Hi, my name is Joanne and I moved to Rancho Bernardo with my 2 "suns" (they are the light of my life so I've always called them SUN) in July 2021. My sun G was rapidly approaching his 18th birthday in Feb 2022 and Jace would be 17 in June 2022.

Anyone who knows me knows my boys were EVERYTHING to me. They never gave me any trouble and I often asked God what I'd done so right in a past life that he gave me such wonderful gifts as them.

AND THEN IT HAPPENED.

On a night like any other Jace was with his Father when my oldest sun and I began getting frantic back to back calls from his Father around 11pm. When I finally woke up enough to answer all I heard was JACE SHOT HIMSELF! I sat up and immediately put my feet on the floor to see if this was real.

It was.

"He must have been playing with my gun" his Father screamed and cried. We packed up and were in the car within 5 minutes when the worst imaginable call came through. JOANNE, HE'S GONE AND HE DID IT ON PURPOSE. I couldn't move, the earth stood still, I truly thought I was paralyzed. My baby boy, my sweet, precious baby boy had taken his life for reasons I still do not know or understand. As he was a donor we had to make a decision to take him off life support. That took me 3 days. I didn't want to let go! WHAT KIND OF MOTHER WOULD LET GO? Since that fateful day my life has been broken in pieces that I can't put back together. As much as I hate to put this out for the world to know and be exposed, there are days even weeks where I don't leave my room. I'm in heavy therapy weekly but I can do that from my phone which doesn't help because I don't have to leave my "DEN OF DEPRESSION" to attend.

I had to leave my job March 1st because of the type of work I do and the stress was too much. How could I continue to sell Less Lethal guns and munitions after what had happened? Since then my home is not my home, I am not myself and my only remaining child has been forced with the task of constantly coming to comfort me as I sob uncontrollably and beg God for my children both living and dead but

YESTERDAY, GOD SHOWED UP. He told me to reach out to my community for help and the response was so IMMEDIATE and beautiful that I'm crying as I write this. I explained my situation briefly in a post and asked for any recommendations for a cleaning service to get my house in order but what I got in return was SO MUCH MORE. Support Group invitations, Offers to cook for us, Requests to just go for a walk with a neighbor, Stories of people who share the same pain and the lost hours on and on.

YESTERDAY GOD SAID, DID YOU THINK I WOULD LET YOU WALK ALONE?

So here I am, doing what my loving and supportive community told me to do. Reaching out for help. If you've made it this far, thank you for reading and if you can do nothing else I only ask that you to send up a prayer for my little family. Thank you all so very very much.