Mother shares loss to help others

Jolie Fish remembers the day she came home to find her son Douglas "Wayne" Lukenbill Jr. and his longtime girlfriend sitting on the couch crying.

"I thought 'Oh no, I'm going to be a grandmother,'"

But the problem wasn't any of the big three parents worry about: sex, drugs or alcohol. At his girlfriend's insistence, Lukenbill told his mother that he was considering suicide.

She was stunned. This couldn't happen in her family.

"I graduated from the University of Montana in 1989 in social work," Fish said. "My last major term paper was on teen suicide."

But she was blind-sided by her own son's suicidal thoughts.

The teenager she saw was happy, charming, good-looking and athletic with lots of friends. His life was just beginning with graduation from Columbia Falls High School a few months off.

But she learned that day that Lukenbill had a different view of himself.

"He felt totally worthless," she recalled. "That really surprised me. I thought we did everything to promote self-esteem."

Fish fell back on her training to probe why he felt that way. But Lukenbill couldn't explain his despair.

"I felt very inadequate," she said. "I'm a social worker. I had expected to be better able to help."

Within 24 hours, she had her son in counseling and under 24-hour watch with family and friends. Things seemed to go well over the next few weeks as Wayne kept his counseling appointments.

Fish was comforted knowing that her son had admitted his suicidal thoughts. She believed this was his cry for help - he won't do it, she though.

On March 12, 1991, she found out she was wrong. Nothing in her son's behavior that day gave her cause for concern.

Lukenbill had a great day at school. He was cheerful and assured his mom that his best friend could leave him alone for a half an hour.

"I was involved in Special Olympics and was later than usual," she said. "His friend had to leave."

When she got home, Fish found a note on the table that stopped her heart. In a shaky script, Lukenbill had written, "I love you mom and I'm sorry."

Lukenbill had unlocked the gun cabinet and ammunition and shot himself to death in a nearby field.

His mother was devastated. She felt that all the beauty in her life had died on that spring day.

For years afterward, Lukenbill's best friend suffered from the trauma and loss. His former girlfriend experienced similar pain even though his mother reassured her the breakup of their relationship was not to blame.

In the months that followed, Fish followed a pattern familiar to other parents who have lost a child to suicide. She pored though his writings, including poems and songs, seeking answers.

She knew that he was unhappy with his scholastic performance compared to his friends and girlfriend who excelled in school.

"He wanted to be better than a C and B student," she said.

Lukenbill tortured himself with thoughts that he wasn't good enough or smart enough. Fish constantly assured him that he only needed to try his best but later wondered if her own "A" grades in college sent another message.

His fears about his abilities escalated as he faced graduating from high school and entering the world of work.

"He told me he didn't want to be a lowlife," she recalled.

Through Lukenbill's writings, Fish pinpointed his suicidal thoughts to a year earlier after he attended the funeral of a friend of her stepson who committed suicide. He began thinking of dying as a way out.

"One of the most important things we can give our teens is hope - that there are ways to get through things," she said.

Since his death, she has spoken to a lot of teenagers in classrooms about their feelings and their need to share their problems.

"They feel no one understands," she said.

She said parents have to convince their children to at least give someone a chance to try and understand.

Fish has faced up to mistakes she made. The most important one was that she locked up the gun cabinet rather than getting the guns out of the house. Lukenbill found a key she had forgotten about.

"In retrospect, that is something I have to live with," she said.

Fish wishes she would have told more people, from teachers to local law enforcement, about his suicidal thoughts. She regrets giving into Lukenbill's pleading that she not tell her ex-husband, Lukenbill's father.

"I would have told my son's doctor," Fish said.

She wonders if antidepressants might have made a difference although their use was not as widely known or accepted 14 years ago.

Fish has shared her experience in many forums over the years. She will do so again at the town hall meeting on teen depression and suicide that begins at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the West Coast Kalispell Center Hotel.

She encourages people to attend to learn to identify and prepare for this mental health crisis in their own family.

"Don't think it's impossible," Fish said. "It can happen in your family."

Reporter Candace Chase may be reached at 758-4436 or by e-mail at cchase@dailyinterlake.com