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Today is the start of #GVSurvivorsWeek, & I'd like to start by asking @johnkrasinski, @becbenit & @nbcsnl to refrain from trivializing gun suicides & suicide in general. It's not funny & minimizes the actual impact that suicides have on our families & communities.
I'm not asking to cancel @nbcsnl or anything of the sort. But rather, I want them & others to stop using suicide as a means of stating that you/the character don't like something. What you're doing is making light of a deadly & traumatic issue.
In suicide situations, whatever a person thought they were escaping was always just temporary, yet that person chose (while not in the right mindset) a permanent solution that the rest of us have to continue to survive & live with.
My mom, Joyce, shot & killed herself on 9-8-79. It wasn't then nor is it now a laughing matter. The method she chose is the most deadly of all suicide methods, its 1 that happens every 22 minutes in America & is the least talked about and the least addressed.
I want @johnkrasinski, @becbenit & @nbcsnl to read about my mom & how her gun suicide has impacted my ENTIRE life. https://momentsthatsurvive.org/tribute/khary-penebaker/
I want you to understand what its like to not know what it sounds like to have your own mom tell you that she loves you
I want you to understand what its like to not know what it sounds like to have your own mom tell you that she loves you
I want you to understand what #MothersDay is like when you see everyone posting about their mom, but yet you're filled with absolute brutal pain because you don't have a mother's day memory that survived. I want you to grasp the pain of not knowing what Christmas morning with
your mom is like. I want you to appreciate what it is like knowing that your mom missed everything about your life that makes you who you are - your successes and failures. Missing graduations; missing childbirths; missing everything that makes me me. https://momentsthatsurvive.org/tribute/khary-penebaker/
My relationship with my mom was stolen from me because she had easy access to a gun. She was severely mentally unwell & should've never been anywhere near that gun. I wish it was me she held, instead of that gun. I wish I could hear how proud of me she is.
I wish @johnkrasinski, @becbenit & @nbcsnl would take the time to consider the impact they could have by changing how they refer to suicide and stop making light of it; stop using it as your scapegoat and your punchlines. I wish they could see me and my pain.
For my fellow gun violence survivors, please take a second to share your story this week for #GVSurvivorsWeek and make sure you add it to @Everytown's #MomentsThatSurvive memorial page: https://momentsthatsurvive.org/submit/
Joyce Penebaker was 27yo when she completed suicide w that gun. I was not even 2 yet. She was a special needs teacher who loved her students & her job. She sat in a car, on the side of the road w depression lying to her, making her believe that my world was better off without her
You never know the demon that someone is facing & the pain they're hiding. Do something kind for someone today & as often as you can. Smile at a stranger. Open a door; buy someone a coffee or a meal. Many of us feel so unseen & invisible that a single act of kindness
could be that thing that tethers us back to the world. Be the light that someone needs today.
Mom,I miss you & I hope I've made you proud. I wish you would've held me instead of that gun.
Forever your son,
Khary
#GVSurvivorsWeek @Everytown @MomsDemand
https://momentsthatsurvive.org/tribute/khary-penebaker/
Mom,I miss you & I hope I've made you proud. I wish you would've held me instead of that gun.
Forever your son,
Khary
#GVSurvivorsWeek @Everytown @MomsDemand
https://momentsthatsurvive.org/tribute/khary-penebaker/
