October used to be my favourite month of the year (tied to the end of September). The weather is usually drier. The sun, low in the sky, still delivers warmth to the face. The bugs have all but disappeared thanks to the cool night-time temperatures, and the days still have some warmth to offer. It’s perfect for whatever you like to do outdoors: gardening, bike riding, long walks, forays into photography, etc.
Brilliant leaves carpet the forest floor, rustling quietly in the early autumn breezes. Animals, both wild and domestic, sense the season that will follow and are busy preparing to hunker down, stashing nuts and other food supplies and, in the case of Harley and Lucy, making sure their beds are clean, fluffed and warm!
Since 2023, though, October has become my most dreaded month of the year.
After his 50th birthday celebration, held at his home in North Vancouver in mid-September, something happened to push my son, David, over the edge. I’ll never know exactly what it was, but I have chosen to stop trying to understand the ‘why’ and instead remember the many good times over those 50 years.
On October 9th, David’s wife, Linnea, called me to say that they’d had a disagreement and he’d left home angry. She hadn’t been able to reach him at all. I got on the phone and tried calling and texting him repeatedly to no avail. After several hours I suggested that she call the police and report him as a missing person. She was reluctant at first, but did, eventually, speak to them.
Meanwhile, a colleague and friend of his had also tried, and failed, to reach him. She contacted the RCMP after receiving a distressing text from him. and requested a wellness check.
What followed was 12 days of uncertainty. The police were searching. David’s friends and family were searching, his work colleagues (and union members) walked the streets of Vancouver – searching. I called, texted and left messages until his phone mailbox was full. Nothing. #StephenAmell (star of the TV series Arrow, among other things) made a video appeal to David begging him to contact his family and to come home. He also included a touching message that spoke to anyone having mental health issues to seek help. I will be forever grateful for that. The video was picked up my major media nation-wide.
Through the (for once a good thing) miracle of social media, I asked my friends, friends of friends, and even complete strangers that, if they knew anyone in Vancouver, to ask them to join the search. In one of my several conversations with the RCMP, one officer asked if I thought David might be driving home across Canada. I told her that, although I’d like nothing better than to see his shit-box of a 21-year-old VW pull into the yard, I seriously doubted it.
11 days of painful uncertainty later, the RCMP called to say that David’s car had been found. The officer informed me that the next day (a Saturday) they would undertake a grid search. My heart plummeted as I realized that probably meant only one thing – they were searching for remains. She assured me I’d be notified of their findings the next day.
I waited all day Saturday, cell phone in hand, for any news. By early evening, I’d heard nothing so I went to bed to read and try to take my mind off the hamster wheel of thoughts. I turned off my social media, but kept my cell phone on and close by – just in case.
After a while, the phone rang. I pounced. It was a call from my brother, Jerry. I was about to say I needed to keep the line open when he tearfully asked if I was ok. I said that ok was not even in my vocabulary that night and he replied, “So, that Facebook post isn’t true?”
I said, “WHAT Facebook post”?
I grabbed my iPad and opened up my Facebook app. There it was – an official #RCMP announcement that the “Missing North Vancouver man has been found, deceased.”
I don’t remember saying goodbye to Jerry or hanging up the phone as I collapsed onto the bedroom floor, wailing. I could barely speak as I tried to tell Joel what had happened. Then, I got on to the phone to call the North Vancouver RCMP. The officer I’d spoken to on Friday was off duty and it took a while to find someone who knew what I was talking about!
I was raging mad! How dare they let me, David’s mother, find out that he was dead on Facebook?
I asked if they had at least had the decency to inform his wife and children in person and she assured me an outreach officer had gone to the house.
Then I asked if anyone had informed his Dad? They said they had no contact information for him – even though he and his wife live in the Vancouver area. I called bullshit on that and hung up.
I had the awful task of notifying first Ian and Elizabeth (David’s father and his wife), and then Dan and Joanne (David’s stepfather and his wife). Those were the worst calls I’ve ever had to make.
For the next several days and weeks, I stumbled through the hours in a mental fog. I didn’t know what to do with myself or anyone else as I kept digging for more and more information about the last days and hours of David’s life. I will be forever grateful to David’s friend, B, who allowed me to talk to her and others. Knowledge does provide some comfort though not enough – ever.
Now, three years later, I am still grieving deeply. Months of therapy and participating in a grief recovery program have helped – but the pain is still raw. I am actually grateful that David’s grandparents were all gone before this happened. It would have killed them.
So many wonderful people reached out to offer comfort and support: family members, friends and even virtual strangers have offered kindness to us all and especially David’s father and his wife, Aunt and Uncle, in Vancouver, stepfather and his wife, and Joel and me. The turnout at the Celebration of Life we held here, in Sussex, was wonderful and I’ll be forever grateful to everyone who contributed, helped with the organizing, or made the trip to attend.
My friend, Alison, videoed a lot of it so I could share it with David’s family back in Vancouver. Apparently they didn’t approve. I haven’t heard from either of my grandchildren since – and that has added to my sorrow. I know that David would never have wanted there to be a rift. But, it’s out of my hands and life is going on for all of us. I hear via David’s dad that Isla is in her first year of a science program at Capillano College and that Mattias is pursuing his interest in mechanics in Vernon. I wish them both well in life.
Now to head out and enjoy a warm, sunny, leaf-filled October morning – a connection with nature that always helps to ground and comfort me.
