Author, A. J. Llewellyn

 

I am thrilled to announce that Laid 3 is out today at the fantastic Stiff Rain Press – and that the totally fun story I concocted with the late, great John Bruno. http://www.stiffrainpress.com/m8/36-978-1-62344-037-4–laid-3-by-aj-llewellyn.html

I’ve been thinking about my friend a lot the last few days, ever since the passing of actor Robin Williams. Both were remarkable men who took their own lives, devastating all those who knew and love them.

John was in pain for a very long time and tried to take his own life several times before succeeding, unfortunately, on January 14, last year.

I still miss the dry, observant, witty, self-effacing man who had such huge dreams and amazing talent, but met constant obstacles that he could no longer overcome.

Depression is a serious illness that robs the people suffering from it of all their senses. Looking back, there are many signs we all could have seen…and did, BUT John was a man who was in counseling and had actually gone to see his therapist on the Saturday before he died. In fact, that night, he checked himself into a motel and took a drug overdose as he had before, but survived.

He returned to his parents’ Michigan home Sunday morning, confessed his suicide attempt, then slept for a full day.

On Monday evening, he crept out of his bedroom window and shot himself in the head.

According to all the reports I’ve read, Mr. Williams too, had been in an AA meeting on Saturday, but took his life two days later.

When someone is determined, they will find a way to silence the dark storms in their minds. John left behind three suicide notes, which I have copies of.  They kept me awake for days, just reading them. Two of them had been written months before – when he’d made earlier attempts. He kept scratching out the dates and putting in new ones. There was a certain macabre humor to these updated notes that were pure John.

The final note however was current and simply devastating. He wrote, in part, “If you want to know why, it’s because I am mentally ill.” He wrote many things, but his handwriting deteriorated at this point to a mind-blurring scramble.

I believe he might have taken anti-anxiety pills, but they were all doctor-prescribed. Ultimately, he had a gun nobody knew about, and he shot himself right in his poor parents’ backyard.

My hope is that Mr. Williams’ passing opens up a discussion about the insidiousness of this disease – and how there are things we still don’t know and the ravages of it.

These were two men who were both seeking and receiving treatment, but nothing worked. The foghorns of doom kept calling them. When I look back on the last weeks of John’s life, a cheery call in December after months of ignored emails and calls was a relief at the time. It’s not that he was Mr. Happy, but he seemed comfortable and focused. We made plans to meet in January here in LA. It turns out his close friends ALL got the same call.

We realized at his funeral that he had in fact no intention of coming here.

He’d called us all to say good-bye.

They say people who’ve made the decision to end their lives act happy toward the end. That wasn’t true of John. He seemed calm, but hardly bubbly.

In fact his last scrawled message on his suicide note said, “I’m scared to die.”

And yet, he wanted it all to end.

I have stopped looking at the notes because they tear at my heart. It is still sore from the loss of my friend and a true, madcap genius who had amazing ideas and a wonderful, warped sense of the ridiculous.

I will miss you forever John, but I have Jack and Lucky, our naughty, naughty creations with which to remember you by.

With a heart full of love an enduring sadness…I miss you.

 

A.J. xxx