No! No! No! 

Her suicide was no one’s fault but her own. Do not let anyone tell you differently. A therapist who tries to tell you that it was your fault is wrong. 

Suicide is tragic and horrible but one cannot blame the survivors. Her death was only your fault if it was murder. And you know it was not murder. 

You might want to wait until you are with a therapist to read the letter.  You know there is not going to be anything good in there.  Maybe have her/him read it first and take their sugggestion as to whether it would be healthy for you to read it right now.

I think you are smart to move on from the marriage.  Even if your husband could manage to forgive himself and forgive you and try to put the marriage back together, there is no way that his son will give him a moment of peace.  He simply does not have the option to be with you at this point.  All of us have the fear that our skids will do something that destroys our marriages.  One of yours sadly showed that they were willing to take the ultimate step to lash out at their parent and hurt them for the rest of their life.  The marriage was an inevitable casualty, planned or not.  Given that the son bluntly stated his intent to punish his father, you, and destroy the marriage, his father would be forever fearful that he would take the same action as his sister if he stayed married to you.  What happened was not your fault regardless of what anyone, including your own family (inexplicably) says.  But leaving with what belongs to you as quickly as possible is probably the kindest thing you can do.

I think I read that you are a nurse?  That should give you a major opportunity to move far away and start over with your daughters.  I hope that will eventually bring you the happiness and peace to put this behind you.  You have every right to do that without ghosts following behind.

Take as long as you need to read the letter or don't read it at all. I doubt it is anything but hateful. You or DH are not to blame for SD's crime. She was still a child, yes, but 16 is old enough to know what she was doing. Shame on your husband for feeding into you two both having a part of blame in SD's choice and shame on your "friends" and family for exiling you from their lives.

I just read your last blog and maybe she just wanted to scare everyone and meant to be found before it was too late? Either way, you don't need SS in your life and it seems like your husband is coping by blaming you and himself. Not healthy for anyone involved. I hope you and your girls are benefitting from therapy.

It's not your fault. I don't even know you and I know that.

I know it's hard, and hearing things is hard too, especially since it's your daughter and you love her. 

Suicide is no one's fault EXCEPT the person that commits it, they failed to reach out, and the reality is, no one else is in their head, even the closest person to them won't see what's going on. There wasn't anything you could have done diffrently, simply becuase you didn't know, because she didn't reach out, you can't see the future, and you can't reach into someone else's thoughts.

The worst thing about suicide is what it leaves behind. Someone that people loved is gone, and they're left wondering all the whys and trying to figure it out and blaming themselves for not "doing something differently." But you aren't the only one that has to take action. The person in pain needs to express that, they have to work with others, reach out, let someone know what's going on in their head and then be willing to struggle and push and work through it all.

I don't know her reasoning, and you probalby don't know the half of it either. But even kids that seem the happiest can be hurting inside, so you couldn't have realized.

My senior year in high school we lost 8 people to suicide and one to a unknown death. It hurt. I was good friends and a co-worker with one of them. None of us knew, she always seemed happy and bubbly, everyone loved her, to this day we have no clue what kind of pain she was struggling through, and it left a lot of people in a confused state, and then enboldened more to do the same. Something all of them had in common was that they really didn't let people know what they were struggliing through or seek help.

So don't let anyone blame you, you're already struggling enough dealing with the loss of YOUR child. In no way shape or form was this your fault. You loved her, you likely would have done anything to prevent it. So don't let anyone throw the blame on you when it's not your fault, and when you have enough grief to already hurt. You don't need to carry that extra burden, it's not yours to carry.

Hang in there. I'm sorry about all the chaos and about things with your DH. But know that the steps you're taking to keep your daughters safe and happy is going to be for the best in the long run. You're strong. You're capable. And most importantly, you're a survivor.

((HUGS))

I'm sorry you are dealing with this all. You were put in a really hard spot, the results are so unfair to everyone. But I agree, this is not your fault, SD was obviously not stable, and I can't help but think it would have happened eventually no matter what. People can't just do what they want and treat people how they want and expect everyone to just take it. That's not how the world works.

I'm sorry this has ended your marriage. I hope you are able to move past it and find happiness. Find new friends, make new family, who won't judge and cast you out. I would love to hear how any of them would have handled things had they been in your exact shoes. It's so easy to judge.

That family seems irreparable so maybe it’s time to move on and focus on taking care of your kids.