My husband bought this truck last week from a man who is stuck. He is in his late 40s and within five minutes of meeting him, he was telling us about his son’s suicide four years ago. His son, an attractive, young businessman, took a drug to help him quit smoking. The drug had serious side effects: sleeplessness, paranoia and hallucinations. Friends and family tried to get him to stop taking the drug, but he believed he could tough it out. Then one morning he hung himself.
While we stood by the truck, the man told us this story. They talked about the truck a few minutes and then my husband took a test drive. While he did, the man told me the story of his son’s death again.
In the office closing the deal, the man talked for almost a half hour about his son’s death. His young coworker, who said this man and his younger son, who now owns the business, are like family to him, sat by. I wondered how many hours of every day he hears this story.
Four days later, this man and his young worker delivered the truck. When he arrived, he began telling my husband about his son who committed suicide as if he had not mentioned it before. He said that his younger son doesn’t talk about it and the coworker agreed as if they had never had that discussion before. It was like dropping into a time warp, an alternative universe.
These two work together six days a week, sometimes seven. And yet it doesn’t distract, doesn’t give him a way forward. It’s hard to imagine what could help.
I’ve met other people like this, who went down into a trauma and never re-emerged. It’s frightening and can make you feel helpless. The person is not in a process from grief to healing. There is no healing happening. Life has paused and stayed on pause. Why some people move through a trauma and others don’t is a mystery to me. You just hope you meet the person down the line and he’s telling a different story.