, I love hearing you talk to him.

[27:38] Jackie: And he is lord of all and lord over everything, even our darkest know, and we have to let him into those dark places.