With the exception of my parents, there is one person who has had tremendous influence on my life, more so than anyone may ever have again. That person is my dear friend Matt.

He and I met in High School, members of the debate teams for different high schools. I was a year older than him, so when I left for college in August, he was just getting ready for his senior year of high school.

I will never forget that my first break from school was October 1-5, 1997. I thought about calling him several times that long weekend, but I was so busy with laundry, family, shopping, that I never did. I rationalized that I would be seeing him the following weekend at a debate tournament anyway, so I spent the time I did have with other friends who were also home from their respective schools, and whom I wouldn’t see again until much later.

I returned to campus on Sunday, October 5, never even having called. On Tuesday, October 7, 1997, he committed suicide by jumping from the Bear Mountain Bridge in Peekskill.

I’m sure I don’t need to tell you how horrible that was. Suicide almost always leaves survivors guilt, and I certainly had plenty. I wasn’t able to gather with the other people who could have shared my loss, because I was away at school (during midterms, no less). My “friends” at school had only known me a few short weeks, and didn’t know Matt at all. None of us knew how to handle a loss like this.

Matt’s body wasn’t found for weeks. When a friend suggested in the interim that Matt could have staged the whole thing and run away instead, I took it as gospel. After all, Matt was a smart kid, and no one actually saw him hit the water.

When I went home for his memorial service, his body had still not been found. They had given up hope of ever finding it and scheduled the service. I almost felt a bit silly going to a funeral for someone I was so convinced was really still alive. I even wrote him letters with directions to my dorm room and phone number, which I sealed in plastic and threw into the river for him to find. After all, if he was hiding somewhere he would need help and call eventually, right? The service itself, while moving and beautiful, was also utterly unfamiliar. It wasn’t at a church or funeral home, or even a cemetery. It was at his high school. And there was no minister or funeral director or script. People just took turns getting up and talking, and it lasted more than 2 hours, if I remember correctly. I know it was long enough that some people left. Instead of a casket, there were pictures. I wasn’t really sure what I was supposed to be experiencing.

I found out that night he had been found, just before driving back to school. I spent that time in the car trying to convince myself that he really was dead. That he really hadn’t staged it, that what I had been through was really a funeral. It didn’t really work.

Long story short, I never realized that my grieving process was abnormal. Not ever having suffered such a serious loss, and being so young, I didn’t know that what I was going through, and the way I was reacting were atypical.

Finally, after almost 3 years, I decided I had “gotten over” it. And of course, by “getting over it”, I meant that I had resigned myself to the fact that I would always feel responsible for his death, and always be in horrible pain. When he wrote in his letters that we would all be ok eventually, I know there’s a part of me that stayed miserable just to spite him. I resigned myself to the fact that I would be that way for the rest of my life.