Description
Maxine is the mother and John, the 20-year of brother of Neil, an 18-year old who took his own life by hanging. Maxine lives with her husband and they have an elder daughter who is married with one child and lives fairly close by. John lives close by with his partner and they have a six-month baby girl. Maxine and John were interviewed some eight months after Neil’s death. Neil was a very intelligent, talented young man who taught himself to play the keyboard and the clarinet. He was very keen on acting and had appeared in soaps and in TV advertisements. He had been accepted by a college of music. His death was totally unexpected. Maxine (and indeed the whole family) are very angry with the police who kept them in the kitchen for four hours while they searched through the house and were escorted if they went to the toilet. They declined to allow anyone to be with or see the body nor allowed anyone to accompany Neil’s body to the mortuary. All this apparently, without any explanation given at the time. Maxine is also angry with the Coroner’s Officer and says that when he got to the house, he complained he should have been called first.
It was four days before they were able to see Neil’ body, and then only through glass. It was a week from the time of death, before the body was removed to a funeral chapel when they could visit as often as they wished. Subsequent explanations have done little to lessen the bitterness. Maxine feels that her life is shattered and that only her two remaining children and two new grandchildren are keeping her in this world. She carries a great deal of guilt and feels that she has no right to be working with children as an assistant at the near-by school. She likes to spend a lot of time in bed, not to sleep but it is only in bed that she feels safe.
Part of the series The Suicide of Young People and its Impact on the Family.
