Woman focuses on prevention after husband's suicide

At the same time, Wells said hello to a new chapter in her life -- one where she takes on the role of ardent advocate for suicide prevention and someone who offers hope to survivors. Maybe her experience, devastating as it was, will help someone else.

"I was searching for answers. You're always looking to make sense of this after it happens," Wells said.

She may never know all the answers to the complex questions that come up when a loved one dies from suicide. But she has joined forces with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and organized Out of the Darkness, a community walk sponsored by the foundation and designed to help those who are left behind after a family member commits suicide.

The walk is in its third year in other communities across the country, but this is the first year it has been held in Huntington. The walk is set for Saturday, Oct. 6, in Ritter Park. Registration is at 9 a.m., the walk begins at 10 a.m.

There is no entry fee, but the foundation is encouraging walkers to earn $150 in donations, half of which will go to the national foundation and half to the local chapter where Wells hopes to fund suicide prevention programs for Marshall University students.

Already, about 70 people are registered to walk and Wells hopes for even more. After all, she is hardly alone in her struggle as a survivor.

There were 272 suicides in West Virginia in 2005, the most recent year for which statewide numbers are available, according to the state Department of Health and Human Services Bureau of Vital Statistics. Nationally, figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention rank West Virginia 37th out of the United States and District of Columbia with 285 suicides in 2004, the last year national numbers are available. According to the CDC, California ranked first with 3,368 deaths, the District of Columbia was last with 33.

If the figures are based on population, West Virginia's rate skyrockets to eighth place. Figures from the CDC show 15.74 percent of every 100,000 people in West Virginia ended their lives by suicide in 2004.

Bob Musick, executive director of the West Virginia Council for Prevention of Suicide, says whatever the number, it is too high.

"Even one. That would be too many," he said.

The council has joined a national suicide hotline, (800) 273-TALK, now available for West Virginians in crisis. The number is answered all day, every day. In addition, council members frequently travel the state and make presentations about suicide awareness. They hold workshops and support groups for survivors.

Maybe, Musick said, someone will be helped.

Like so many others, Greg Wells struggled for years, not knowing exactly what was wrong with him. There was a family history of depression, but everything else in his life was going well. He was happily married and had two children.

"He would get so sad. He would sit there and cry and say 'Everything in my life is fine. I don't know why I feel this way,'" Rebecca Wells said. "Anyone who thinks suicide is a choice and depression isn't real hasn't lived with someone who has it."

Greg Wells died at 47. The average age of a man who committed suicide in West Virginia in 2005 was 48.9. Depression, overwhelmingly, is the leading cause of suicide in West Virginia and the nation.

Greg Wells tried medications and mixtures of medications. He had 13 electroshock therapy treatments that required general anesthesia and 4 a.m. trips to Charleston.

"He hid it well," his widow said. "He didn't want the people he worked with to know, he didn't want our children to know and that put a lot of extra pressure on him, I think. He begged me not to tell people what was wrong with him. It was not an easy time."

When he died, Wells spent her time searching for answers for help with explaining the death to their 15-year-old twins. One child, she said, doesn't talk much about their father's death. The other one is more open and has appeared with Wells in a television and radio ad campaign about suicide prevention.

"It's very difficult to talk about, but it's just going to keep happening. If you don't talk about it, it's still going to happen," Wells said.

Indeed, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention estimates someone takes their life in the United States every 16 minutes.

Besides organizing the walk, Wells works alongside Musick as a member of the state council.

In the end, Wells knows there was nothing more she could have done for her husband. She supported him, he got good medical care and tried what seemed like every combination of medication and therapy.

"Sometimes I wonder if I couldn't have said something different or done something different, but I know I couldn't have," she said.

What she hopes for now is that people will talk to each other and learn what to do if a loved one is struggling and where to turn for help. More than anything, she wants the stigma for survivors to be gone.

"Until we change the way people view it, it will be difficult. But why should it be any different, any more embarrassing, than a death from cancer or any other cause of death," she said.

For information about Out of the Darkness, visit www.outofthedarkness.org or call (304) 638-8777.