The Grief I Inherited: Losing Mum to Suicide with Natalie Sutherland

Natalie was just two years old when her mum, Elaine, died by suicide at only 26. She grew up without memories of her mum and, perhaps even harder, without anyone really talking about her. Natalie learned very young that her mum was a subject best avoided. She didn’t even discover how she had died until she was 13. In this incredibly open conversation, Natalie talks to Rosie about what that silence did to her. The anger. The risk-taking. The desperate need to understand where she came from. The years spent searching for someone to blame, including her mum, her dad and eventually herself. Becoming a mother brought much of that buried grief crashing back to the surface. When her own children reached the age she had been when Elaine died, Natalie became terrified that history might somehow repeat itself. Years later, during an extraordinarily dark period in her own life, Natalie attempted to take her own life. Surviving changed something. For the first time, she began to understand how her mum might have reached a place where dying felt like the only option. And with that understanding came forgiveness, not just for Elaine, but eventually for herself. Rosie and Natalie talk candidly about maternal suicide, addiction, shame, motherhood, inherited trauma and the complicated reality of loving someone who died by suicide. They also explore the enormous pressure placed on those left behind to spot the “signs”, the fear many parents have about asking for help when they are struggling, and what happens when the support people desperately need simply isn’t there. They also talk about children. When do you tell a child that their parent died by suicide? What words do you use? How do you give them the truth without making that truth something frightening or shameful? Natalie was raised in silence. She has chosen to raise her own children very differently. And after growing up feeling as though her mum had almost been erased, she made herself a promise: people would know her name. Her name was Elaine. This is a raw, funny, painful and deeply important conversation about what suicide leaves behind, how grief can echo through generations, and what can happen when we finally start talking about the things families have been too frightened to say out loud. TikTok: @therantingmaInstagram: @natalie_rantingma Support CALM Widowed AF is currently fundraising for CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably) and its work to prevent suicide and support those affected by it. Rosie’s JustGiving page:https://www.justgiving.com/page/rosie-moss-1 Find out more about CALM and access support:https://www.thecalmzone.net/ Content warning: This episode contains detailed discussion of suicide, suicidal thoughts and a suicide attempt, as well as alcohol misuse and difficult childhood experiences. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 999 or go to your nearest A&E.