Brittany had always been a very happy, smiling, humorous child.  Then in 2003, a lot of things happened which I believe led to her eventual suicide. 

Brittany lost her dad to cancer in May of 2003 and she never grieved his death.  I was not included in his funeral service, so Brittany wasn’t able to have me there by her side.  After, I tried to get her to talk about his death and she just told me that she was fine.  Brittany acted like any other teenager so I assumed she was fine.

Then in July of 2003, my relationship ended. Brittany and I moved to Lake Fenton to start our lives over. Brittany said she was o.k. with the move as long as she could keep in touch with her friends.  That wasn’t a problem she had friends visit and talked with them on the phone.

In September, she started 7^th grade at Torrey-Hill Middle School.  She made friends on the very first day of school!!!  I knew she would because Brittany always had a lot of friends.  She soon became a very popular girl.  The phone would ring constantly and all the calls were for her.  In addition, her cell phone constantly rang.  My girl conquered a new school like a champion!!

In November, I began to notice a change in Brittany’s mood.  She began to get very quiet.  When she did talk, it was always in a very sarcastic tone.  I would ask what was wrong and she just told me nothing and if I pushed she told me to leave her alone.  Brittany spent a lot of time in her room and trying to get her to come out was like pulling teeth.  Then I started getting calls from school.  Brittany was not turning in assignments, was disrespectful to teachers and the administrators.  She began getting detentions for being late to class, talking all the time, and for disrespect.  When she got in trouble at school, she was also grounded at home

The school administrators and I worked together as a team and tried to help Brittany and to motivate her.  I stopped grounding her because when she was grounded, so was I and it wasn’t getting us anywhere.  She seemed to be slightly improving around Christmas and we decided that a new year would be different for us both.  Once school started back in January, all hell broke loose.  Brittany was stealing my cigarettes and smoking.  Her grades hit bottom, she was failing almost every class.  I received her mid-term progress reports and saw the grades and lost it!!!  I had the papers in my hand and I hit her with them.  Brittany then punched me in the mouth.  I punched her arm and told her to knock the shit off and go to her room.  We were both crying!!!  I had never ever hit her (or my other daughter) before and I can’t believe we had a fist fight.  This was out of control.  I have always believed that hitting your child is a result of out of control anger and I was out of control with anger and just proved my own theory correct!!

I called a therapist the next day.  I told her our lives were out of control and I need help.  Brittany and I both loved her therapist.  She saved our family!!!  While Brittany was not diagnosed with Depression, she was headed that way and we all thought we caught her in time.  She was more or less just a normal teen who had a lot of crap to deal with in a very short period of time.  The therapist recommended an anti-depressant and I agreed because we needed something.  Brittany started taking 10 mg of Prozac daily.  Within one month of taking the Prozac, I had my daughter back. The pissy attitude child was gone.  I had a child who wanted to spend time with me, to talk with me, and I wanted to do the same.  We learned how to handle choices and the consequences that came with our choices. Sometimes it still took Brittany a while to talk about things that were bothering her but she eventually did.  She came to me and told me that she had tried smoking pot and to her surprise, I didn’t fly off the handle.  I was impressed that she trusted me and I told her that it is not something she should be doing.  We discussed peer pressure and how sometimes it’s very hard to be the bigger person and just say no, I don’t want to.

By April, everyone was commenting on Brittany and what a change there was in her.  She was happy, smiling, laughing, her grades improving and she was again, a pleasure to be around.  Brittany had regained all of her privileges because she earned them!!!  I knew before I couldn’t handle her and I got help and it worked!! Or so I thought.  At the end of March, 2004, the psychiatrist increased her dosage to 10 mg one day and the next day, 20 mg.  Did the increase in Prozac help or hurt my baby girl??

The last normal day was two teenage girls driving me crazy with giggling, walks to McDonalds, scary movies, trashing a living room and bedroom, comments like “Oh Mom....please and the pouty faces when I had to say no.  I took Brittany’s friend home around supper time and we stopped quick at store to look for sandals.  Summer was coming and Brittany needed sandals.  We didn’t find any but decided to go to the mall on Sunday and then have roast beef for Sunday dinner.  All was great!!!

I had a date that night with my ex-boyfriend Russell and when I got home with Brittany, she told me to start getting ready.  She got on the telephone and then on the computer, instant messenging her friends.  I noticed she was upset and when I asked her what was wrong, she told me nothing and not to worry.  I asked if she wanted to talk and she said no, she was fine.  In therapy, I learned to give her space to think about what was bothering her and then to approach her again to see if she was ready to talk.  I asked again and she said, “it’s no big deal mom, I’m fine”.  I joked with her and said I wanted smiley Brittany back and she laughed.  She helped pick out my clothes for my date.  Now if this were the old Brittany, she would have retreated to her room but she didn’t, she stayed in the living room.  I never thought she wouldn’t get through whatever upset her.

After being gone for 3 ½ hours that Saturday night, Russell and I returned to my apartment to find every light on, the t.v. on,  the remote control for the t.v. in pieces, pictures on the floor and my dogs running around in a frenzy panicked state, especially Buster...Brittany's favorite and her little buddy.  My ex-boyfriend tried to calm the dogs down while I went to look for Brittany and I opened her bedroom door to find her hanging from the sprinkler head in her bedroom.  I let out a blood curdling scream and began to try to get her down.  Russell came in and screamed and we both struggled to finally release her from the noose made from the dog’s (Frankie's) leash.  I yelled at Russell to start CPR while I called 911.  I knew in my heart she was gone but we had to try!!!!  I picked up the telephone and it wouldn’t dial out and I couldn’t understand why I had no dial tone.  I found my cell phone and called 911 and got out about half the words when Russell came down the hall just shaking his head no.  I dropped the phone, screamed a hysterical "NO",  and ran to hold my girl and ask her what happened after I left????  I held my baby in my arms and rocked her like I did so many times before.  I asked why didn’t she call me, mommy was just 5 minutes away, I wanted to know what was so bad that she had to leave her mommy.  We worked through so much and became friends again, why baby girl, why, why, why???  I then looked to the sprinkler head and wondered why the damn thing didn't break or weaken due to the 100 lbs. hanging from it..........,why it couldn't save my girl!!!