I don’t know what happened except that his mother helped with with an assignment till fairly late at night and when she got up early in the morning he was dead.
I am trying to make sense of the senseless at the moment. He has struggled with drugs, addiction and mental health issues, and he lost his father recently. He had seemed lately to be really stressed about getting all the work done but he was finished. He made it. His final essay, which his mother sent to me right after she found him, talks about how proud he was of himself for getting done, being clean, and the joy he felt because he was going to graduate and how he was sure it would have made his dad proud. He turned 18 a week ago and was supposed to have graduated Sunday.
So sad. I went to a similar funeral last winter. A little older, had struggled with issues, but was doing better. For him, it was prescription drugs (HIS prescription) and Nyquil.
I’m so sorry, furlibusea. When I was teaching we lost two students, a year apart. The first was a boy who committed suicide. No one saw it coming, and he’d even called a girl he liked to say goodbye. She thought he must have been moving away. The second was a very popular boy who accidentally overdosed on narcotics he and his best friend had stolen. The pain will just take your breath away, even if you weren’t very close to the students.
Is this striking anyone else as odd? If I ever find my son dead, the last thing on my mind is going to be making sure his outstanding assignments are handed in.
Am I missing something?
People do really weird stuff when someone close to them dies. It’s definitely strange to an outsider, but perfectly within the range of normalcy for people to react to the shock of death with thoughts like “this paper was so important, I have to make sure his paper gets in on time! What will his teacher think of him if his paper doesn’t get turned in?”
I took that to mean in a day or two, since that’s what he was doing right before he died and the mom wanted to share it with the teacher. I know when my sister died, and when my parents died, I wondered what hey were doing and thinking near the end. If any of them had been writing a letter or something like that, I would have wanted to share it with the person and talk.
If, however, it was immediately after she found her son, I would think it odd.
Furlibusea, I am sorry. It’s always puzzling and sad to lose a student. One of my students died the week after school was out couple of years ago in a freak accident. He was a sweet kid too.
I think she must have just hit submit. The goal of him graduating had become an extremely important family goal to honor his father. I think it was odd too, but I can just imagine enough of what she was going through to be my worst nightmare.
I read it as his mother feeling the need to complete a task for him because he would have wanted to turn it in on time. When a person is in shock, moving through regular actions can help. She was helping her son, which she saw as part of her job as mother.
furlibusea, my condolences to you. A friend of mine also lost a student suddenly to an accident at home in this, his first year of teaching. It’s just terrible.
Since it was so important, I hope there is something the school can do to show the mother that he did graduate. Like a special certificate or something, if he can’t have a real one? Just so she can have that forever, and know that he really did make it there.
I’m very sorry, furlibusea. It’s so sad. I hope you find out a little more, just for your own peace of mind. I’ve lost old friends and acquaintances and never known what happened, and it’s a restless feeling not to know.
Wow. I feel bad for you, and I feel really, really bad for his mother.
You say he lost his father recently. Were his mom and dad still together? If so, it means the mom lost both her son and her husband. Even losing an ex can be hard.
I was at the graduation on Sunday and the school gave his sister his diploma. The assignment his mother sent was literally the last thing he needed to do. He had turned 18 about 4 days before he died. His parents were still together, and yes, she lost husband and son within three months of each other.
I don’t know what the cause was. I may not ever know.
