Ashley Walks On - Nov. 2024

During the Thanksgiving holiday, Ashley, my nephew, ended his life.

I knew Ashley through my sister, Mary, his mother. 

Love radiated from her in her stories about him or when I’d hear her talk to Ashley on the phone. She animated his personality through her unconditional love for him. 

Mary was brought to her knees losing Ash. She lost her buddy, her son. But…. she does understand his desperation.

Mary was unable to care for him when he got more and more difficult to handle and she adopted him out when he was nine, seeing no other way.

Later in his life they often had daily contact by phone or texts. She let him try to make sense of his life. So many times she just listened.

 

She did her best to coach him and ask him questions about his ideas. Sometimes he'd blame her for his frustration. Eventually he’d apologize and reassure her, “I love you Mom, I’m trying, I’m doing my best.” 

Knowing their bond was strong and his death would be hard on her, Ashley took the time to write Mary a long letter. He also wrote to his best friend and another to his son, Dakota. (Ashley also had a daughter, Annilee who died as an infant)

Mary’s the one who called to have someone do a safety check on him. She could tell by talking to him, his texts, then silence—something was not right. They lived 450 miles from each other so she didn’t see him often and depended on other ways to check on him.

Ashley tried to end his life other times. He’d be angry and questioned why anyone would stop his death. He didn’t feel they had the right to decide for him. He was continually at risk. He struggled and struggled. 

Ashley spent time in jail, suffered depression, addictions, homelessness, loneliness, unemployment and failed relationships. He tried to cope, stay on his medicine and make a life for himself.

Suicide isn’t easy to understand. I can’t imagine the unbearable amount of pain a person has to go through in order for them to plan this final act. When I hear “She was a coward to do that” or “What a selfish thing to do” or “They're going to hell”, I think… 

“First—-walk in their shoes”.

I don’t judge Ashley. I abhor the word “Committed” in the description of someone who took their own life. I think the crime is not in Ashley giving up, but in medicines and society not able to help him manage his mental disease year after year.  I’m included in this society. Ashley’s mental illness frightened me and I was estranged from him.

He showed a non-judgmental love toward those who directly hurt and used him. He gave the shirt off his back, sometimes literally. Money, possessions, his living space and his time to people. His employers always admired his work ethic and his enthusiasm. He kept up an unrelenting fight to live. It isn’t always the story told when a person takes their life, how hard they worked to survive.

Ashley was a proud Indigenous American. He was a member of the Sault Tribe of Chippewas. Mary was able to seek help for his passing through the the Chippewa Tribal Elders in St. Ignace. She attended a pipe ceremony on loss and hope for the new year. It eased some of her grief with acceptance of Ashley’s death. 

Ashley's cousin, Holden, a member of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewas, recorded a song in Tiergarten Park, Berlin, Germany in Ojibway, (to send to Mary) He drummed and sang a song to protect Ashely. To help the ancestors see him as he 

walked on.

I write about Ashley to say his name. To recognize him as a human being who lived his life as best he could with the skills he had and resources available to him. He was loved and will not be forgotten.

Graffiti I Found In Berlin