Seventy-Eight Thank Yous
James Pretlove
Astonished when my cheerful and dynamic mother died by suicide in 2018, I felt a numbed anguish. When the thank yous started dropping in, everything began to change. In time I came to respect her decision, realising the many gifts there were not only in Mum’s life but in her death too. With both depth and lightness, this piece joins new conversations arising about suicide and has been appreciated all over the UK from St Stephen Walbrook in the City of London, birthplace of the Samaritans, via the Oxford Storytelling Festival, to the Universal Hall in Findhorn.