According to the Daily Mail, 48-year-old Tricia Belstra was on a Southwest Airlines flight from Colorado to Indiana to attend the funeral of her 25-year-old son Kyle who committed suicide in August after breaking up with his long-time girlfriend.
During the flight, Belstra began to feel overwhelmed and kept the sick bag between her knees. Her flight attendant, a young man who she couldn’t identify, poured her drinks and asked her what was wrong.
Belstra told the attendant about her son’s death and he consoled her while she cried. As she exited the plane, the young man handed her a note written on a napkin. When Belstra entered the terminal, she started to read the note and burst into tears.
“In 2004 my family lost my older brother. As traumatic as it still is for me, I can’t even pretend to truly know the pain you feel as a mom. I did, however, watch my mother’s grieving process (a process that will never end). Firstly, being a mother is about giving birth to a new life as a promise to the future. Your mission doesn’t end now — your son’s life is bigger than his death and always will be. My mom struggled desperately chasing a far away goal of somehow lessening the pain. As she realizes now, the pain hardly lessens. Don’t expend your energy trying to chase this. Instead, go all out finding opportunities to experience joy. Visit family, get closer to those you’ve lost touch with, travel. This is your story and you owe it to yourself and your son to make sure that you survive this. Do not pressure yourself. The world is full of people who do truly care about you, even if it doesn’t feel that way. I won’t stop thinking about you anytime soon, or how you’re doing or what you’re up to. You’ll come out of this a stronger person and I’ll be rooting for you the whole time.”
