Survivors face unique struggles after losing loved ones to suicide: ‘The pain gets softer’

During Thanksgiving dinner in 2024 — just months after her long-term boyfriend died by suicide — Amanda Killam broke down sobbing, remembering how much he enjoyed the traditional feast and mourning that he wasn’t there to share it.

This year, she cried the night before Thanksgiving, but was able to get a bit of enjoyment over dinner with family and friends. Instead of overwhelmingly painful, it was bittersweet, sharing a good meal and company while still wishing her partner were by her side.

“It doesn’t get easier, but it gets softer. The pain gets softer,” said Killam, of Commerce City.

While grieving a loved one is hard regardless of how they died, people who lost someone to suicide face unique challenges, dealing not only with sadness, but also with anger, feelings of abandonment, the sense of being blamed by others, or guilt that they didn’t know the deceased was suffering.

Professional help and support from people who’ve been through the same thing can help work through those feelings and rebuild a life, survivors said.

Killam’s partner, Rob Nickels, died by suicide at 42. She knew about his history of health problems, including a stroke in his 20s and two kidney transplants, but he never talked about the extent of his mental suffering.

Nickels had texted about his intent to die while Killam was getting ready to fly home from Dallas. She called and attempted to talk him down, then notified friends and family in Denver to call 911 after hearing sounds suggesting he’d begun an attempt. She also called businesses near their apartment in the hope someone could get there fast enough to intervene.

First responders attempted to resuscitate Nickels, but he died shortly before Killam’s plane landed in Denver. In the aftermath, functioning was nearly impossible. Sometimes she’d skip meals because the idea of choosing what to shop for and cook was overwhelming.

“It was hard not to feel like a failure,” she said.

Killam was skeptical of therapy in general, but said she started it shortly after Nickels’ death to work through the sadness, guilt and feeling of abandonment from losing her partner. It helped to have an outside perspective, because her family and friends, while supportive, didn’t know how to challenge her to change thought patterns that weren’t helping her, she said.

Not everyone who is grieving needs professional help, but therapy can help if someone is struggling to manage the stressors of everyday life, can’t sleep or feels consistently isolated or empty, said Mandy Doria, a licensed professional counselor who specializes in traumatic loss at the Stress, Trauma, Adversity Research and Treatment Center on the University of Colorado’s Anschutz Medical Campus.

Any loss can be devastating, but when someone dies by suicide, the survivors may become hypervigilant, for fear that they miss a sign that someone else they love is struggling, she said.

People can’t go back to the way life was before a major loss, so they have to think about what it would mean to rebuild, Doria said. Often, that involves doing something to remember and give meaning to the life the deceased led, such as continuing to make their favorite recipe or volunteering for a cause they cared about, she said.

“When you lose someone to suicide, it can really shake your worldview and understanding of life,” she said. “Resilience is believing that it’s possible to bounce back and committing yourself every day to doing that.”

Angela Rouse, of Thornton, lost her oldest son to suicide when he was 29 and facilitates a support group for survivors, called Heartbeat.

Her son left behind five children, four of whom she and her husband are now raising. They had to process their own grief while helping their grandchildren through the mental health struggles that come from losing a parent early in life.

“It was nonstop therapy for three years,” she said.

Even seven years after the loss, it still can come up in unexpected ways, such as when she saw a friend’s daughter holding her sister’s baby — an experience her oldest son never got to have with his younger brother’s children.

Her youngest grandson has been having a hard time coping with her recent breast cancer diagnosis because of the fear of losing another central figure in his life.

“I’m the only parent, mom figure he’s had,” she said.

People who are grieving also experience the secondary losses of people they thought would be with them through the worst times, who ultimately don’t always come through, Rouse said. And it can be hard to connect with people when your world is reeling, but they seem essentially fine, she said.

“My circle got a lot smaller, that’s for sure,” she said.