Grieving mum ‘broken’ by son’s apparent suicide
Patrick Hanson-Friend was a bubbly teenager with lots of friends and a loving family. The Invercargill 15-year-old is one of at least four Southlanders whose deaths are suspected suicides since early March, with two of them teens.
A good looking and outgoing boy with a witty sense of humour, Patrick had much to look forward to, but school, as always, was playing on his mind.
A dyslexic, he struggled with school work and dreaded going to classes each day.
‘‘His brain wasn’t wired for school,’’ his mother, Catherine Hanson-Friend said.
‘‘He was a dyslexic and it challenged him every day of his school life.’’
She had dropped Patrick and his sister at an Otatara bus stop on the morning of April 7, but rather than catch the bus to James Hargest College, he made the decision to skip school and by that evening he was dead.
His grieving mother believes it was not planned; rather, it was a decision made in the moment.
‘‘I think he couldn’t face school that day . . . there was nothing else. He hadn’t broken up with a girlfriend, he hadn’t fallen out with friends. There was nothing else.’’
Anything outside of school, he loved to the fullest, his mother said.
‘‘Patrick was the life and soul. He made up for what he perceived as his failings at school with his personality and love of life.’’
He made friends easily and mixed with all ages, but he also had occasional ‘‘adolescent lows’’ like many teens his age.
Despite this, and contrary to many others who commit suicide, he was generally very open about his feelings with his family and told his parents plenty about his life.
His mother, a grief counsellor, said there were no taboo subjects in the family. She and husband Caine had always encouraged their children to be open with them. Likewise, the parents had always been open with their children.
She knew the importance of this through her social work and counselling background.
However, when Patrick was experiencing a low mood he would sometimes sit in his bedroom not wanting to talk, but his mother would get him into the lounge to watch the family’s favourite comedies together.
Patrick told his parents the night before his death he was feeling down and they chatted, but nothing emerged to suggest the tragedy that would unfold the following day.
The family was ‘‘broken’’ by his death, she said.
‘‘Every single person he touched remembers him as the bubbliest, loveliest person . . . and I know that because he is my boy,’’ his mother said.
The song they chose for his funeral was Stuck in a Moment, by U2.
‘‘Had he realised that moment would pass,’’ his mother said, ‘‘I think it would be different.’’
A child taekwondo prodigy who had national titles to his name, Patrick once dreamed of going to the Olympics, but gave up the sport in 2014.
Girls and his mates had taken precedence over taekwondo and he had started to get disruptive at school but, a natural sportsman, he continued to enjoy football, athletics and boxing training.
Hanson-Friend said her son’s body was taken back to their home following his death, with more than 130 of his friends from several schools visiting.
It was not only a time for family and friends to spend time with him before the funeral; it was also a lesson for other teens, his mother said.
‘‘I wanted his friends to see what dead looks like. There’s no coming back from this.’’
She knows nothing can fix the damage done and she doesn’t want the same thing happening to another family.
Since her son’s death she had used her work contacts to help ensure Southland teens who knew about the recent suicides were getting the right information to keep themselves safe.
Mental Health foundation acting chief executive Hugh Norriss said Hanson-Friend had done the right thing by encouraging her kids to speak openly, but suicide was not easily predicted.
‘‘One of the difficult things with suicide is there’s no particular pattern that leads up to it. It’s different in every case.
‘‘We can only do our best and it’s important not to blame each other. If someone encourages their family to talk about their problems, that’s the right thing to do.
‘‘But sometimes you don’t know, it’s so bewildering and it can be so out of character.’’
Norriss said there were no suicide bereavement support groups in Invercargill, but he encouraged the community to set one up.