I remember that moment clearly. I was sitting in the rocking chair in the tiny living room of the first home I owned with my ex-husband, I was five months pregnant with my first daughter, and I was in complete and utter despair. I was rocking back and forth, unable to imagine how I would get through that day, let alone the next one and the one after that.

My mom, who had come in from the farm to be with me, was trying to get me to eat, but I didn’t see the point. Why eat to survive a day that pointed toward such a bleak future?

My husband had just attempted suicide. At that moment, he lay in a hospital bed recuperating from the multiple surgeries they had to do to stitch him up. I’d come home briefly for a change of clothes and then was on my way back to the hospital. I couldn’t help but wonder, though… was there any point to the surgeries if he really didn’t want to live? Read more...