Mother Seeks to Spare Others Pain of Suicide

There are plenty of “if onlys” in Lynda Breeze’s life.

If only she hadn’t joked about her son’s growing goatee. If only she had been able to stem her son’s drug use. If only she had been better at talking to him about his pain.

Yet she knows there’s no changing what happened to her only child less than two years ago. Jake, a 20-year-old Simi Valley High School graduate, placed a .38-caliber handgun to his head and ended his life.

While she mourns that he will never write another haiku, place the star atop the Christmas tree, or collect driftwood and shells from the beach to make gifts, she knows that she can help prevent other young adults from taking Jake’s path.

The petite mother with fiery, short-cropped red hair visits any school that invites her to talk about topics such as drugs and suicide, using her son’s painful experience as an example.

After talking with students at Simi Valley’s Santa Susana High School on Monday during the Red Ribbon Week for drug awareness, Breeze sat at the curbside in front of the school.

“The drugs changed him so much--there’s no magic that fixes that despite counseling,” Breeze said, her eyes watering. “Believe me, we tried everything we could think of.”

During high school, Jake began smoking marijuana. Later, a friend talked him into taking acid.

Breeze said Jake was dealing with a number of issues. His fear that his mother, who was hospitalized with esophageal problems, would die. His anxiety about life outside of high school. His inability to stop using drugs. And his fear of losing all his friends.

Before Jake committed suicide, he left his parents a handwritten note.

“Everyday I wish that I could go back to that night and throw that last acid hit down the toilet!” said one excerpt from Jake’s letter, written all in capital letters. “I killed my soul with drugs two years ago. I’ve become a shell of what I once was.”

It’s the letter Breeze has shared during four appearances she has made at Simi Valley’s Apollo continuation high school to discuss suicide and drugs.

What she wants parents to realize is that they should take their children seriously when they say they are in pain or ready to hurt themselves.

And she wants children and young adults to know that no matter how bleak the future looks, talking to someone to let out your frustrations can help.

“Talk to me,” Breeze said. “Talk to someone. That ability to commit suicide is not long-lasting. You can reach a point in depression where everything becomes so overwhelmingly black that there’s a gap. And the need for self-preservation is gone. But it doesn’t last long.

“If someone is with you, it will pass quickly.”