I was watching Eat Pray Love and remembered a tragic story. I was early in attending AA meetings at the time. I was sitting in a low stone wall outside a meeting house when I noticed a shadow of a man sitting alone. I walked over to him and sat down. His name was John. He told me about the constant nightmares he was having every night for the past several months.

In the nightmare he described driving out of his driveway as his wife (he had no memory of being married) was running after him screaming. That is where the dream ends. He described this through tears and sorrow. He felt that something had happened in his past that he could not remember. We talked a bit more before the meeting started. Afterward he quietly left, driving away in an old faded Volvo.

I saw John only one time more. He arrived just before the meeting started. John asked if I would skip the meeting to talk with him. John appeared tormented, tears rolled down his cheeks as he spoke with halts and starts. His voice broke with every word. John stated with a very low voice that he remembered what the dream was about. What he told me broke my heart. I put my are around him and felt my own tears fall. John told me that he was drunk when he got into an argument with his wife and then stormed out of his house.

He jumped into his car and backed out of the driveway spinning the tires on the gravel. He stopped to catch his breath before telling me that his daughter was riding her tricycle in the driveway. John howled and sobbed uncontrollably. I had no words. My mind was numb thinking of my own daughters. John and I sat for a while as the meeting went on inside. John said he needed to leave and take care of things. He promised to be at the next meeting.

Looking back, I wished I had the skills I do now to understand and talk about sorrow and loss, about regret and the pain that invades one’s soul. John wasn’t at the next meeting nor at then next three. I didn’t even know his last name to find out what happened. It wasn’t until a while later that I found he had ended his life soon after we spoke. This lives with me so very deeply in my soul.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-TALK(8255)

“Lifeline assists people in immediate crisis with a skilled, trained crisis worker who will listen to the problems they are experiencing and will connect them to local mental health services. All calls are confidential and free.”